Hi-Tech Crime CRIM30375

Tweets and cybersex: workplace web use is a minefield Some are working but some have other business. Michiel2005 , CC BY Mark Griffiths , Nottingham Trent University Market research reports have indicated that many office employees in the UK spend at least one hour of their day at work on non-work activities. They are booking holidays, shopping online, posting messages on social networking sites and playing online games. This, we are told, costs businesses millions of pounds a year. These findings highlight that internet abuse is a serious cause for concern, particularly to employers. A few years ago I developed a brief typology of internet abusers. This included criminal internet abuse. While some non-work-related internet activity is relatively harmless, others can cause real problems for employee, employer and colleagues. Internet activity abuse This involves the use of the internet during work hours in which other non-work r

Cutting cybercrime is a question of smart design Websites and social networking sites must be designed to be defensible. Z33 art centre, Hasselt Nigel Phair , University of Canberra Is it possible to “design out” online crime? It’s definitely worth a try. Back in 1989, the Australian Institute of Criminology released a report containing advice for home-owners and builders to manipulate the design and surrounds of their dwellings. By doing so, they were told they could minimise their chances of becoming a victim of crime, particularly property crime. Efforts were made to improve lighting, to cut hedges and to avoid creating places where criminals could hide when break-and-entering a house. These are examples of the Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design ( CPTED ) concept in action. But as more and more citizens spend their time online, it’s worth taking the CPTED concept into the internet environment to “target-harden” users

What Facebook isn't telling us about its fight against online abuse Shutterstock Laura Bliss , Edge Hill University Facebook has for the first time made available data on the scale of abusive comments posted to its site. This may have been done under the growing pressure by organisations for social media companies to be more transparent about online abuse , or to gain credibility after the Cambridge Analytica data scandal . Either way, the figures do not make for pleasurable reading. In a six-month period from October 2017 to March 20178, 21m sexually explicit pictures, 3.5m graphically violent posts and 2.5m forms of hate speech were removed from its site. These figures help reveal some striking points. As expected, the data indicates that the problem is getting worse. For instance, between January and March it was estimated that for every 10,000 messages online, between 22 and 27 contained graphic violence, up from 16 to 19 in

Little Mix member Jesy Nelson confronts the harsh realities of online abuse – and she's not alone Jesy Nelson performs with Little Mix. Shutterstock. Laura Bliss , University of Birmingham Jesy Nelson – 28-year-old member of British girl group Little Mix – has spoken candidly about what it’s like to be on the receiving end of online abuse, and the effect that it had on her mental health. From the moment Little Mix won ITV talent show The X Factor in 2011, Nelson was subjected to a barrage of horrific messages about her weight and looks. In a new documentary, Jesy Nelson: “Odd One Out” , the pop star opens up about her harrowing experiences. She is not alone. Anti-bullying charity Ditch the Label has found that 17% of 10,020 young people surveyed in 2017 had experienced some form of cyber-bullying, while a further 69% admitted doing something abusive online. Of those who had been bullied online, 26% developed suicidal thought

Public porn: when you can, and can't, view and have sex in public Not here, you don’t! Shutterstock Samantha Pegg , Nottingham Trent University Pornhub’s latest annual statistics once again reveal some interesting trends in the viewing habits of its UK users. The good news is that the UK’s taste in pornography appears to have matured – quite literally: “MILF” is now the second most searched for term among British Pornhub users. This follows my 2016 article about the dangers associated with the rise in searches for “teen” porn , a search term that remains popular globally but no longer features in the top 20 UK searches. In 2017, we saw increased interest in bondage porn and this trend continued in 2018. In fact, people in the UK are 28% more likely to search for bondage porn than other users. But interest in watching sexual activity take place in public is growing, too. In 2017, I noted a rise in searches for the very specific p

Upskirting is now illegal – now the normalisation of men's sexual privilege in society must be tackled shutterstock Hannah Bows , Durham University Upskirting – taking a photo or filming underneath a skirt or dress without consent – has finally become a criminal offence in England and Wales (it was already an offence in Scotland from 2010). Yet despite this progress, a recent report conducted by British GQ reveals that one in 10 men don’t think upskirting is sexual harassment. In some ways this isn’t surprising, as men’s entitlement and sexual privilege has in many ways become a cultural “right”. Take for example the response to women describing their widespread experiences of men’s sexual entitlement (#metoo), it wasn’t long before the #notallmen hashtag appeared – with many men denying and normalising such behaviours . From video games developed where players (most likely men) can “play” at raping women, to advertisements th

Why news outlets should think twice about republishing the New Zealand mosque shooter's livestream Colleen Murrell , Swinburne University of Technology Like so many times before with acts of mass violence in different parts of the world, news of shootings at two Christchurch mosques on Friday instantly ricocheted around the world via social media. When these incidents occur, online activity follows a predictable pattern as journalists and others try to learn the name of the perpetrator and any reason behind the killings. This time they did not have to wait long. In an appalling example of the latest technology, the gunman reportedly livestreamed his killings on Facebook. According to reports , the footage apparently showed a man moving through the interior of a mosque and shooting at his victims indiscriminately. Amplifying the spread of this kind of material can be harmful. Read more: Since Boston bombing, terrorists are using new social media to

Comic explainer: what is lone-actor terrorism? Wes Mountain/The Conversation , CC BY-ND Wes Mountain , The Conversation Security services and governments around the world remain vigilant to the threat of lone-actor terrorists in our cities. But when there’s often no indication of an explicit intention or ideology, questions about mental health and with groups like Islamic State willing to encourage and claim responsibility for almost any attack , how do we define lone-actor terrorism? In this comic explainer, Raffaello Pantucci, Associate Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Director of International Security Studies at RUSI , explains the theory behind lone-actor terrorism and what we know about lone actors’ effectiveness, motives and behaviours that could help us to better understand and disrupt future attacks.

Hackers are making personalised ransomware to target the most profitable and vulnerable Andrey Popov/Shutterstock Lena Connolly , University of Leeds and David Wall , University of Leeds Once a piece of ransomware has got hold of your valuable information, there is very little you can do to get it back other than accede to the attacker’s demands. Ransomware, a type of malware that holds a computer to ransom, has become particularly prevalent in the past few years and virtually unbreakable encryption has made it an even more powerful force. Ransomware is typically delivered by powerful botnets used to send out millions of malicious emails to randomly targeted victims. These aim to extort relatively small amounts of money (normally £300-£500, but more in recent times) from as many victims as possible. But according to police officers we have interviewed from UK cybercrime units, ransomware attacks are becoming increasingly targeted a