The motives behind cybercrime can range from being super simple to a myriad of emotions and reasons. I am going to rank the most common motives from 1 to 8 (1 making the most sense and 8 making the least). 


1. Money
Money makes the most sense because it is the leading cause of most crime and effort in general. It is the universal resource that can have infinite uses. They say money cannot solve all issues. This was obviously a saying of the past because in the modern day, it really can solve almost anything. The article provided even shows that money made from cybercrime mostly goes into immediate needs, investment, or back into resources for more crime. This means that money either goes to problem-solving (immediate needs) or investment to make more money.

2. Multiple reasons
Multiple reasons ranks second because it includes money and emotion. This makes sense to me because it combines the need for money and possible emotional encouragement. The article is not super informative and gives surface-level insight into this, but highlights mainly the financial and egotistical drive of online crime.

3. Political
Political crime is on the rise all across the world. From cybercrime to political assassinations. Politics makes solid sense to me because people not only get passionate about politics, but some even get irrationally angry. Cybercrime for political reasons is a form of protest, and there is a lot of political action that drives protests every day. The article covers actual international political cyber attacks that come from one government to another. This only reinforces my thoughts and gives more cause for this. Many countries do not get along and want to attack or politically influence each other.

4. Revenge
Revenge is middle of the road. This means that I can certainly see the point of view, but I do not understand the actual emotional drive for these crimes. Revenge porn being a massive contributor to this reason is not only sick, but makes sense to me. Some very troubled and mentally sick individuals would do this and sleep soundly at night.

5. Boredom? (Not really classified correctly)
Boredom comes fifth but is not really classified all that well. I would say it is more social/emotional. The article provided explains the rise of cyberbullying and grooming. Obviously, these are more socially based reasons for cybercrime. This reason makes loose sense, especially because these things used to happen more often in real life but have now spread to the internet for easier access and anonymity. Still, the overall motivational reason for the crime is just plain stupid to me.

6. Curiosity
I can generally understand the curiosity, but there are consequences. The article describes a boy who carries out multiple breaches into government agencies and eventually is caught and driven into a deep depression. He ends up killing himself after being falsely accused of a cyber attack he did not commit. The government is the body that controls and runs the entire country, so it is not a good idea to just breach its security. Not much thought went into his actions.

7. Recognition
This makes absolutely no sense to me. Who or what do you need to be recognized by that you would commit a crime? Sure, there have been a FEW cases where it ends well, but it usually does not. What makes even less sense is that by being recognized, you leave a trail and eventually get caught. The only thing that criminals should be recognized by is the law.

8. Entertainment
I don’t even know what to say about this. The article describes a man scraping profile info for fun. Get a hobby or something. There is no world where this is the only thing to do for fun. That guy must be the most boring husk of a human to be doing this for entertainment.