Essay World

The rapid growth of the internet and computer technology over the past few years has led to the growth in new forms of crime-dubbed cyber crime- throughout the world. Based on statistics on the various forms of cyber crime and other evidence which form of cyber crime pose the most serious threat to individuals and business? What concrete steps should government take to protect individuals’ n companies from cyber criminal? What can individual and business do to protect themselves against cyber crime?

Word count:725 words
Introduction
Types of Cyber Crime
Ways to fight cyber crime by individuals.
Ways to fight cyber crime by government
Conclusion

Introduction
About two years ago I received a mail that I won a lottery worth 10 million dollars and out of curiosity and excitement I unwrapped it but was disappointed .But then about a couple weeks later though I did not receive the prize money but I received all sorts of bills that had to be paid. My father received bills for many different things such as electronics, clothes, and other items that had been purchased under our account on the Internet. My father was so pissed off because he thought that my brother or I had purchased all those items. So we called the Company and found that our computer had been hacked into. And the so called hacker purchased items on our account number. And we found that the hacker gained entry by a message that I had opened. So we ended up paying only few thousands. This is called cyber crime but I prefer to call it cyber terrorism that has attacked us from our computer screens and made our lives miserable.

Types of Cyber Crime
Cybercrime is defined as crimes committed on the internet using computer as a tool and we innocents are the target. There are various forms of cyber crime like Spamming. I am sure all of us has encountered unwanted product advertisements. PIRACY is also a serious threat that involves illegal reproduction and distribution of software applications, games, movies and audio CDs which is causing a huge monetary loss to entertainment industry world wide
Hacking is also a serious crime by a hacker who is simply a talented computer user who misuse his vast knowledge . Virus attacks that say “I love you” enters our computer and destroys all the computer information are also a serious threat. Computer frauds , thefts and harassments through social networking sites like orut and facebook are also daggering our lives. Undoubtedly we cannot single out only one crime that is posing maximum threat but all forms of crimes are equally posing a serious threat to both business and individuals.

Ways to fight cyber crime by individuals.
To fight back the individual and businessman should be proactive, not reactive We do not have to remain at the receiving end of crime forever. The fight against cyber crime starts in our very own home .We should not reply any e-mail from unknown persons, we should learn to report spam mails to the e-mail servers .We should not upload our personal information on social networking sites or our account details on other such sites. Also the use antivirus soft wares can be a great help to fight against viruses and worms.

Ways to fight cyber crime by government
The author of the "Lovebug" virus remains free because his nation did not have cyber crime laws. The "AnnaKournikova" virus caused billions of dollars in damage, but the individual who distributed it received only 150 hours of community service as a penalty Cybercrime is not “armed robbery”, not “pen and paper crime” and should not be handle as such. Fighting Cybercrime requires intelligent knowledge and that has to be IT intelligence. What I mean is this, men of the regular Police force should not be allowed to investigate crimes committed over the internet. IT experts should be recruited into law enforcement agencies to assist in the fight.At this hour when cyber crime is growing in leaps and bounds with growing technology the government need to strengthen criminal penalties against computer crimes; work to harmonize laws against cyber crime internationally; and improve coordination among law enforcement authorities in different jurisdictions.

Conclusion
There will always be new and unexpected challenges to stay ahead of cyber criminals and cyber terrorists but we can win only through partnership and collaboration of both individuals and government. There is much we can do to ensure a safe, secure and trustworthy computing environment. It is crucial not only to our national sense of well-being, but also to our national security and economy.