Essay on How to Avoid Being a Victim of Cybercrime

Due to the massive and sheer number of connection among the people and electronic devices, cyber-crime is now indeed a bigger risk worldwide currently than ever before (Grabosky, 2016). Cybercrime refers to aspects or kind of cyber or computer related crimes. Based on statistics and data available on cybercrime, it is speculated that every three seconds somebody's identity gets stolen. Cybercrime has surpassed prohibited drug trafficking regarding money making criminally. Moreover, if there were no security packages that are sophisticated, unprotected personal computers could get infected within four minutes just after connecting to the internet. There are several ways in which individuals are committing cybercrime use depending on their goals and the skill-set. They include copyright infringement, fraud, bullying, child pornography, cyber stalking, and theft of personal data among many other crimes.

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The methods in which an individual can avoid getting victimized as a result of cybercrime are many. It is quite something that proper precaution ought to be undertaken to prevent such incidences. Firstly, avoid the habit of downloading unknown applications. In reality, the internet harbors much free software from unknown sources, and thus the software may contain malicious applications that when installing it on your computer they may easily cause enormous damage to it. Therefore, to prevent this kind of fraudulence, its ideally relevant to only download applications that understand them adequately (Grabosky, 2016).

Secondly, to ensure that you prevent hacking, keep your passwords of various accounts private, confidential and personal. Avoid exposing your passwords to other people as this may expose you to the crime. The passwords also are supposed to be changed in often schedule so as to prevent other people from accessing your private accounts on the internet without your permission or consent (Berlatsky, 2014). In addition to this, avoid joining sites that youre not familiar with and then providing your credentials either knowingly or unknowingly. When a "pop-up" site emerges on the window, it is always advisable that you ignore them rather than clicking on them. It is because some automatically retrieve your information just from the click.

Thirdly, avoiding the use of the public computer. It is essential in the prevention of cybercrime victimization. When you want to carry out important transactions such as banking or online shopping, don't use public computers. Some people who may earlier own used the computers may have in one way or another installed application or programs that may have the ability to track and record your passwords. After you have left the region or cybercafe, they will easily access your personal data and thus scamming you based on what youre doing. Other individuals in congested cybercafe have the ability to note your password just by looking at what you are typing and eventually they may log into your email and do whatever they want with your account. Therefore, it is essential to ensure that you while carrying out important function online ensure that you are in possession of a personal computer (Berlatsky, 2014).

Another way to avoid being a victim of cybercrime is to make sure that you prevent the use of public networks. That said, it is equally important to avoid connecting to free WIFI from public places, coffee shops and of recent in buses while traveling. In this case, as you connect your electronic device to such networks, you take the risk of exposing it to potential hackers, and thus they can easily break through the low-level system securities that such kind of systems possesses (Berlatsky, 2014). Finally, it will lead to damage of your electronic device since they can send viruses to make it malfunction or steal personal information from it.

Cases such as cyber bullying may be avoided by; not minding bashers or trolls which agitate in the internet surfers to other users and the process, they raise up a discussion which may later lead to verbal abuse. To avoid such incidences do not answer back to attention seekers either those commenting bad comments in your profile. Avoid being emotionally affected with what you read on the internet, and they can't hurt you. They are just words. Report cyber bullies in an occasion you encounter them to relevant authorities such as administrators and moderators (Grabosky, 2016). Alternatively, you may shut down your computer and leave it if the cyber bullies persist since they only exist on the internet. If you log out from the web, then you break away with them.

Consequently, you can prevent online piracy by; avoiding the downloading of illegal contents. It is preferred to purchase content only from legitimate and reputable sources like iTunes and Amazon. Stop the sharing of content with other users freely such as music and videos over the internet as it may lead to online piracy which punishable severely by the federal law (Grabosky, 2016). Be the first person to report the sites that intentionally share pirated content if you encounter them. You may contact the local government authorities or ISP which deal with such related issues.

Last but not least, prevention of cybercrime on online pornography you can do the following; block pornographic websites by installing an antivirus application on your personal computer and setting it over the internet. If you are using Local Area Network or Metropolitan Network, you have the responsibility to contact the administrators so as to restrict the access to such areas. Ensure that you talk and put on board the people viewing or exposing children to pornographic content. Explain to them accordingly on the impact and effects posed by doing carrying out such activities, and it should be well-understood that discussion may resolve such issues if right a right channel is undertaken (Conklin et al., 2016). Report prostitution activities such as cyber prostitution and report such cases to the local area authorities so as they can respond promptly and take proper actions.

In conclusion, it is important that people are aware of cybercrime so that they can evade them. Most people are often victimized in cyber-crimes due to lack of knowledge concerning the same. Therefore, it is the responsibility of every individual to understand such incidences as they are increasingly flooding the market and equally becoming a dangerous adventure globally especially in the developing world. In summary, the ways to avoid being a cybercrime victim are; keep latest patches and updates to your computer. Incorporate the use of security software to protect your computer, protect your personal computer, review credit cards and bank statements regularly, chose strong passwords to use, and configuration of your computer securely (Conklin et al., 2016). The paper has outlined satisfactorily on the means on ways of avoiding being a victim of cybercrime.

References

Conklin, W. A., White, G. B., Williams, D., Davis, R., & Cothren, C. (2016). APrinciples of computer security.

Grabosky, P. N. (2016). Cybercrime.

Berlatsky, N. (2014). Cybercrime. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, a part of Gale, Cengage Learning.

Stefoff, R. (2009). Cybercrime. Tarrytown, NY: Marshall Cavendish Benchmark