In our latest module we were provided 7 articles which encompassed reasons why some are attracted the life of cybercrime. We were asked to rank these motivations from “most sense” to “least sense”:
- Multiple reasons: It is quite hard to boil down the “why” when it comes to someone committing a cybercrime. I believe that each individual who decides to commit these offense carries with them a myriad of motivations.
- For Money: This to me is the most logical, because at the end of the day crime is typically monetarily driven. The internet is so widely accessible, that with a decent hot spot you can learn the most basic of technology exploits from YouTube, free of charge. This provides an extremely low overhead, with nothing but upside for those who are driven by money.
- Political: Given the volatile political landscape, there seems to be the growing presence of individuals and groups who are seeking to push their own political agendas. As the importance of internet presence has exponentially grown, it would only make sense that cyber criminal activists would take to waging their war on ideologies online.
- Recognition: A lot can be said about world events occurring due to an individual wanting their name in the media, cybercrime is no different.
- Revenge: The article provided was certainly a tough read, yet I found the reasoning to fall lower than the first four.
- Entertainment: While I could see how hacking could be considered entertainment, the risk to reward ratio does not seem to make sense.
- Boredom: The concept of breaking the law out of sheer boredom, while foolish, does make sense, yet not more than the aforementioned motivations.