Professional Documents
Culture Documents
SYSOPs must also worry about being liable to their users as a result of viruses
which cause a disruption in service. Viruses can cause a disruption in
service or service can be suspended to prevent the spread of a virus. If the SY
SOP has guaranteed to provide continuous service then any disruption in service
could result in a breach of contract and litigation could ensue. However, contr
act provisions could provide for excuse or deferral of obligation in the event o
f disruption of service by a virus.
Legislation
The first federal computer crime law, entitled the Counterfeit Access Device and
Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1984, was passed in October of 1984.
The Act made it a felony to knowingly access a computer without authorisation, o
r in excess of authorisation, in order to obtain classified United States defen
ce or foreign relations information with the intent or reason to believe that su
ch information would be used to harm the United States or to advantage a foreign
nation.
The act also attempted to protect financial data. Attempted access to obtain in
formation from financial records of a financial institution or in a consumer fil
e of a credit reporting agency was also outlawed. Access to use, destroy, modif
y or disclose information found in a computer system, (as well as to prevent aut
horised use of any computer used for government business) was also made illegal.
The 1984 Act had several shortcomings, and was revised in The Computer Fraud an
d Abuse Act of 1986.
Three new crimes were added to the 1986 Act. These were a computer fraud offenc
e, modelled after federal mail and wire fraud statutes, an offence for the alter
ation, damage or destruction of information contained in a "federal interest com
puter", an offence for trafficking in computer passwords under some circumstance
s.
Even the knowing and intentional possession of a sufficient amount of counterfei
t or unauthorised "access devices" is illegal. This statute has been interprete
d to cover computer passwords "which may be used to access computers to wrongful
ly obtain things of value, such as telephone and credit card services."
Remedies and Law Enforcement
Business crimes of all types are probably decreasing as a direct result of incre
asing automation. When a business activity is carried out with computer and com
munications systems, data are better protected against modification,
destruction, disclosure, misappropriation, misrepresentation, and contamination.
Computers impose a discipline on information workers and facilitate use of alm
ost perfect automated controls that were never possible when these had to be app
lied by the workers themselves under management edict. Computer hardware and sof
tware manufacturers are also designing computer systems and programs that are mo
re resistant to tampering.
Recent U.S. legislation, including laws concerning privacy, credit card fraud an
d racketeering, provide criminal-justice agencies with tools to fight business
crime. As of 1988, all but two states had specific computer-crime laws, and a f
ederal computer-crime law (1986) deals with certain crimes involving computers i
n different states and in government activities.
Conclusion
There are no valid statistics about the extent of computer crime. Victims often
resist reporting suspected cases, because they can lose more from embarrassment
, lost reputation, litigation, and other consequential losses than from the acts
themselves. Limited evidence indicates that the number of cases is rising each
year because of the increasing number of computers in business applications whe
re crime has traditionally occurred. The largest recorded crimes involving insu
rance, banking, product inventories, and securities have resulted in losses of t
ens of millions to billions of dollars and all these crimes were facilitated by
computers.
Bibliography
Bequai, August, Techno Crimes (1986).
Mungo, Paul, and Clough, Bryan, Approaching Zero: The Extraordinary Underworld o
f Hackers, Phreakers, Virus Writers, and Keyboard Criminals (1993).
Norman, Adrian R. D., Computer Insecurity (1983).
Parker, Donn B., Fighting Computer Crime (1983).
Dodd S. Griffith, The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986: A Measured
Response to a Growing Problem, 43 Vand. L. Rev. 453, 455 (1990).