Introduction
Cybercrime refers to a crime of any kind that involves the combination of a network and a computer. Cyber-criminals use the computer to commit electronic crimes. The computer may also serve as a target for the criminals. Cybercrime is a threat to any organization as it avails private and confidential data to criminals. The criminals in turn use the data to destroy fundamental organizational structures such as databases, reputation and even steal assets such as money, electronically.
Discussion
Ignoring or paying insignificant attention to cybercrime can be very costly. For instance, the attack on Sony Pictures by hackers in December 2014 demonstrates how devastating cybercrime can be to any company (Durbin, 2015).
Cybercrime is a collective term that encompasses a host of electronic crimes such as email spoofing, hacking, data diddling, password sniffing, software piracy and denial of service. If the threat is not dealt with, every crime that constitutes a cybercrime could lead to a different form of damage to the organization that is unique and different from the others.
Cybercrime can be detected by an organization through the use of a myriad of intrusion detection techniques. For instance, operating system commands, tripwires, and anomaly detection techniques are some of the methods that could be used to detect cybercrime. The process of identifying cybercrime and taking appropriate action can be rigorous and expensive.
Each organization needs to have in place an IT department with qualified security personnel to determine and act appropriately on the threat whenever need arises. The target organization may also consider hiring the services of an independent computer forensics investigator who will provide insights as to the prevention and detection of future e-crimes.
Conclusion
Cybercrime is one of the top current IT threats, and every organization must establish the necessary up to date counter mechanisms for security purposes.
Reference List
Durbin, S. (2014). View: The top five IT threats of 2015 – FT. The Financial Times. Web.