Crime and Technology

An example of computer crimes is identity theft. Identity theft can be a devastating thing for anyone to go through and can have devastating effects that can last for years, with the individual having to clean up the criminals mess and reclaim their identity. I have never had to deal with this but can only imagine what a horrible ordeal it must be. High technology crimes are becoming more common a problem for law enforcement to deal with. Everyday patrol officers may encounter these high technology crimes by way of citizens reporting these crimes and having to take the initial reports. This is hard because there is not much that can be done regarding identity theft unless you know who the responsible individual is. Another technology crime could be “crashing” a computer remotely and having to deal with all the data on a personal computer being lost. I do not believe there is anything police can do regarding this crime. I have heard it mentioned in a previous class that hackers sometimes just crash people’s computers at random for no particular reason; this can be frustrating I am sure. The biggest challenge that law enforcement faces in the arena of technology crimes in my opinion is proving who committed the crime. I think that training can be provided in this area and improved upon, and of course as the technology advances the tools available to law enforcement will improve as well. Law enforcement has to constantly strive to stay one step ahead of the technologically advanced criminals that more than likely devote a good deal of their time to improving their criminal skills on the computer. As I have mentioned in previous classes I think it is not a bad idea to get these tech savvy criminals on our side whenever possible and it is not a greater threat to have them working for us.