Crime doesn't pay,... or does it?
Does society regard cyber crime as serious? Or does it still take a Hollywood view of hacking as something secretly to be admired?
In America, the FTC found that James Reno and ByteHosting Internet Services were responsible for distributing scareware products that used underhanded methods. Victims were given fraudulent diagnoses that their computers were infected with a virus and then offered packages with names such as WinAntivirus and ErrorSafe, as cures to the non-existent problem.
The FTC described this as a fraud worth $40 million. Originally fined $1.9 million, which itself seems somewhat light given the proceeds cited in the case, the FTC agreed to settle for $116,000 after Reno pleaded poverty and said this was all he had left. It isn't clear what happened to the unaccounted for $39 million. If someone robbed a bank of $40 million and, when caught, offered to give back the 2% of the haul which they hadn't yet spent, I doubt the courts would accept that as the end of the matter.
The British Government is equally guilty of sending out the wrong messages. Lord West, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Security and Terrorism, told the BBC that hackers had been recruited to work in the newly formed Cyber Security Operations Centre. "You need youngsters who are deep into this stuff. If they have been slightly naughty boys, very often they really enjoy stopping other naughty boys," he said.
Such a statement sends out all the wrong messages. It says hacking into other people's systems is only "slightly naughty". It says that if you want a career in security, hacking is a cool way to get yourself a reputation. It promotes the idea that hackers are somehow brighter, more intelligent, and more adept than the people who work hard at security and who spend years learning the skills involved. And it suggests he thinks that anyone who has outgrown acne is old and past it and just can't keep up as far as computing is concerned. For a government officer to make such a statement is shameful.
22nd July 2009
This article comes from the SKILLZONE email newsletter, published monthly since January 2008, and covering topics related to technology and the internet. All articles and artwork in the SKILLZONE newsletter are orignal content.