How Cyber Laws Affect Us and How Up-to-Date They Are? - Paper Example

Introduction

Cybercrime is still a hot topic raising concern within the legal community. Countermeasures and awareness have increased over the years but have not yet matched the rise in the cases of computer crime. Cybercrime refers to the types of crimes involving mobile devices, computers, and internet related services. The crimes categorize into those assisted by computer networks and those directly targeting a specific computer. They include; cyberstalking, denial of services, information theft, phishing scams, identity theft, fraud, malware, and viruses. Federal law acts as a measure to counter and regulate the crimes. The act is divided into three categories; Computer Fraud and Abuse Act that guide on access to information and damages caused Wiretap Act that governs against interception of communication, and disclosures and the Network crime Statutes that govern against identity theft and devices access. The paper will review how the law affects us and how up to date they are with the technology available.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

How Cyber Laws Affect Us

Individuals

Cybercrimes span from the uncomplicated student mischief to online terrorism activities. Therefore, the individual day to day online activities could lead to consequences related to cybercrime. Some of the offenses stipulated under cybercrime laws that are mostly mitigated by individuals include unlawful internet gambling, using misleading images or words on the internet, activities relating to spreading or using child pornography or any sexual exploitation of children and unauthorized publication of materials (Upadhyaya and Aruna 41). While some of these activities are seemingly hard to get involved in, some constitute part of our day to day lives such as misleading content or images due to the availability of many social media platforms. Therefore, the laws help us to be wary of our activities while using the internet (Diamond 136). Individuals within a social circle are likely to perpetrate cyberbullying. While the consequences are harsh according to the law, it is a common mistake that is easy to get involved with. The spread of illegal content or copyrighted material constitutes of cybercrime in some countries. The definition of unlawful content has a broad scope and would even reflect on personal opinions that are not generally accepted to represent hate crimes and incitement. It would, therefore, come out as an infringement to the personal freedom of expression (Jackson 23).

Corporate Behavior

Cybercrime affecting corporate organizations leads to reputational harm, loss of their customers and regulatory fines. Organizations that deal with much personal information are deemed to introduce protective measures to prevent leaks that result in fraud, and identity theft. The legislation, on the other hand, is a driver towards companies instituting preventive measures towards cybercrimes. Consequently, companies are expected by the law to implement a cyber essentials scheme that upon implementation provide organizations with protection from prevalent forms of internet crimes (Karali 45). The cyber essential also have certification to prove the viability of the methods. Government legislation ensures that companies handling personal information or earning government contracts have implemented the cyber essentials. Other players within the corporate world and the customers are influenced by the laws to invest in companies that have basic cyber protection schemes. The government also goes a step further to give incentives to companies that have implemented safety measures in protecting their client's information (Robinson et al. 79). Resultantly, the corporate community has increased its investment in cybersecurity within its systems.

Governments and International Relations

Presently, over 95 countries have taken into the implementation of strict laws against cyber-crime. The leap is a great one as it helps deal with the problem before it spreads out. Therefore, states have to increase their budgetary expenditures in beefing up security and in the hunt for cybercriminals. The problem with the countries involved in cybercrime war is that there is no harmonization of what constitutes of cybercrime and the laws pertaining the crime itself. It, therefore, affects foreign relations when the fight against these criminals transcends the countries boundaries to another region. According to Norse Security, the US receives 5,000 cyber-attacks in an hour, while most of them originating from China and Russia (Karali 45). Such a situation will, therefore, affect the relationship between countries.

Cyber Laws Catching up with Technology

GAO cybercrime report (GAO-07-075) identified that there are four primary challenges associated with fighting cybercrime. They are reporting of cybercrime, having sufficient analytical and technical capabilities for enforcement of cyber laws, having a borderless environment and awareness issues (Aggarwal et al. 48). The first significant issue facing the ability of the law in combating cybercrimes is the availability of technical and analytical expertise in handling the crimes. Federal and state officials are clear that the pool is limited. While those involved with the cyber-attacks are busy honing their skills on a daily basis, the federal and state official are rarely engaged in intensive training regarding the crime (Taylor et al. 12). Few departments in the criminal justice are equipped with personnel who are willing and capable of unraveling the scams and crimes. Apart from training, the criminal justice systems also face the problem of funding into the cause. Therefore, the law lags behind in the issue of facilitating cybercrime combating methods.

The second problem leasing to slow catch up of the law with technology is the runaway rate of growth. Technology is growing so fast, and the degree of crimes are increasing with the time. The incoming generation, therefore, will have increased use of the internet to commit the crime (DAHL 34). Computer related crimes constitute almost a quarter of crimes currently. The cyber laws, on the other hand, are static. Much has not changed to the original cybercrime acts through the years. It is therefore hard to deal with the changing issues. It allows for cybercriminals to find ways around the law and limits the powers of the law enforcement agencies in dealing with the criminals.

Cybercrime laws do not transcend jurisdiction while cybercrime does; arguably, it regulates the types of criminal courts and agencies are allowed in the administration of justice to a matter. Within many countries, different branches of the court are assigned different types of cases while agencies only persecute crimes within their jurisdiction. Moreover, cybercrime laws are not harmonized between countries and therefore even the work of local; and international agencies are limited (Shostack 50). On the other hand, cybercrimes are not selective of countries regions or types of organizations. Globalization has enabled their activities all over the world. The whole scenario limits the powers of the law and its enforcement. It is therefore incapable of dealing correctly with matters of cybercrime.

Recommendations

The task force model of fighting computer-related crimes should change. Multiagency cooperation and should spring up to reduce the limitations involved in the law enforcement. Apart from the shared experiences from the agencies, there will be an increased improvement in solving jurisdictional issues. Further, the criminal justice department and the legislators should work hand in hand to analyze the situation on the ground often and consequently update the cyber laws time and time again (Eichensehr 357). The goal of the new cyber laws should aim at self-healing the internet rather than arrest the ever-increasing internet offenders. The corporations should also yield an increased budgetary allocation to improve issues of staffing, training, and provision of necessary equipment for the agencies working in the crime divisions. Finally, the laws should call for public involvement in the fight against the cybercrimes (Munir and Maryam 28). It should span from public debates on matters pertaining their protection to the direct use of public response squads to help report and stop the crimes.

Conclusion

Cybercrimes affect people, organizations, and nations. The resulting massive losses are alarming, and there is the need for action towards regulation. Cyber laws have instituted in the past with the aim of combating the issues. They have had a significant role in beefing up the security of information in organizations and improving awareness of computer-related crimes. The laws have however been ineffective due to their static nature compared to the ever-changing technology. The hackers and other internet criminals have therefore had the upper hand compared to the criminal justice system, and this is the reason they have prevailed. Much is needed to update the cyber laws, increase multiagency cooperation and improve the public involvement in cyber laws so that we can stop computer-related crimes.

Work Cited

Aggarwal, Pooja, P. Arora, and R. Ghai. "Review on cybercrime and security." International Journal of Research in Engineering and Applied Sciences 2.1 (2014): 48-51.

DAHL, Matt. "Understanding the New Federal Cyber Laws." Security Magazine (2014).

Diamond, Larry. "Liberation technology 1." In Search of Democracy. Routledge, 2015. 132-146.

Eichensehr, Kristen E. "Cyberwar & International Law Step Zero." Tex. Int'l LJ 50 (2015): 357.

Jackson, Stephen. "NATO Article 5 and Cyber Warfare: NATO's Ambiguous and Outdated Procedure for Determining When Cyber Aggression Qualifies as an Armed Attack." The CIP Report (2016).

Karali, Y., S. Panda, and C. S. Panda. "Cyber Crime: An Analytical Study of Cyber Crime Cases at the Most Vulnerable States and Cities in India." International Journal of Engineering and Management Research (IJEMR) 5.2 (2015): 43-48.

Munir, Asad, and Maryam Tahira Gondal. "Cyber Media and Vulnerability: A discourse on cyber laws and a probe on the victimization of cybercrimes in Pakistan." Global Media Journal: Pakistan Edition 10.2 (2017).

Robinson, Michael, Kevin Jones, and Helge Janicke. "Cyberwarfare: Issues and challenges." Computers & Security 49 (2015): 70-94.

Shostack, Arthur B. CyberUnion: Empowering Labor Through Computer Technology: Empowering Labor Through Computer Technology. Routledge, 2016.

Taylor, Robert W., Eric J. Fritsch, and John Liederbach. Digital crime and digital terrorism. Prentice Hall Press, 2014.

Upadhyaya, Rhyme, and Aruna Jain. "Cyberethics and cybercrime: A deep dwelved study into legality, ransomware, underground web and bitcoin wallet." Computing, Communication, and Automation (ICCCA), 2016 International Conference on IEEE. 2016.