What is Cyber Crime? Classification and Most common Cyber Crimes by Anshul 2023

What is Cyber Crime? Classification and Most common Cyber Crimes by Anshul 2023

What is Cyber Crime?

Cyber crime is crime involving computers and networks. The computer may have been used in the commission of a crime or it may have been targeted. Cybercrime can be defined as "any illegal act where a computer or communication device or computer network is used to commit or facilitate a crime".

Cybercrime can be defined as "the illegal use of any communication device to commit or assist in the commission of any illegal act". Cybercrime is explained as a type of crime that targets or uses a computer or a group of computers under a network for the purpose of harm. Cyber crimes are committed using computers and computer networks. They can target individuals, business groups or even governments. Investigators use a variety of methods to examine devices that are suspected of being used or the target of cybercrime.

Classification of Cyber Crimes

Cyber crimes can generally be classified into four categories:

1. Personal Cyber Crime:

This type is targeting individuals. This includes phishing, spoofing, spam, cyberstalking, and more.

2. Organization Cyber Crime:

The main targets here are organizations. Typically, this type of crime is perpetrated by teams of criminals that include malware attacks and denial-of-service attacks.

3. Property Cyber Crime:

This type targets assets such as credit cards or even intellectual property rights.

4. Society Cyber Crime:

It is the most dangerous form of cybercrime as it also includes cyber-terrorism.

Most common cyber crimes

Now that you have understood what cyber crimes are, let us discuss some of the common cyber crimes.

1. Phishing and Scams:

Phishing is a type of social engineering attack that targets a user and deceives them by sending fake messages and emails to obtain sensitive information about the user, or by downloading malicious software and trying to exploit it on the target system.

2. Identity Theft

Identity theft occurs when a cyber criminal uses another person's personal data such as credit card numbers or personal photographs without their permission to commit fraud or a crime.

3. Ransomware Attack

Ransomware attacks are a very common type of cybercrime. It is a type of malware that has the ability to prevent users from accessing all their personal data on the system by encrypting it and then demanding a ransom to give access to the encrypted data.

4. Hacking/misusing computer network

The term refers to the crime of unauthorized access to a personal computer or network and abusing it by shutting it down or tampering with stored data or in other illegal ways.

5. Internet Fraud

Internet fraud is a type of cybercrime in which the Internet is used and can be considered as a general term that groups all crimes committed on the Internet such as spam, banking fraud, theft of service, etc.

Other types of cybercrime

Here are the other 9 types of cyber crimes:

1. Cyber Bullying

It is also known as online or internet bullying. This includes sending or sharing harmful and degrading material about someone else that causes embarrassment and can lead to psychological problems. It has become very common recently, especially among teenagers.

2. Cyber stalking

Cyberstalking can be defined as unwanted persistent content such as unwanted persistent calls and messages targeting other individuals online with the aim of controlling and intimidating.

3. Software Piracy

Software piracy is the illegal use or copying of paid software in violation of copyright or license restrictions.

4. Social media fraud

Using social media fake accounts to do any kind of harmful activities like impersonating other users or sending intimidating or threatening messages. And one of the easiest and most common social media frauds is email spam.

5. Online Drug Trafficking

With the great rise of cryptocurrency technology, it has become easier to transfer money in a secure private way and complete drug deals without attracting the attention of law enforcement. This led to the growth of drug marketing on the Internet.

6. Electronic Money Laundering

It is also known as transaction laundering. It is based on unknown companies or online businesses that make acceptable payment methods and credit card transactions but provide incomplete or inconsistent payment information to purchase unknown products.

8. Cyber extortion

Cyber extortion is the demand of money by cyber criminals to give back some important data stolen or to prevent malicious activities like denial of service attacks.

9. Infringement of Intellectual Property

It is a violation or infringing of any protected intellectual property rights such as copyright and industrial design.

9. Online Recruitment Fraud

One of the less common cybercrimes that is becoming increasingly popular is fraudulent job opportunities issued by fraudulent companies with the aim of obtaining financial gain from applicants or even using their personal data.