Cybercrime

Introduction

The advent of increased Internet use to complete everyday tasks has also led increasingly to digital components being involved in both small-scale and large-scale crimes, as Nowacki and Willits (2019) write:

Over the past 20 years, computer-facilitated crimes (henceforth cybercrimes) have become increasingly problematic in both the USA and in international contexts. Cybercrimes can affect individuals, industry and even governments. These offenses can look similar to traditional types of offending, but are often assisted through technology to expand their scope (Wall 2007). They can also take the form of offenses that are not possible in the absence of technology, such as hacking.

Markets and users

To explore the size and typical behavior of cybercrime markets and users, the data from Thomas Holt and Olga Smirnova’s study, Examining the Structure, Organization, and Processes of the International Market for Stolen Data, 2007-2012 (ICPSR 35002), are used in their 2016 book, Data Thieves in Action: Examining the International Market for Stolen Personal Information, alongside data like the National Crime Victimization Survey: Identity Theft Supplement, 2012 (ICPSR 34735). In addition to Holt and Smirnova’s book, Holt’s 2014 recorded seminar Establishing Reputation and Avoiding Risk in Stolen Data Markets can provide additional insight into the cybercrime landscape.

Crime trends

The effects of cybercrime on greater crime trends is explored by Miró-Llinares & Moneva (2019) – in particular making the argument at one point that juvenile crime trends in the Uniform Crime Reporting program suggest a correlation between the emergence of cybercrime and a drop in forms of juvenile “real-world” crime. Pursuing the topic of juvenile cybercrime in particular, Back et al. (2018) use data from the Second International Self-Reported Delinquency Study, 2005-2007 (ICPSR 34658) to examine the motivating factors behind juvenile hacking offenses.

Police structure

Another area of research examines how the structure of police organizations affect response to cybercrime. Are specialized police units for cybercrime necessary, and how widespread are they currently? Willits & Nowacki (2016) use data from several waves of the Law Enforcement Management and Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) Series to explore both the generalized and specialized methods of police work related to cybercrime.

Conclusion

This Research Spotlight does not reflect all the existing research in cybercrime. To see how each of the ICPSR studies mentioned in this Spotlight has been examined in other scholarly literature, to gain ideas for extending prior research, or to conduct a larger literature review, you can search the ICPSR Bibliography of Data-related Literature. Searching with the term “cybercrime” (or related terms such as “internet crime”) will lead you to search results containing publications linked to the study data analyzed in them. Discovering data via the literature in this way can begin your investigation of the existing and potential uses of the data distributed by ICPSR.

When authoring publications that include your secondary analysis of study data downloaded from ICPSR, be sure to cite the study in the publication’s references section, using the provided data citation and unique identifier (in the form of a URL containing a DOI). Once your paper is published, submit its citation to the ICPSR Bibliography via this form, so it can be added to ICPSR’s collection of linked data-related literature, enabling others to find, learn from, and cite your work.