The Advancement of Technology and Cybercrime

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are inexperienced and do not have the funds to hire a professional programmer to evaluate and fix their security issues.

Hackers can gain access to databases and networks through various exploits and techniques of hacking. Hackers can cripple a business by shutting down their website through an attack called a “DoS” (Denial of Service) attack. Denial of Service attacks are acted out by flooding a server’s ports with so many packets it cannot process. This will result in the web service being so slow it is unresponsive, often to the point in which it crashes. This is a very common, subtle attack that can be very effective in some scenarios.

Another way of hacking into a business or individual’s network is a back door. Back doors are often referred to as Trojan horses. Trojan horses are pieces of software that seem harmless and show no symptoms of being malicious until the hacker decides to use the code it deploys on the target’s machine (Kim, 6). Hackers can use this to gain access to all of a user’s stored passwords and files. It is one of the most common forms of attack in the modern day cyberspace.

Attacks do not always have to be remotely acted out. If an attacker chooses to, they can go to the physical location of a network and if they can connect, they can observe all of the packets transferred from machine to machine across the network (Kim, 6). This type of attack is not near as common as others but still holds to be very reliable. The programs used to carry these attacks out are known as Sniffers, or Network Analyzers as a more proper term.

When it comes to regulations currently placed in the cyberspace, many of the Amendments in The Constitution carry over, but not word for word. The First Amendment applies to anything you say on the internet and you cannot be criminally charged for racism and radical beliefs. “The First Amendment protects the same forms of speech in cyberspace that it does in the real world. Hate speech and other forms of racist speech receive the same protection on the Internet as they have always received under traditional First Amendment analysis” (Kim, 8).

The fourth amendment protects individuals from being searched without good cause. The Government has no right to search any piece of technology without proof that there is a reason for them to have suspicion of an individual. Government officials have no right to search any piece of property without a warrant or good cause. This is not exclusive to an individual’s home or vehicle. However, “There is disagreement as to whether there should be a special approach created for computer-related searches and seizures...” (Kim, 9).

Alongside the Amendments, there are two systems that help process the way information and data are handled. The Information Technology System is not related to the Informational System. The Information System refers to people and the things people do while the Information Technology System caters to technology and automated processes. The Information Technology system follows a very strict set of instructions and is related to technology.

Policy against encryption is constantly debated against as people value their privacy. This is especially dominant in the economy. Without any way of encrypting data that pertains to gross product, it could very easily be compromised. This furthers the point that more complex security is crucial to the well-being of businesses and the economy. “The growing use of computers and online networks also means that individuals require assurances of privacy and security for their records and transmissions” (Shelley, 5).

The security the nation currently has is incapable of assuring that privacy and security is in good hands. Advancements need to be made very soon so the possibility of data theft is obsolete. Citizens need to be assured that their Government is secure and records are not being compromised. Citizens need to be assured that there is no reason for them to have any worry about nationwide security.

Some people could very well argue that security is on-par with where it should be in this day and age. The Department of Homeland Security works with many federal civilian agencies to ensure that everything runs smoothly (Kim, 20). They promote the use of updated policies and react to events that may occur as soon as they are recognized. The Department of Homeland Security has the National Cybersecurity Protection System which is constantly being updated and worked to perfection so the security of everything in the nation is not compromised.

While the DHS may possibly be working very hard and updating everything as quickly as possible, new methods of acting out attacks are occurring every single day. It is impossible to defend against an attack that is unrecognizable (Kim, 24). When an attack is successful, all data and information is put at jeopardy. Risking the smallest bit of top secret data could possibly be detrimental to society and our nation. If the wrong people have the right information, they can do a lot of wrong faster than anyone could imagine.

There seems to be countless anti-virus companies that make great products for defending machines and networks from attackers (Kim, 3). These companies gain knowledge by capturing viruses and malware and breaking the code to see how they work. They use this code to program the equivalent of vaccines for consumer machines to become immune to the virus. The companies that do this are very reliable and in most cases succeed very well at their goal. The community helps defend each other this way, so not everything is put on the government.

While anti-virus and anti-malware companies may seem perfect, they are not. These companies do have to get infected before they can do anything about a virus (Kim, 3). The odds of these viruses making their way to a user first is much more likely. Once a virus spreads, it is often very hard to stop. Companies will try and say their product detects every virus so they can bring in customers, but this is not all so true. They can only protect machines against viruses that are known by them and no company is conscious of every virus in the world.

Anti-virus companies work on a completely different scale than that of the United States government (Shelley, 2). The United States federal security is far more important than that of the individuals that make up society. Keeping government documents secure and free of damage is key to having a secure nation. The government’s levels of security should be prioritized over all other forms of security, not while the others are ignored. A push that will set the national cybersecurity standards high is what the country needs more than anything.

So why does any of this security matter to anyone that it doesn’t directly impact? The

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