Thursday, March 17, 2005

Cybercrime is on the increase

An article in today's Guardian warns about the growing dangers of cybercrime. From phishing to eBay fraud, organised crime is increasingly using the internet to promote some criminal activities. Although this is a growing development, there seems to be a certain luddite stream running through these articles. It is almost as if the authors are telling us that these things are new because of the internet.

Nevertheless, these fears may be warranted to some extent. The online world brings a new scale to this issue, as criminals can have better chance of reaching more and more people, but it also allows access to otherwise inaccessible targets. Today's FT relates a case of cybercrime: hackers in Israel targeted a Japanese bank through their UK servers. Die Hard with computers. And no Bruce Willis. And no Alan Rickman.

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