The Criminal Mind in the Age of Globalization

Saron Messembe Obia

• Publisher: VIJ Books (India) Pty Ltd
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9788194697428
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Política y relaciones internacionales
• Subtopic: Globalización

Crackdown of cybercriminals can only be effective if criminal investigators collaborate with security expert, financial accountants and mobile service providers. This book provides insight on cybercrime, identity theft and identity fraud, exposing the modus operandi, analyzing theories such the triangular theory of crimes and the constructive theory. There exist several Challenges; at the level of intelligence sharing, cooperation with the international criminal police and social networking sites censorship (double biometric identification or digital fraud (signature)) which is cross-examined with the 5 stages of cybercrime and three stage model of cyber criminality. The book equally describes prostitute involvement in white collar crimes and other offenses illicit drug trafficking, and harassment. The piece finally concludes with contemporary trends of post 9/11; of cyber terrorism, cyberbullying and radicalization in Europe, Middle East and part of Africa. This transnational order is explained by the new cyber terrorism theory, a necessity for modern warfare.

CHAPTER ONE

CYBERCRIME, IDENTITY THEFT AND IDENTITY FRAUD

The internet is a global tool for the transfer of information by individuals, organizations and governments.¹ The evolution from manual to digital information technology (internet) involves the use of e-commerce whose activities involve online sales of different commodities and the delivery of different services (ATM, Monetary transfers) across the globe. Aunshul Rege defines cybercrime as any crime related to information and communication technology used by an agent or perpetrator to swill victim from savings, it is either a single attack or on-going series of events.² Identity theft or identity fraud is a practice of stealing personal information (person’s name, social security number, driver’s license, birth date or credit card numbers) and pretending to be that person in order to obtain financial resources in that person’s name without consent.³ Technological advancements in terms of the cyberspace in Africa, has produced shifts in the ability to reproduce, distribute, control and publish information, the internet in particular has changed the economics of production and reproduction (Longe and Chiemeke, 2008).

Due to the complexity of internet activities and the scope of different practices within the cyberspace of a country⁴, it is important to expose the difference between a hacker and a cybercriminal. According to Misha Glenny⁵, the difference between a cybercriminal and a hacker is that a cybercriminal is someone who indulges in illegal activities on the internet for financial motives, whereas a hacker is one that breaches into a computer system of an individual, organization or government institution without authorization. The hacker either seeks to steal information files or cause damage to data. On the other hand, a hacker can become a cybercriminal even though the two individuals are categorized as cyber criminals. With such challenges to expertise, there is, therefore, the need for African stakeholders to strengthen the avenues and develop the skills of personnel involve in the control, management and supervision of the cyber space⁶. Such actions will facilitate control, management, examination and evaluation of cybercrimes and particularly the means to track perpetrators of these crimes.

Since the lack of expertise (technological and educational expertise) is invariably attached to the lack of evidence during proceedings in the Criminal Justice System⁷. The lack of evidence is a major challenge to track and render justice against cybercrimes due to the complexity of the crime. Cyber criminals mutate their strategies to hide the pattern of cybercrime from policing and the Criminal Justice System. For example, a pedophile who baits his victim through email or social networks. This delays the decision-making process thereby delaying the punishment and this can also lead to wrong decisions encouraging other criminals to be casual and fearless. Furthermore, the hacking of the Cameroon presidential website in 2015, makes such reinforcement and search for effective expertise as well as the development of a criminal database and an upgraded version of the internet an urgent proposition.

From the foregoing, the difficulty to identify, disrupt, dismantle and prosecute cybercriminals has become a major security challenge to African countries. The evolution of technology has become complex and technically advanced, such that these non-conventional crimes demand innovative security expertise and operations because advances in technological system and software have created a gap between the security personnel services and the criminals whose research have shown that they continue to outpace the authorities due to their better mastery of the internet.

When the security develops understanding of a pattern or profile of cybercrimes, the cybercriminals adopt different and innovative means of operation as well as complex dispositions to operate, such as change of Internet Protocol (IP) address.⁸ This is due to their constancy and age frequency to the new technologies and internet operation systems⁹. The increasing number of registered cases and complaints from victims of cyber criminality, appeals for proper solution in combatting its threat.

Typology of Crimes

Carders or card cloned: Stealing bank or credit card details is another major cybercrime. Duplicate cards are then used to withdraw cash at ATMs or in shops.

Malware: Malware is software that takes control of any individual’s computer to spread a bug to other people’s devices or social networking profiles. Such software can also be used to create a ‘botnet’ a network of computers controlled remotely by hackers, known as ‘herders,’ to spread spam or viruses¹⁰.

Internet dating and romance scam: The paradigm of cybercriminals in Cameroon has change the dynamics of international and national security. As crimes keep evolving with on various social networks like Facebook¹¹, cougars and even oasis, women are more seen on Facebook. With the quest to find a foreigner (bush faller)¹² that would take them out of Cameroon through marriage or invitation to the resident country.

Phishing: Phishing involves cybercriminals posing as reputable organizations or businesses in order to obtain confidential information from their victims. This is often carried out through sending emails or utilizing phony website. An example of this is where victims are asked to enter their login details on “bank” websites where they are then redirected to the fake website allowing the cybercriminals to then record their information. Phishing (sometimes called carding or brand spoofing) is often linked to identity fraud. Financial and personal details obtained fraudulently from victims are used to gain access to funds and this has cost businesses and financial institutions billions of dollars.

Cyberstalking: Cyberstalking is the use of the internet to harass an individual, an organization or a specific group. There are many ways in which cyberstalking becomes cybercrime. Cyberstalking involves monitoring of someone’s activity real-time, via an electronic device online, and while offline. Cybercrime becomes a crime because of the repeated threatening, harassing or monitoring of someone with whom the stalker has, or no longer has a relation. Cyberstalking can include harassment of the victim, the obtaining of financial information of the victim or threatening the victim in other to frighten them. An example of cyberstalking would be to put a recording or monitoring device on a victim’s computer or smartphone in order to save envy keystroke they may make so that the stalker can obtain information. Another example would be repeatedly posting derogatory or personal information about a victim on web pages and social media despite being warned not to do so.

The Changing Character of Crime in Africa

The changing pattern of crime can be described as the sociology of crime and addresses questions about the emergence of new patterns and the rise of different categories of crimes in society. The sociology of crime examines the manifestation of diverse crime structures such as violence and deviant behaviour and the responses to it. Durkheim E. has observed that crime, violence and deviant behaviour are linked to community welfare and development¹³. Violence and crime therefore affect every dimension of man’s social existence from a social, political and historical perspective and are not new phenomena in the field of development theory¹⁴. According to Rogers (1989) the link between violence, crime and societal development is historic and can be traced to urbanization and underdevelopment (security) in the developing countries. For instance, Africa is viewed as the most violent continent based on crime victimization rates followed by Latin America (UNICRI, 1995; UNCHS, 1996).

Violence as a particular crime can be described as an action or word that is intended to hurt someone or the extreme use of force that leads to an attack on someone. Violence or violent conduct is a situation or event in which an individual, people or an organization is hurt or killed. In the sociology of knowledge, violence is considered as a global public health problem that can be explained psychologically and scientifically.

The psychological explanation about violence turns around the argument that humans are biological creatures who although operate at animal level are more superior to other animals¹⁵. However, there is evidence that violent behaviour is caused by physical action which originates from the stimulation of the brain. The biological aggressive tendency is triggered by some psychological mechanism linked to the human brain. On the other hand, the scientific evidence explaining violent behaviour or the physical argument on violence is linked to substances that can cause a dramatic change in some one’s behaviour.

However, the unprecedented increase of violence in the 21st century can be linked to technology which is increasingly at the service of hate ideologies, deviance and cybercrimes as new dimensions of criminal behaviour. There are more evidence of violence in the life of individuals such as child abuse by their parents and tutors; women injured or humiliated by violent partners (Bekali, E., 2017); elderly persons maltreated by caretakers; youth violence and self-inflicted violence because the victims learn from their victimizers. New generations learn from the past as well as social conditions that nurture violence.

Some research has argued that to avoid violence it’s important to stay indoors, or lock doors and windows to avoid dangerous people and places. However, escaping from violence is not possible by locking oneself indoors because of technology and the exploration of cyber space that allows the penetration of every boundary or barrier to prevent violence. For instance, the threat of violence behind those closed doors such as child abuse, violence on wives by their partners and those in war and conflict zones can be breached through the internet (internet or cyber bullying).

Another pattern of crime is deviant behaviour. Deviance can be defined as behaviour that violates expected rules and norms and it is more than nonconformity. Sociologists who study deviance and crime examine cultural norms and how they change over time, how they are enforced and what happens to individuals and societies affected by deviance. It is behaviour that departs significantly from social expectations, such as the contemporary behaviour of youths stripping down their trousers or piecing their body parts. Sociologists like Charles Darwn continue to stress the social context and not just individual behavior when considering deviance. The study of deviance looks at why people violate laws or norms and the study of how society reacts to such non-conformist tendencies or attitude such as cybercrimes and the search for wealth by youths. The societal reaction to deviant behaviour suggests that social groups actually create deviance by making the rules whose infraction constitutes deviance and by applying those rules to particular people and labeling them as outsiders. In this regard, Robert Merton looks at deviance as innovative behaviour.

Robert K. Merton discusses deviance in terms of goals and means that is, as part of strain and anomie theory while Emile Durkheim states that anomie is the confounding of social norms. However, Robert Merton further states that anomie is the state in which social goals (youth search for quick wealth) and the legitimate means to achieve them do not correspond. Merton equally postulated that, an individual’s response to societal expectations and the means by which the individual pursued those goals are suitable in understanding deviance. Relating to this study the understanding is therefore that the youth’s wanton search for quick wealth through fraud is not a legitimate answer to youth bulge, unemployment, poor education or poverty. He observes that deviant action is motivated by strain, stress, or frustration in individuals and arises from a disconnection between the society’s goals and the means to achieve those goals. The problem from a sociological stand point in this study would therefore be to deal with the social context in which behaviors such as cybercrimes are committed. Using ‘innovation’ which includes technology like the internet, Robert Merton describes the terms of acceptance and rejection of social goals and the institutionalization of achieving them.

Robert Merton argues that ‘innovation’ is a response to the strain generated by the cultural emphasis on the acquisition of wealth and the lack of opportunities to achieve it; the quest to get rich and the lack of the means to get rich. This causes people and particularly youths in Cameroon¹⁶ like in other parts of the world, to be innovators and thereby engage in illegal activities that are considered deviant, such as stealing, cybercrimes, violence and thugry. By Mertons observations, innovators like the youths cybercriminal minds therefore, accept society’s goals but reject the socially acceptable means of achieving them such as monetary success gained through crime.

Merton claims that innovators are those who have socialized with similar world views (the internet world or Android generation) but who have been denied the opportunities they need to be able to legitimately achieve society’s goals. The continuous innovation of technology has therefore led to the changing form and patterns of crime from conventional to non-conventional crimes. Cybercrime began with ‘scamming’ whose outcome was that of easy money through fraudulent means, led to other innovative patterns and practices such a...