Cybercrime

Transnational and organised crime

The global nature of information technology enables criminal activity to be truly transnational. That is, a person sitting in Spain can disable a computer in Singapore, or disseminate child pornography in Swaziland. Additional problems arise from the difficulty of exercising national sovereignty over capital and information flows. Jurisdictional issues may arise from transborder online transmission. If an online financial newsletter originating in Albania contains fraudulent speculation about the prospects of a company whose shares are traded on the Australian Stock Exchange, where has the offence occurred?

The globalisation of crime poses further problems, as the cost of investigating and prosecuting transnational crime may be prohibitive in all but the most serious cases. Sovereign governments are finding it difficult to exercise control over online behaviour at home, not to mention abroad. A resident of Chicago who falls victim to a telemarketing scam originating in Albania, for example, can expect little assistance from law enforcement agencies in either jurisdiction. As a result, regulation by territorially-based rules may prove to be inappropriate for some types of offences.

Of equal concern is the lack of international consensus on what constitutes criminal behaviour. What is treasonous in Tibet, or blasphemous in Bangladesh, is protected in Philadelphia. New international arrangements are being crafted to address these issues. Will they be adequate to meet the challenge?

Source: Grabosky P 1998. Crime and technology in the global village, paper presented at the Internet crime conference, 16-17 Feb 1998

See also (broader topic): Transnational and organised crime

• 2008 Pacific Islands computer crime and security survey (PDF 1.98MB)
  Nigel Phair, Kambah, ACT : esecurity publishing. 2008
• Organised crime in Australia (PDF 516kB)
  Australian Crime Commission, 2008
• McAfee North America criminology report : organized crime and the internet 2007 (PDF 1.3MB)
  McAfee, 2007
• McAfee virtual criminology report : cybercrime : the next wave
  McAfee, 2007
• McAfee virtual criminology report : organized crime and the internet : December 2006 (PDF 556kB)
  McAfee, 2006
• McAfee virtual criminology report : North American study into organized crime and the Internet (PDF 2.82MB)
  McAfee, 2005
• Impediments to the successful investigation of transnational high tech crime
  Russell Smith, 2004
• IT and organized crime
  Victor Sabadash. Computer Crime Research Center, 2004
• Travelling in cyberspace on a false passport : controlling transnational identity-related crime
  Russell Smith. British Society of Criminology conference proceedings, 2003
• Designing appropriate sanctions to counteract cross-border plastic card fraud
  Russell Smith. International Association of Financial Crimes Investigators 10th annual conference, 2002
• Organized crime and cybercrime : synergies, trends and responses
  Phil Williams. US Department of State global issues journal, 2001
• Organized crime and cybercrime
  Phil Williams. Computer Crime Research Center, 2001
• Computer crime in a world without borders
  Peter Grabosky. AFP Platypus magazine, 2000
• Combating transborder electronic crime
  Elizabeth Montano. Transnational crime conference, 2000
• Cyber crime and information warfare
  Peter Grabosky. Transnational crime conference, 2000
• Crime and technology in the global village
  Peter Grabosky. Internet crime conference, 1998
• International cooperative measures
  Gareth Grainger. Internet crime conference, 1998
• International technological controls
  Steve Orlowski. Internet crime conference, 1998
• Internet crime prevention
  Adam Sutton. Internet crime conference, 1998
• Paedophile internet activity
  Patrick Forde and Andrew Patterson, 1998
• Child pornography in the digital age
  Anna Grant, Fiona David and Peter Grabosky, 1997