Have you been a victim?

Have you been a victim? Find out why.

A burglar walking down a street at night might pass a dozen houses before selecting his victim. Lights, noise, dogs, and nosy neighbours – all these things can deter them. It’s the same on the internet.

The difference is that technology means that criminals can look at millions of houses before deciding which ones to attack and can then attack all the vulnerable ones simultaneously.

Except in very unusual circumstances, such as fame or vendetta, you are unlikely to be singled out individually for attack. It is much more random than that.

Criminals use the internet’s reach and efficiency against us. They can:

• Send out millions of emails in a day.
• Download DIY virus kits from the internet.
• Hijack tens of thousands of computers to spread viruses and spam.
• Use viruses to find vulnerable computers or private information.
• Anonymously subcontract techy stuff to bad hackers.
• Buy and sell vast quantities of personal information.
• Use software to guess most passwords in seconds.
• Host fraudulent websites on other people’s computers.
• Impersonate real users using stolen identities.
• Operate clandestinely almost anywhere in the world.

And it costs them next to nothing. On the other hand the rewards are substantial:

• If someone signs up for a gambling site after clicking on a spammer’s advert, the spammer receives up to half of the money they spend gambling as a ‘reward’ for bringing in the customer.
• Or a share of their spending on online porn or product sales.
• With a stolen identity, they can empty your bank account or max out your credit cards.
• E-commerce sites can suffer extortion or risk having their site jammed.
• Criminals can impersonate legitimate buyers and sellers online.

How do they get your details? There are countless ways you can be targeted, including:

• Your name and personal details might be stolen from a database
• Your email might be lifted from a friend’s computer that has suffered a virus attack.
• You might get a virus in a spam email that has been sent to ten million email addresses.
• Your computer could be the victim of a computer-to-computer virus that sneaks in.

There are three key points:

• Online crime is about making money.
• Victims tend to be targeted at random.
• People with less protection are much more likely to be victims.

If you are connected to the internet, the chances are that you will be on the receiving end of a virus or fraudulent email or other attack. But that doesn’t mean you have to be a victim.

If you protect yourself properly (and we’ll tell you how on this website), you can dramatically cut the risk of being a victim. Think of it as leaving the lights on, setting the burglar alarm and buying two large Alsatians and a twitchy Jack Russell Terrier.