A Deep Dive into the World’s Leading Hubs of Cybercrime
The Cybercrime Index has ranked countries by cybercrime threat level. This research is a result of three years of intensive research by an international team of researchers. The study, published in the journal PLOS ONE, identifies the globe’s key cybercrime hotspots by ranking the most significant sources of cybercrime at a national level.
The research will help remove the veil of anonymity around cybercriminal offenders and we hope that it will aid the fight against profit-driven cybercrime.” – Dr. Miranda Bruce, University of Oxford and UNSW Canberra.
Co-author Dr. Miranda Bruce, from the University of Oxford and UNSW Canberra, said the study will enable the public and private sectors to focus their efforts on key cybercrime hubs and spend less time and funds on countermeasures in countries where the problem is not as significant. “The research will help remove the veil of anonymity around cybercriminal offenders and we hope that it will aid the fight against profit-driven cybercrime,” Dr. Bruce said. “The data that underpins the Index will help identify new hotspots and it is possible early interventions could be made in at-risk countries before a serious cybercrime problem even develops,” she added.
The Cybercrime Index is based on a survey of leading cybercrime experts from around the world who are involved in cybercrime intelligence gathering and investigations. The experts nominated the countries they consider to be the most significant sources of five major categories of cybercrime, ranked each country according to the impact, professionalism, and technical skill of its cybercriminal offenders, and then compiled the data in a report.
“The five major categories of cybercrime assessed by the study were technical products/services, attacks and extortion, data/identity theft, scams, and cashing out/money laundering,” said Dr. Bruce. “By continuing to collect this data, we’ll be able to monitor the emergence of any new hotspots and it is possible early interventions could be made in at-risk countries before a serious cybercrime problem even develops,” she noted.
Co-author Professor Jonathan Lusthaus, from the University of Oxford’s Department of Sociology and Oxford School of Global and Area Studies, said that cybercrime has been an invisible phenomenon because offenders often mask their physical locations by hiding behind fake profiles and technical protections. “The best means we have to draw a picture of where these offenders are actually located is to survey those whose job it is to track these people,” Professor Lusthaus said.
Many people think that cybercrime is global and fluid, but this study supports the view that, much like forms of organized crime, it is embedded within particular contexts.
The next step of the research is to figure out why some countries have become cybercrime hotspots, and others haven’t, and whether national characteristics like educational attainment, internet penetration, GDP, or other national attributes are associated with cybercrime. Many people think that cybercrime is a global and fluid phenomenon, but the Cybercrime Index supports the view that it is embedded within particular contexts.
Dr. Bruce, the Department of Sociology and UNSW Canberra, said that the collaboration with the University of Oxford has produced the World Cybercrime Index, which will enable the public and private sectors to direct their resources more effectively. “The research will help remove the veil of anonymity around cybercriminal offenders and we hope that it will aid the fight against profit-driven cybercrime,” Dr. Bruce said. “The data that underpins the Index will help identify new hotspots and it is possible early interventions could be made in at-risk countries before a serious cybercrime problem even develops,” she added.
The Cybercrime Index provides a deeper understanding of the geography of cybercrime and how different countries specialize in different types of cybercrime. It includes data from 92 leading cybercrime experts from around the world, who were asked to consider five major categories of cybercrime, nominate the countries they consider to be the most significant sources of each of these types of cybercrime, and then rank each country according to the impact, professionalism, and technical skill of its cybercriminal offenders. The top ten countries are Russia, Ukraine, China, the US, Nigeria, Romania, North Korea, UK, Brazil, and India.
Professor Federico Varese from Sciences Po in France said that the study is the first step in a broader effort to understand the local dimensions of cybercrime production across the world. “We are hoping to expand the study so that we can determine whether national characteristics like educational attainment, internet penetration, GDP, or levels of corruption are associated with cybercrime. Many people think that cybercrime is global and fluid, but this study supports the view that, much like forms of organized crime, it is embedded within particular contexts,” Professor Varese said.
Professor Ridhi Kashyap from the University of Oxford and Professor Nigel Phair from Monash University are the other co-authors of the study. The study has been funded by the European Union-supported project CRIMGOV.
The study “Mapping the global geography of cybercrime with the World Cybercrime Index” has been published in the scientific journal PLOS ONE.
