Cyber technology has afforded both law-abiding citizens, as well as criminals, ease of access regarding how they communicate and interact with others online. People now have at their fingertips the ability to reach loved ones and friends thousands of miles away in an instant. This is also true for criminals who prey on the unfortunate, the ignorant, and sometimes the most vulnerable in our society. Those who prey on others now have the advantage of doing so from the comfort of their own homes and with that, they also can remain completely anonymous. They have various means at their disposal to use if they so choose. They can send malicious code to an unsuspecting individual by way of email in hopes that they might extract personal and sensitive information from that person. They may try to infect someone’s device with ransomware and force that individual to pay large sums of money in exchange for their sensitive information.

 The list of things that a criminal can now do to someone from a distance is immense and without the proper precautions, we all could end up at the mercy of these criminals. What’s more, traditional crimes like stalking and harassment have transcended the “real world” and moved into cyberspace. Criminals often use different internet mediums to threaten, coerce, intimidate, and terrorize law-abiding citizens. Criminals can do this under the guise of someone familiar to the victim. By creating a fake profile with fake pictures, a criminal can secretly stalk or harass someone from thousands of miles away, even to the point of inducing actual fear in that person. Cyber technology can be and is a great tool to use. It has connected people around the world in a virtual space that is easily accessible, but without the proper protections in place, any one of us can become a victim of these cyber criminals seeking someone to prey upon.