Organized (Cyber)crime
Digital bank robbery is a huge problem that is not addressed often in the news. Banks avoid publicizing attacks because they do not want customers to worry about the bank's ability to protect their money. Upwards of 60 percent of computers that hackers targeted in 2003 belonged to financial institutions.
Extortion began on electronic gambling Web sites and soon spread regular companies. A survey by Carnegie Mellon University's H. John Heinz III School of Public Policy and Management and InformationWeek Magazine found that almost one in twenty businesses polled had been threatened with denial-of-service, a potential financially devastating attack that prevents a legitimate user of a network service from using the service. This attack is usually accomplished by flooding the network with junk traffic, overloading its capabilities.
Terrorists use the Internet to gather details on potential targets and law enforcement efforts in locations of interest, collecting funds and support, information sharing, and creating publicity. This eliminates the trails investigators can follow, such as phone bills and travel expenses, making it harder to connect individuals to each other.
Software piracy-the unauthorized reproduction and/or distribution of copyright protected works, includes computer software, movies, music, and games-can mean millions of dollars lost to the legitimate owners of the copyrights.
Finding the origins of money laundering schemes has been a problem for law enforcement in terms of both organized crime and terrorism. Hedge funds-places where investors can deposit money, then later withdraw it from an offshore location-and "paper banks"-those that do not really have physical locations-are the focus of new legislation connected with the Patriot Act. Offshore online casinos and Internet banking provide many criminals with an easy way to clean funds and avoid taxes. Historically, organized crime groups have frequently maintained legitimate businesses as fronts for criminal activity and money laundering. The Internet makes it easier.
Cargo theft has always been a staple of organized crime, but with access to computers where hackers can change delivery addresses to divert goods, it has never been easier. In fact, the National Cargo Security Council estimates that losses from cargo theft run between $10 billion and $15 billion annually, with motor carriers as the most common prey.
Receiving or distributing child pornography over the Internet is illegal-and profitable. The hijacked computers mentioned above are ideal locations to store such materials, unbeknownst to the computer owner. Network users intentionally mislabel the names of files, disguising them to look like
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