Cyber-crime Science = Crime Science + Information Security

Cyber-crime Science is an emerging area of study aiming to prevent cyber-crime by combining security protection techniques from Information Security with empirical research methods used in Crime Science. Information security research has developed techniques for protecting the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information assets but is less strong on the empirical study of the effectiveness of these techniques. Crime Science studies the effect of crime prevention techniques empirically in the real world, and proposes improvements to these techniques based on this. Combining both approaches, Cyber-crime Science transfers and further develops Information Security techniques to prevent cyber-crime, and empirically studies the effectiveness of these techniques in the real world. In this paper we review the main contributions of Crime Science as of today, illustrate its application to a typical Information Security problem, namely phishing, explore the interdisciplinary structure of Cyber-crime Science, and present an agenda for research in Cyber-crime Science in the form of a set of suggested research questions

Responding to organised crime through intervention in recruitment pathways

Foreword: A multifaceted strategy is required to effectively combat organised crime. A key element of preventing and responding to organised criminal activity is to target how individuals become involved in illicit activities and to develop effective methods of preventing their recruitment. Using prior research into the methods used by organised crime groups to identify potential targets or confederates, and individuals’ motivations to seek or agree to participate in criminal activity, a framework is presented that identified key recruitment pathways together with some strategies that would make recruitment and engagement less effective

Identity crisis? Negotiating blackness in the British police service: a regional perspective

Our paper will address preliminary findings from a pilot study in which we will interview a sample of black police personnel from Nottingham, UK. Our goal in this project is to uncover the mechanisms by which police officers as well as other police staff negotiate their black identities in the context of their roles within law enforcement an entity that clearly been historically characterized by systemic racism

Social engineering and crime prevention in cyberspace

This paper highlights methods of syntactic and semantic social engineering attacks (human-based and computer-based) that are currently prevalent in the cyber community. It will also present the emerging trends in high-tech crime; and, the likely future direction cyber-crime will take with respect to social engineering

A Tale of Two Deterrents: Considering the Role of Absolute and Restrictive Deterrence to Inspire New Directions in Behavioral and Organizational Security Research

This research-perspective article reviews and contributes to the literature that explains how to deter internal computer abuse (ICA), which is criminal computer behavior committed by organizational insiders. ICA accounts for a large portion of insider trading, fraud, embezzlement, the selling of trade secrets, customer privacy violations, and other criminal behaviors, all of which are highly damaging to organizations. Although ICA represents a momentous threat for organizations, and despite numerous calls to examine this behavior, the academic response has thus far been lukewarm. However, a few security researchers have examined ICA’s influence in an organizational context and addressed potential means of deterring it. However, the results of these studies have been mixed, leading to a debate on the applicability of deterrence theory (DT) to ICA. We argue that more compelling opportunities will arise in DT research if security researchers more deeply study its assumptions and more carefully recontextualize it. The purpose of this article is to advance a deterrence research agenda that is grounded in the pivotal criminological deterrence literature. Drawing on the distinction between absolute and restrictive deterrence and aligning them with rational choice theory (RCT), this paper shows how deterrence can be used to mitigate the participation in and frequency of ICA. We thus propose that future research on the deterrent effects of ICA should be anchored in a more general RCT, rather than in examinations of deterrence as an isolated construct. We then explain how adopting RCT with DT opens up new avenues of research. Consequently, we propose three areas for future research, which cover not only the implications for the study of ICA deterrence, but also the potential motivations for these types of offenses and the skills required to undertake them

The hidden environmental harms of the cut-flower industry

Corporate flower farms are based along the shores of Kenya’s Lake Naivasha, a Ramsar Convention protected wetland. Kenya suffers from high unemployment and relative poverty and prioritises economic development. Corporate flower farms are polluting the Lake with the use of agrochemicals and depleting its waters to irrigate this thirsty crop. The influx of people seeking work is also affecting the Lake as wastewater pollution is problematic. This paper will consider the issue of trying to determine who is responsible for the harms associated with any industry, and will also discuss existing and prospective methods of regulating corporate flower farms

Deterrence in Cyberspace: An Interdisciplinary Review of the Empirical Literature

The popularity of the deterrence perspective across multiple scientific disciplines has sparked a lively debate regarding its relevance in influencing both offenders and targets in cyberspace. Unfortunately, due to the invisible borders between academic disciplines, most of the published literature on deterrence in cyberspace is confined within unique scientific disciplines. This chapter therefore provides an interdisciplinary review of the issue of deterrence in cyberspace. It begins with a short overview of the deterrence perspective, presenting the ongoing debates concerning the relevance of deterrence pillars in influencing cybercriminals’ and cyberattackers’ operations in cyberspace. It then reviews the existing scientific evidence assessing various aspects of deterrence in the context of several disciplines: criminology, law, information systems, and political science. This chapter ends with a few policy implications and proposed directions for future interdisciplinary academic research

Resettlement of young people leaving custody: Lessons from the literature

This literature review aims to set out the research and practice evidence about effective resettlement services for children and young adults and can be used to inform future policy and practice to ensure service delivery is evidence based. The findings of the review will help to steer the focus of Beyond Youth Custody’s research over the duration of the programme and act as a baseline to assess how our understanding has advanced in terms of what works in facilitating the transition from youth custody to the community and beyond. In addition, the review highlights some examples of good practice, as well as the emerging key principles of effective resettlement provision

Is the responsibilization of the cyber security risk reasonable and judicious?

Cyber criminals appear to be plying their trade without much hindrance. Home computer users are particularly vulnerable to attack by an increasingly sophisticated and globally dispersed hacker group. The smartphone era has exacerbated the situation, offering hackers even more attack surfaces to exploit. It might not be entirely coincidental that cyber crime has mushroomed in parallel with governments pursuing a neoliberalist agenda. This agenda has a strong drive towards individualizing risk i.e. advising citizens how to take care of themselves, and then leaving them to face the consequences if they choose not to follow the advice. In effect, citizens are “responsibilized .” Whereas responsibilization is effective for some risks, the responsibilization of cyber security is, we believe, contributing to the global success of cyber attacks. There is, consequently, a case to be made for governments taking a more active role than the mere provision of advice, which is the case in many countries. We conclude with a concrete proposal for a risk regulation regime that would more effectively mitigate and ameliorate cyber risk