Cyber Law

Staying ahead of crime on the internet has its own challenges and in fact staying ahead of the criminals is near impossibility. This is a challenge to the individual, to businesses and organizations and to even the government. Such has been the scope of the cyber attacks and issues concerning security. The internet and all other information technologies are a behemoth to deal with owing to their global nature. Cyber attacks are therefore seen from about all angles. The enactment of laws to curb the menace is sometimes defeated by the fact that the laws are only applied in a specific country and not globally. Again the rate at which cyber crime is growing leaves stakeholders in this industry well surprised and not really knowing what to do. Cyber criminals continue to exploit and use the convenience, the anonymity and the speed which is provided by the fast changing technology available today. The cyber crimes are for example the cyber attacks on computer data and systems,social engineering, internet auction fraud, identity theft, child pornography, cyber espionage, the infiltration of online financial services and the ecommerce sites, zombie computers, the more traditional forms of attacks of viruses and malware, botnets, denial of service attacks, email scams and phishing.

The approach to curbing the very problems associated with cyber crime and security needs to be revisited and has to be drawn all over again. Combating cyber crime may never be very easy but there are ways and means of cutting down on the risk and incidences of crime. For the individual, it is necessary to learn the basics and take the necessary precautions. The organizations and the businesses take even more drastic measures since the stakes involved are very high. There are whole departments which have been created to deal with cyber security. Here there are cyber security experts whose sole intention should be to ensure that the business or organization does not fall prey to the cyber criminals. The cyber crimes committed are so many and different and each may require it own unique approach to combat. Therefore, not just a single law is required to take care of this whole menace.

There are very important steps to take and which will certainly work to guarantee that an individual does not fall victim to the machinations of cyber criminals. The steps listed and discussed will ensure that safety is assured. The very first rule is that staying informed of happenings and all other new information and events drawn up from the cyber security field. The knowledge of what is happening and the release of security patches ensure that both hardware and software is kept security tight. The backing up of files and data should be a practice done regularly to ensure that in the odd occurrence of a cyber attack is eliminated. Antivirus software should be used to protect a computer and make sure any odd activity is flagged and appropriate action taken. The antivirus should be updated regularly and this guarantees full protection.

Other measures are the frequent changing of passwords to ensure that data and accounts are protected. The ideal passwords should have at least six characters and which should not be word contained in the dictionary. The ideal password should have a combination of lower case and upper case letters, special characters, numbers which are way better and offer good protection from any hacking activity. Passwords should be protected and should not be given out to other people. Another measure is that care should be taken to ensure that email attachments are not opened indiscriminately. Suspicious emails especially those that have extensions and are from unknown sources should not be opened. These file extension may carry viruses and when opened release their load into the system causing all manner of damage. Encryption is yet another way to go about protecting data and communication on the internet. Many different systems allow for the encryption and all that is needed is to turn on the encryption to protect your data.

The current status of cyber crime guarantees that by taking measures to secure your own computer and protect your personal information, you are not only preventing cyber criminals but also protecting others internet users.