Computer Crime, Security and Data Protection.

* People who break the security of computer networks

* People who break the security on application software

* People who create malicious programs like viruses

This is a simple way to divide the activities that fall under "hacking". I will now summarise each of these types of hackers and discuss other areas linked to the issue - Hacking.

Network hackers

These are the hackers you see in movies, real hackers don't fit those stereotypes. They aren't nerds living in darkened dorm rooms or multi-millionaire industrial spies. They are average people with strong computer skills and the desire to test those skills in ways that often prove illegal.

Network hackers engage in several sorts of activities. Some, like "denial of service attacks" or "mail bombs," are designed to swamp a computer network's ability to respond and perform its internal functions. For instance, a denial of service attack on a Web server floods it with bogus requests for pages. The server spends so much time trying to process these requests that it can't respond to legitimate requests and may crash. A mail bomb is similar but targets a victim's mail server. A number of businesses and Internet service providers have suffered these sorts of attacks in recent years.

Software crackers

Application software, such as programs for word processing or graphics, puts the power of a personal computer in the hands of a user, even one who doesn't know how the computer works. It's often expensive and, like anything else that's useful but expensive, there's bound to be someone who wants to get it free of charge. That's where "crackers"; hackers who break software security come in. These hackers develop their own software that can go around or lie the security measures that keep the application from being replicated on a PC. For instance, you have a piece of software that requires a serial number to install. A software hacker does this in much the same way that networks hackers attack network security. They may set up a serial number generator that tries millions of combinations of numbers and letters until it finds one that matches. The hacker could also attack the program at the assembly-code level, finding and altering the security measures.

Virus builders

Some hackers are also virus builders. Viruses, worms, Trojan horses and logic bombs are all forms of programs that can invade a system. Some are malicious, some aren't.

A virus is a program that may or may not attach itself to a file and replicate itself. It may or may not corrupt the data of the file it invades. It may or may not try to use all of the computer's processing resources in an attempt to crash the machine. If that seems vague, it's because viruses are tricky. They may be simple notes that say "Hello" or they may attack and corrupt the files at the core of the system, causing it to crash. Worms invade a computer and steal its resources to replicate themselves. They use networks to spread themselves. A Trojan horse appears to do one thing but does something else. The system may accept it as one thing, but upon execution it may release a virus, worm or logic bomb. A logic bomb is an attack triggered by an event, like the computer clock reaching a certain date. It might release a virus or be a virus itself.

No defence

No one connected to a computer network is really safe from hackers. But remember most invasions or infections don't result in serious injury to the system that has been attacked. The only real defence is limiting your risk by using virus scanners and enforcing security measures on network computers. But in the end, hackers see security systems as a challenge, not an obstacle.

Computer fraud and crime

In the world of computers, computer fraud and computer crime are very serious issues facing every computer user. This ranges from system administrators to personal computer users who do work in the office or at home. Computers without any means of security are vulnerable to attacks from viruses, worms, and illegal computer hackers. If the proper steps are not taken, safe computing may become a thing of the past. Many security measures are being implemented to protect against illegalities.

The Computer Misuse Act, 1990

Hacking, computer fraud and computer viruses are all relatively new crimes that established English laws were not designed to deal with. For example, under old laws, a hacker could only be prosecuted for the theft of electricity. To deal with these new crimes, a law was introduced in 1990 called The Computer Misuse Act. Under this law, the following offences could be dealt with:

) Hacking- unauthorised access to any program or data held in a computer penalty is a maximum fine of £2000 and a six-month prison sentence.

2) Computer fraud and blackmail. Penalty is an unlimited fine and a maximum five-year prison sentence.

3) Viruses- unauthorised modification of the contents of a computer, impairing the operation of any program or reliability of data. Penalty is an unlimited fine and a maximum five-year prison sentence.

Security threats to ICT systems

Computer systems are vulnerable to many threats which can inflict various types of damage resulting in losses of systems. Damage can range from minor errors to much more serious situations. Losses can range from the actions of supposedly trusted employees defrauding the system to outside hackers roaming freely through the Internet. The exact amount of computer-related losses is unknowable; many losses are never discovered and others are covered up to avoid publicity.

Common Threats

A wide variety of threats face today's computer systems and the information they process. In order to control the risks of operating an information system, managers and users must know the vulnerabilities of the system and the threats which may exploit them. Knowledge of the threat environment allows the system manager to implement the most cost-effective security measures. In some cases, managers may find it most cost-effective to simply tolerate the expected losses.

Computer viruses and related threats represent an increasingly serious security problem in computing systems and networks. What Are Computer Viruses and Related Threats? Computer viruses are the most widely recognised example of programs written to cause some form of damage to computer systems or networks. A computer virus performs two basic functions: it copies itself to other programs, thereby infecting them, and it executes the instructions the author has included in it. As you can gather from the previous information from my report, there are a lot of different types of viruses. Therefore, threatening a huge threat to any company or organisation computer system.

How to protect ICT systems

Computers have become more and more popular and important to our society. We can use computer everywhere and they are very useful and helpful to our life. The speed and accuracy of computer made people felt confident and reliable. Therefore, many important information or data are saved in the computer. Such as your diary, the financial situation of a company or some secret intelligence of the military department. A lot of important information can be found in the memory of computer. So, people may ask a question: Can we make sure that the information in the computer is safe and nobody can steal it from the memory of the computer?

The most common and probably best solution is 'Computer Security'. Computer security is exactly what it sounds like. It is security on a computer to prevent people from accessing a computer. It is very difficult to secure a computer for a computer is like a mechanical human brain and if one has a real human brain they can operate it. In other words if one knows how a computer works they can make it work. If they do not then they cannot do anything at all. This is what computer security is meant to do. It is done by making it only possible for someone to access a computer by using a password or by locking it up.

Computer security has become such a big issue due to the huge amount of loss in profits by businesses. This happens because the computers were not totally secure from unwanted visitors. An example of how this could happen is a big business in America was to spend millions of dollars on research and development that would only stolen by another to profit themselves. Businesses lose three hundred million to about five billion dollars yearly due to these computer criminals; hackers or computer information thieves.

Computer security has come a long way since the creation of computers. But still we cannot fully believe our computers are fully secure and safe from unwanted hackers. Computer security is very hard to create presently for anyone can get in if they know what to do.

How to protect from Viruses

Companies are becoming more aware and threatened by the fact that their computers are prone to attack. Virus scanners are becoming necessities on all machines. Installing and monitoring these virus scanners takes many hours and a lot of money for site licenses. Many server programs are coming equipped with a program called "netlog". This is a program that monitors the computer use of the employees in a company on the network. The program monitors memory and file usage. A qualified system administrator should be able to tell by the amounts of memory being used and the file usage if something is going on that should not be. If a virus is found, system administrators can pinpoint the user who put the virus into the network and investigate whether or not it was intended.

Matthew Ainsworth

4/27/07