Fergie's Tech Blog

Cybercrime Fight Hurt by Apathy, Law Enforcement Hurdles

Michael Cooney writes on NetworkWorld:

General public apathy and collaboration with the law enforcement community assure that cybercrimes of all sorts will continue to rise.


That was one of the conclusions from a congressional hearing this week called "Hacked Off: Helping Law Enforcement Protect Private Financial Information."


A big problem we are facing in the fight against financial crimes is that the criminal complaint has almost disappeared. Even when a police report is filed, it is often "so the bank will give you your money back. Case closed," said [.pdf] Gary Warner, director of research in computer forensics with the University of Alabama at Birmingham.


"The understandable hesitation of law enforcement to 'work a case' in these areas has led to an unfortunate form of apathy by the consumer as well as the financial institutions. Large banks lose millions of dollars each year to phishing and malware, but they reimburse the cost to customers and structure the losses into the cost of doing business. Consumers have been trained that if they experience financial losses they should contact their financial institution rather than the police. If they have had their money returned by their financial institution, there is little incentive to share that information with law enforcement," Warner stated.

posted by Fergie @ 7/01/2011 01:30:00 PM