E-crime is a mainstream issue

Tackling e-crime involves piecing together a complex jigsaw of issues. There is little disagreement over what those pieces are, but fitting them all together seems to be an endless challenge.

Awareness, education, co-ordination, organisation, collaboration, best practice, information sharing – every one is a vital part of the picture.

Huge investments in time and money are being made by police, government and business to get on top of the problem.

And when a survey by the Get Safe Online campaign suggests that more people are worried about internet crime than about burglary, there can be little doubt there is public support for finding the solution.

Yet one cannot help but feel that something is missing. The experts at Scotland Yard perhaps put it best when launching the Metropolitan Police’s e-crime co-ordination unit. The biggest challenge, they say, is to make e-crime mainstream.

For many home computer users, it is a bit too technical and scary. All the buzzwords – such as firewalls, spyware and botnets – are essentially meaningless to many, and brand e-crime with a complicated label. No doubt there are some hard-to-understand elements in house alarms, padlocks and keys, but everyone uses them without a second thought.

For businesses, there is still too often a reluctance to admit to being victims, as if it labels them as unsecure and inefficient. But what company would try to hush up a break-in or theft?

While there have been examples of large-scale organised cyber crime, increasingly the victims are lower profile. The crooks are using the principle that it is easier to steal one pound from a million people online than £1m from one person – but most people have no idea where to report e-crime.

It should not be any different from reporting a break-in or a mugging.

It is time to remove the technological mystique. E-crime is simply crime, and should be treated as such.

What do you think? Email us at feedback@computing.co.uk

Further reading:

Central unit fights cybercrime

E-crime deters online banking