Killing With Keyboards - Assignment Example

Killing with Keyboards According to Vacca (2005, p.137), Identity theft is the offense that involves stealing of a person’s personal information “in order to impersonate that person in a legal sense.” This means that the person’s privacy is at risk. The information that the wrongdoer will steal will be used, disclosed and misused for some wrong purpose. Threats that come with identity theft, like in the given scenario, include (1) misusing Chris’ information to bankrupt him; (2) using the information to carry out fraudulent activities in online e-commerce; (3) disclosing the information to a pedophile to threaten Chris’ children; (4) altering the information to spread confusion just for the sake of fun; or, (5) harassing him for ransom.

Vulnerabilities include: (1) Trojan horses, which are destructive programs that are sent into the computer system so that all important passwords and valuable information such as the social security number is conveyed to the thief. (2) Email phishing, in which the victim (Chris) is sent emails that scam him by leading him to a counterfeit website which inquires about his private information. (3) Viruses, which infect the systems and unlock all important information. (5) Social networking, which makes all shared information vulnerable. (5) Employee sabotage, in which a colleague gets unauthorized access to information.

Measures include educating the internet users about their rights of protection so that they do not become victims at the hands of criminals (Newman, 2009). The more the awareness about the user’s information security, the lesser will be the chance of fraudulent activities.ReferencesNewman, R.C. (2009). Computer Security: Protecting Digital Resources. USA: Jones & Bartlett Publishers.Vacca, J.R. (2005). Identity theft. Computer Forensics: Computer Crime Scene Investigation. USA: Cengage Learning.