Cybercrime and Cybercriminals

With the growth in the public domain in recent years of the Internet, cyberlaw has emerged as a real problem. In a legal sense, cyberlaw encompasses cybercrime (that is, crimes completed either on or with a computer), electronic commerce theft, intellectual property rights or copyright infringement, and privacy rights infringement or identity theft. Cybercrime involves such activities as child pornography; credit card fraud; cyberstalking; defaming another online; gaining unauthorized access to computer systems; ignoring copyright, software licensing, and trademark protection; overriding encryption to make illegal copies; software piracy; and stealing another’s identity to perform criminal acts. Cybercriminals are those who conduct such acts.

Though cybercrime has in recent times presented real-life and legal problems regarding jurisdictional areas, in the United States and elsewhere legislators seem determined to stop cybercriminals in their tracks. Often, cybercriminals use the Internet to commit their exploits. Consequently, and particularly in U.S. jurisdictions, the current trend seems to be that Internet Service Providers (ISPs) must comply with law enforcement agents in locating cybercriminals or the ISPs might find themselves facing penalties. Recent U.S. case law indicates that the courts are moving to expect that the ISPs will determine where the cybercriminal is located and to block his or her Website access if such access results in illegal acts occurring in that geographic location.

See Also: Black Hats; Identity Theft or Masquerading; Internet; Internet Service Provider (ISP).