Information Security - CHAPTER TWO: History of Cybercrime - Section

4/18/2019 Print Information Security - CHAPTER TWO: History of Cybercrime - Section From ABC-CLIO's Praeger Security International website https://psi-praeger-com.ezproxy2.apus.edu/ Information Security CHAPTER TWO: HISTORY OF CYBERCRIME p27 Introduction WHILE CYBERCRIME IS A RELATIVELY NEW PHENOMENON, some key people and events have been critical in dening this emerging eld. By understanding these events, it is possible to gain a better perspective on current events and trends in cybercrime. In this chapter, the history of computer crime is described to show how computer crimes have evolved over the past few decades. This chapter will describe critical events and inuential people that have helped to shape current policy and thus will provide a foundation to understand the current status of computer crimes. Pre-1970 The Internet can be traced back to events in the 1950s when the United States was preoccupied with the Cold War and the Soviet Union. In 1957, the Soviets launched the satellite Sputnik into space, thereby winning the space race. As a way to advance American technology and prevent the Soviets from getting any further ahead, in 1958 the U.S. government created a new agency, the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA), with the responsibility of developing new technologies to be used for military purposes. In 1962, a new division of ARPA was formed, the Information Processing Techniques Oce, and a scientist from MIT, J. C. R. Licklider, was appointed to lead the new agency. He proposed a network of interconnected computers that scientists could use to share research and work jointly on projects. The idea lay dormant for a time, as few people had the expertise to carry out the plans. The next director of the agency picked up the idea again and formed the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANet), an early precursor of the Internet. Ray Tomlinson, an engineer, was the rst person to send an email over the ARPANet. He was p28 also the rst person to use the @ symbol in one of those communications. In 1990, ARPANet became the Internet. In the 1960s and 1970s, there was little computer crime as the technology was neither widely available nor used by the general population. At that time, computer use was largely restricted to the military and to researchers at universities and other scientic labs. Most unauthorized hacking events were simply pranks carried out on computer systems at universities by inquisitive students who did not intend to cause any harm. The viruses they left behind were easily identied and removed. These hackers sought to discover kinks in the system and then use that information to make improvements. The events generally caused minimal damage to computers or data, if any at all. The entire purpose of hacking in those days was simply for fun—to prove that a person had the technological savvy and skills to break into a supposedly secure system. At the time, there were few laws that criminalized these activities, so they were not considered to be crimes, and few people were prosecuted for these acts. In fact, oenders often signed their names to a virus. Some may argue that the rst person to recognize and study computer crime and security issues was Donn B. Parker. During the early 1970s, as the Internet was evolving, Parker researched computer crime and security issues. He became a senior computer security consultant at the Stanford Research Institute and, in that position, wrote the rst federal manual on computer crime, Computer Crime—Criminal Justice Resource Manual, in 1970. This was a manual for law enforcement ocials, who were beginning to see more complaints of computer crimes. An example of early hacking is described in Box 2.1. Box 2.1 An Early Example of Cyber Hacking Magician and inventor Nevil Maskelyne, who was born in 1863, was fascinated by the expanding technology of the wireless telegraph. Maskelyne knew that British physicist John Ambrose Fleming had scheduled an appearance at the lecture theater of London's Royal Institution in June 1903, to demonstrate a modern communications system that would allow a person to send and receive Morse code wirelessly over long distances. Fleming had positioned his friend Guglielmo Marconi on top of a cli in Poldhu, Cornwall, England. Marconi was to send a message to Maskelyne using Morse code, which Maskelyne would receive in the theater. But even before Marconi sent his message to Maskelyne, the machine began to receive a message. At rst, the message was only one word that was repeated over and over: rats. Then the message changed to a limerick: "There was a young fellow of Italy, who diddled the public quite prettily." Clearly, Fleming was embarrassed at the failure of his technology. Neither he nor Marconi could account for the strange messages received, but it was quickly apparent that Marconi's assertion regarding the privacy and security of this new technology was not accurate. In today's terms, Fleming and Marconi had been hacked. Some time later Maskelyne announced that he had sent the messages through the projector in the auditorium. In other words, Maskelyne was the hacker. p29 The 1970s During the 1970s, technology was rapidly advancing. Cybercriminals were likewise learning more about computer systems and their vulnerabilities, all the while honing their hacking skills. Throughout the decade, hackers' intentions and purposes were quickly changing. No longer were hackers nding ways into systems for fun; now they intended to cause harm. One of the rst computer viruses designed to damage systems appeared in 1971. Called Creeper, the virus was released in the ARPANet. A computer infected with the virus displayed a message on the screen indicating that the system was infected and the identity of those responsible for creating the virus. The rst computer crimes also appeared during the 1970s. The rst types of computer crimes to be recognized were computer intrusions and fraud.1 Likewise, one of the rst identied cybercrimes occurred in 1973, when a chief teller at Union Dime Savings Bank embezzled money from the company by manipulating account data in the bank's computer system. In the 1970s the use of computer hacking expanded, and computerized phone systems became a prime target of "phreakers." These technologically savvy people could break into a system, discover the correct codes and tones, and get free long-distance service. One of those phreakers, John Draper (also known as Cap'n Crunch), discovered that a toy whistle he found in a box of Cap'n Crunch cereal was the same frequency as the p30 AT&T phone network. Using the free whistle, he was able to congure the system so that thousands of people got free phone calls from AT&T. https://apus.intelluslearning.com/lti/#/document/100734970/1/6e4f07443955c9ac9d0900eeb1d51966/c4c609ddcdef0ffe806d855ebf0514d5/browse_p… 1/11 4/18/2019 Print Information Security - CHAPTER TWO: History of Cybercrime - Section While computer crimes like Draper's were slowly emerging, the majority of the population remained largely unaware of crimes committed via computers and the Internet. Consequently, the impact of these events went mostly unnoticed by the general public.2 However, to those who were more aware of computers and their increased vulnerabilities, it was clear that there was a potential for similar crimes to be committed at any organization that relied on computers. In response, state legislators began to respond to the newly emerging crimes. They proposed and debated new legislation that sought to dene specic computer operations as illegal. The rst computer crime law that focused on cybercrime was the Florida Computer Crimes Act of 1978. The law was passed after it was discovered that employees at the Flagler Dog Track had used a computer to print fraudulent winning tickets. The new law dened all unauthorized access of a computer as a crime, even if the person committing the crime had no malicious intent.3 New laws also meant that oenders could be, and were, arrested and prosecuted for computer crimes, but because of the novelty of these crimes (and partly because criminal justice personnel were unfamiliar with the technology), there were few actual prosecutions for computer crimes. Few cybercrime laws were passed at the federal level. However, some in the federal government were beginning to recognize the potential dangers of the Internet. In 1977, the General Accounting Oce (now known as the General Accountability Oce) recommended that the U.S. government should limit the number of federal employees who used a computer. This would reduce the likelihood of a computer attack or security breach. The 1980s By the 1980s, computers and technology had become more mainstream. The Internet was rapidly expanding, and computers were being used in more businesses, government oces, and homes. Companies were beginning to use the Internet so they could reach out to users not only in the United States but also internationally to expand their markets. Because computers were becoming more widely used, computer crimes were becoming more frequent. Moreover, oenders were also changing. Their intent was no longer to break into a computer system just for the fun of it. Many viruses and hacking attacks were now meant to cause critical harm to computer systems or result p31 in theft of data. The crimes quickly became serious threats to businesses, nancial institutions, and government oces. As crimes grew in intensity, courts began to recognize the dangers of computer crime and punished oenders with harsher sentences in terms of lengthier prison terms and higher nes. As a result, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was assigned the task of overseeing credit card and computer fraud. During this period, some signicant trends became apparent, such as the growth of new viruses, more convictions for those guilty of computer crimes, the emergence of hacking groups, the use of cybercrime as entertainment, the publication of hacking magazines, and an international perspective.

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