With the purpose of violating, impairing or damaging the assets of third parties or entities, whether or not they are patrimonial, computer crimes are all those illegal, criminal, unethical or unauthorized acts that use electronic devices and the Internet.
Huila Newspaper, Report
By: Alejandro Polanco
These cybercrimes include a wide range of illegal conduct of various kinds and are also called cyber or electronic crimes. Information technologies are present in all of them, whether they are the means or the end itself.
The people who commit cybercrime are experts in the use of technology, and because of this, they can not only use it to their advantage but also get jobs that support it. Therefore, a significant part of cybercrimes against companies are carried out by those companies’ own personnel.
Computer criminals are called active subjects in this context. On the other hand, those who are victims of such crimes are called taxpayers. It is very difficult to identify cybercrime.
Also, many taxpayers do not report them, which is another factor. Businesses that are victims of these crimes are often silent out of concern for their reputations. Therefore, the extent of these crimes is poorly understood.
As a result of the wide range of crimes that fall under the umbrella of cybercrime, all of which use information technology, we refer to them as “cybercrime” in the plural. The variety of computer crimes that can be committed is only limited by the technical skill and imagination of the perpetrator and the security of computer systems, these are some types of computer crimes:
fraud
Fraud refers to the different ways of obtaining personal or bank data for illegal purposes, as well as its manipulation and unauthorized modification and identity theft. It uses things like Trojans, the phishing, manipulation of input or output data, the salami technique understood as the diversion of funds from accounts to another pirate account, etc.
Unauthorized access to computer services
They are all the ways by which criminals manage to enter protected electronic systems, in order to modify or intercept files and processes. It ranges from the use of “winning” calls to the intervention of telephone lines, called wiretapping.
theft of services
Those actions through which the person has access to digital services, or facilitates access to third parties, in order to make illegal use of resources. It includes from the theft of time in Internet consumption, to the impersonation of personality to access programs that have been authorized only to trusted personnel.
Since this type of crime began to be committed before national legal systems even thought about this possibility, legal tools have been gradually developed to deal with it. These are designed to safeguard cultural heritage, confidentiality of information, property rights of computer systems and legal security.
The Huila newspaper spoke with Captain Luis Ernesto Niño, Neiva’s deputy chief of criminal investigation, so that he could more clearly unravel this type of robbery that is gaining strength more and more and of which you could be a victim.
What are the crimes that occur the most in the city of Neiva and what measures does the law establish?
The violation of personal data and abusive access to a computer system, it is clear that the methods most used in the city of Neiva are forms of fraud through social networks, especially to obtain personal data that are used to extort the citizens.
Regarding the measures of the law, everything is contemplated in Law 1273 of 2009, there the crimes are defined, this law modifies the penal code created with these new criminal types with prison sentences of up to 48 months, which would indicate that people Those who commit these crimes would face their responsibility in a prison.
How are scams and theft of money handled in applications like nequi or other types of platforms?
What happens with these platforms is that they are very easy to create, so they are used to move money through them, often false amounts or there is no truth in the owners of said accounts, in view of this, it is the Prosecutor’s Office who assumes the investigation of these crimes supported by the judicial police and the technical investigation body, Sijin and CTI constantly monitor movements that generate suspicion in these digital media.
What should a person do when being a victim of these crimes?
The first thing and the invitation is always to report and collect information on movements or transactions that help create a line of monitoring cybercriminals. The national police have the virtual caí that is active 24 hours, as well as our official website or, if possible, physically approach our facilities where trained investigators will provide the necessary help.
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What recommendations can be given to citizens to avoid being victims of these types of theft?
It is important to verify the pages that we enter to consult information, but especially to verify when buying, as products that are offered at low prices should and must generate suspicion, as well as antivirus installations on their computers to avoid any other software that can be installed without your consent when interacting with bone pages that only seek to obtain user information, another recommendation is, if possible, when purchasing products, to use the cash on delivery option, allowing you a space of trust and security of the purchase.
Likewise, the National Police urges and invites to be very careful with the processing of personal data that, as it indicates, are personal, as well as the fine line between these computer crimes and sexting that operate under the same network and although for many it may be Normalized sharing moments of privacy with outsiders can end in extortion in most cases.
The most worrying thing is that there is still a long way to go before public entities and private companies begin to strengthen their cybersecurity systems to reduce the risk of being victims of computer crime.
This was shown by a study by the Superintendence of Industry and Commerce (SIC) reviewed by the CCIT, to more than 32,763 entities. This showed, for example, that 65.5% have not implemented appropriate and effective measures to guarantee the security of personal data, 82% of those responsible for the processing of personal data have not implemented a management system for the defense of information and 88% have not put protection policies in place for remote access to personal information.
These figures represent a red alarm in terms of cybersecurity, especially in times when the use of new technologies is being leveraged massively. Therefore, having cybersecurity systems, programs, and up-to-date equipment that allows you to protect your data, information, and assets that you manage should be the first thing to do.