FAKULTI PENDIDIKAN DAN BAHASA

SEMESTER TIGA SEPTEMBER / SMP 2011 OUMH1203

ENGLISH FOR WRITTEN COMMUNICATION

MATRIKS NO. NAME IC NO. CONTACT NO. E-MAIL LEARNING CENTRE

: 680924035337001 : ZULKIFLI BIN MAT YUSOFF : 680924035337 : 0139627568 : zmy68@oum.edu.my : PUSAT PEMBELAJARAN WILAYAH KELANTAN

INTRODUCTION The Internet is one of the fastest-growing areas of technical infrastructure development. Today, Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are omnipresent and the trend of digitalization is growing. The demand for Internet and computer connectivity has led to the integration of computer technology into products that usually functioned without it, such as cars and buildings. Electricity supply, transportation infrastructure, military services and logistics are virtually all modern services depend on the use of ICTs. Although the development of new technologies is focused mainly on meeting consumer demands in western countries, developing countries can also benefit from new technologies. With the availability of long-distance wireless communication technologies such as WiMAX and computer systems that are now available for less than USD$200 in USA, more people in developing countries should have easier access to the Internet and related products and services. The influence of ICTs on society goes far beyond establishing basic information infrastructure. The availability of ICTs is a foundation for development in the creation, availability and use of network-based services. E-mails have displaced traditional letters; online web representation is nowadays more important for business than printed publicity materials and Internet-based communication and phone services are growing faster than landline communications. The growing danger from crimes committed against computers, or against information on computers is beginning to claim attention in national capitals. In most countries around the world, however, existing laws are likely to be unenforceable against such crimes. This is because of lack of legal protection, means that individual, businesses and governments must rely solely on technical measures to protect themselves from those who would steal, deny access to or destroy valuable information. Self-protection, while essential but it is not sufficient to make cyber space to be a safe place to conduct business. The rule of law must also be enforced. Countries where legal protections are inadequate will become increasingly less able to compete in the new economy. As cyber crime increasingly breaches national borders, nations perceived as havens run the risk of having their electronic messages blocked by the network.

Undeterred by the prospect of arrest or prosecution, cyber criminals around the world lurk on the Net as an omnipresent menace to the financial health of businesses, to the trust of their customers and as an emerging threat to nations security. Headlines of cyber attacks command our attention with increasing frequency. Cyber crimes can be defined as a harmful acts committed from or against a computer or network which is differed from most terrestrial crimes in four ways. They are easy to learn about how to commit this crime; they require few resources relative to the potential damage caused. Cyber crimes also can be committed in a jurisdiction without being physically present in it and they are often not clearly illegal. The availability of ICTs and new network-based services offer a number of advantages for society in general especially for developing countries. According to a research, there is a big increase in cyber crime in Malaysia. Over the last two years, more than 8500 cases have been reported and this is terribly worrying. In the same period, it has been reported that the increment has reach 55% which is a big number. In USA, hacking computer system and fraud is the most popular crime while in Malaysia, the crime focus more on piracy. Every type of crime should be treated fairly because it will certainly bring harm to the various industries related to computer and information technology. Govil defined that cyber crime is regarded as computer-mediated activities which are either illegal or considered illicit by certain parties and which can be conducted through global electronic networks. Cyber crimes describe criminal activity in which the computer or network is a necessary part of the crime. From the definition stated, we know that the computer is the major source of cyber crime. We also noted that cyber crime is a growing list of internetfacilitated offenses.

TYPES OF CYBER CRIME Cyber crime refers to all activities done with done with criminal intent in cyber world. These crimes fall into three slots as below: i) ii) iii) Cyber Crime against Persons Against Business and Non-Business Organizations Crime Targeting the Government We will examine the acts wherein the computer is a tool for an unlawful act. This kind of activity normally involves a modification of a conventional crime by using computer. For examples; Financial claims which includes cheating, credit card frauds, money laundering and etc. Cyber pornography which is includes pornographic websites; pornographic magazines produced using computer and Internet to download and transmit pornographic pictures, photos, writings and etc. Sale of illegal articles which is includes sale of narcotics, weapons and wildlife and etc by posting information on websites, bulletin boards or simply by using e-mail communications. Online gambling; there are millions of websites all hosted on servers abroad, that offer online gambling. In fact, it is believed that many of these websites are actually fronts for money laundering. Intellectual Property Crimes which is includes software piracy, copyright infringement, trademarks violations and other types of piracies. E-mail spoofing which is can determined when the e-mail appears to originate from one source but actually has been sent from another source. This can also be termed as e-mail forging. Forgery which can be defined as a counterfeit currency notes activity, postage and revenue stamps, mark sheets etc. All of these items can be forged using sophisticated computers, printers and scanners.

Cyber defamation occurs when defamation takes place with the help of computers or the Internet. As example; someone published defamatory matter about someone on a websites or sends e-mail containing defamatory information to all of that persons friends. Cyber stalking which is involves following a persons movements via the Internet by posting messages on the bulletin boards frequented by the victim, entering the chat rooms which are always being visited frequently by the victim.

Unauthorized access to computer system or network: this activity is commonly referred to as hacking. The Indian Law has however given a different connotation to the term hacking. Unauthorized access to computer system or network consists of the activities below: Theft of information contained in electronic form includes information stored in computer hard disks, removable storage media and others. E-mail bombing; refers to sending a large amount of e-mails to the victim resulting in the victims e-mail account or mail servers. Data diddling; this kind of an attack involves altering the raw data just before it is processed by a computer and then changing it back after the processing is completed. Salami attacks; are used for the commission of financial crimes. The key here is to make the alteration so insignificant that in a single case it would go completely unnoticed. For example; a bank employee inserts a program into banks servers that deducts a small amount from the account of every customer. Denial of service which is involves flooding computer resources with more requests than it can handle. This causes the resources to crash thereby denying authorized users the service offered by the resources. Virus or worm attack; which viruses are programs that attach themselves to a computer or a file and then circulate themselves to other files and to other computers on a network. They usually affect the data on a computer, either by altering or deleting it. Worms, unlike viruses do not need the host to attach themselves to. Logic bombs; Logic bombs are a dependent programs. This implies that these programs are created to do something only when a certain event occurs. For example;

some viruses may be termed logic bombs because they lie dormant all through the year and become active only on a particular date. Trojan Horse; A Trojan as this program is aptly called, is an unauthorized program which functions from inside what seems to be an authorized programs, thereby concealing what it is actually doing. Internet Time Theft; this kind of cyber crime connotes the usage by unauthorized persons of the Internet hours paid for by another person. Physically damaging a computer system; this crime is committed by physically damaging a computer or its peripherals. The different between cyber crimes in Malaysia and USA, cyber crimes in Malaysia focused on computer-related crimes meanwhile cyber crimes in USA focused on content-related crimes and computer sabotage crimes. This thing happened because there are more hackers in USA instead in Malaysia. Besides, information technology in USA is advanced more than Malaysia. Moreover, USA is a country which is all information gathered there and being distributed to another countries. Most of the important and critical information about nations security and economic are gathered in USA. Meanwhile in Malaysia, information technology sharing is still at novice level. That is the reason why cyber crimes in Malaysia focused on computer-related crimes.

CYBER CRIME PREVENTION SUGGESTION The next part we will discuss is about how to prevent us from being the victim of cyber crime. This part will suggests several ways to protect and prevent individual, business organization and government from being the victims of cyber crimes. Preventive Steps for Individuals Children Children should be educated not to give out identifying information such as name, home address, school name or telephone name in a chat room. They should be advised not to give their photo to anyone on the Internet without first checking or informing parents or guardians. They also should be told not to respond to the message which is suggestive, obscene, belligerent or threatening and not to arrange a face-to-face meeting without telling parents or guardians. They should remember that people whom they know via the Internet might not be who they seem or think.

Parents Parent should use content filtering software on their personal computer to protect children from pornography, gambling, hate speech, drugs and alcohol abused. There is also software to establish time controls for use of limpets; as example blocking the usage after a particulars time and allowing parents to see which site item they have visited. Parents and guardians can use this software to keep track of the type of activities of their children.

General Information Do not delete harmful communications such as emails, chats etc. They will provide vital information about system and address of the person behind these. Try not to panic. If you feel any immediate physical danger approached, contact your local police to seek for help. Individual should avoid getting into huge arguments online during chat and discussions with other users.

Individual also need to remember that all other internet users are strangers whom they do not know with whom they are chatting with. Individual also need to be extremely careful about how they share their personal information online. Individual also be advised to choose chatting nickname carefully. They also should know the importance of not to share any personal information in public space online and do not give it to strangers at all. Be extremely cautious about meeting online person. If they decide and choose to meet, they should do it in a public place accompanied with a friend or friends. If the online situation becomes hostile, log off the website and if a situation places individual in fear, they should contact the local police. Individual also be advised to save all communications for evidence and not edit the log in any way. They also need to keep a record of their contact and inform Law Enforcement Officials about the matters.

Preventive Steps for Organizations and Government Physical security; is most sensitive component as prevention from cyber crime computer network should be protected from the access of unauthorized persons. Access control system is generally implemented using firewalls, which provide a centralized point from which to permit or allow access. Firewalls allow only authorized communications between the internal and external network. Password; to proof identity is an essential component to identify intruder. The use of passwords in the most common security for network system including servers, routers and firewalls. Mostly all the systems are programmed to ask for username and password before accessing to computer system. This provides the verification of user. The password should be changed with regular interval of time and it should be alpha numeric and should be difficult to be guessed by others. Finding the holes in network; system managers should track down the holes before the intruders do. Many networking product manufactures are not particularly aware with the information about security holes in their products. So, the organization should work hard to discover security holes, bugs and the weaknesses and report their findings as they are confirmed.

Using network scanning programs; there is a security administration tool called UNIX which is freely available on the internet. This utility scans and gathers information about any host on a network, regardless of which operating system or services the hosts were running. It checks the known vulnerabilities include bugs, security weakness, inadequate password protection and so on. There is another software product available called Computer Oracle and Password System (COPS). It scans for poor passwords, dangerous file permissions and dates of key files compared to dates of CERT security advisories.

Using intrusion alert programs; as it is important to identify and close existing security holes, business organizations and government also need to put some watchdog into the service. There are some intrusion programs which identify suspicious activity and report so that necessary action is taken. They need to be operating constantly so that all unusual behavior on network is caught immediately.

Using encryption; encryption is able to transform data into a form that makes it almost impossible to read it without the right key. This key is used to allow controlled access to the information to selected people. The information can be passed on to anyone but only the people with the right key are able to see the information. The encryption allows sending confidential documents by e-mail or save confidential information on laptop computers without having to fear that if someone steals the data, it will be exposed to the public. With the right encryption or decryption software installed, it will hook up to mail program and encrypt or decrypt the messages automatically without user interaction.

Detection; cyber crime is the latest and perhaps the most specialized and dynamic field in cyber laws. Some of the cyber crimes like network intrusion are difficult to detect and investigate even though most of crimes against individual like cyber stalking, cyber defamation, cyber pornography can be detected and investigated through following steps: After receiving such type of mail; 1) Give command to computer to show full header of mail.

2) In full header, find out the IP number and time of delivery of number and this IP number always different for every mail. From this IP number we can know which one was the internet service provider for that system from which the mail had come. 3) To know about Internet Service Provider from IP number take the service of search engine like nic.com, macffvisualroute.com, apnic.com, arin.com. 4) After opening the website of any of above mentioned search engine, feed the IP number and after some time the name of ISP can be obtained. 5) After getting the name of ISP, we can get the information about the sender from the ISP by giving them the IP number, date and time of sender. 6) ISP will provide the address and phone number of the system, which was used to send the mail with bad intention. 7) After knowing the address and phone number of the criminal, the criminal can be apprehend by using conventional police methods.

CONCLUSION The problems with cyber crime and the suggestion about how to prevent us from being the victims of the cyber crime are what help us to look at the dangers of the cyber space. The internet is a very powerful tool and effective means of communication but it is vulnerable just like anything else. The way to protect it for now is for everyone to be smart and follow preventive measures; individuals, business organizations and government alike should all follow these measures. We have seen the actions of the government and what bots and viruses are capable of and it is important that security measures can be implemented. If everyone does their part, not only will they be safer but it will be setting an example for others as well as making it more difficult for hackers to cause damage.

Words count: 2762 words

REFERENCES The Lack of Attention in the Prevention of Cyber Crime and How to Improve It; http://infosecwriters.com/text_resources/pdf/BPladna_Cybercrime.pdf An Overview of Cyber Crime; http://www.clusif.asso.fr/fr/production/ouvrages/pdf/CyberCrime2004.pdf Computer Crime and Computer Fraud; http://www.montgomerycountrymd.gov/content/cjcc/pdf/computer_crime_study.pdf Cyber Crime and Punishment? Archaic Laws Threaten Global Information; http://www.witsa.org/papers/McConnell-cybercrime.pdf