Criminal expertise plays a crucial role in the choices offenders make when committing a crime, including their modus operandi. However, our knowledge about criminal decision making online remains limited. Drawing on insights from cyber security, we conceptualize the cybercrime commission process as the sequence of phases of the cyber kill chain that offenders go through. We assume that offenders who follow the sequence consecutively use the most efficient hacking method. Building upon the expertise paradigm, we hypothesize that participants with greater hacking experience and IT skills undertake more efficient hacks. To test this hypothesis, we analyzed data from 69 computer security and software engineering students who were invited to hack a vulnerable website in a computer lab equipped with monitoring software, which allowed to collect objective behavioral measures. Additionally, we collected individual measures regarding hacking expertise through an online questionnaire. After quantitatively measuring efficiency using sequence analysis, a regression model showed that the expertise paradigm may also apply to hackers. We discuss the implications of our novel research for the study of offender decision-making processes more broadly.
DOCUMENT
Attack surfaces are increasing as products are increasingly more connected. This has been acknowledged by the European Commission in their Europe: fit for the digital age strategy and in recent legislative proposals. Most importantly, the proposed Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) sets minimum cybersecurity requirements for products with digital elements. These requirements range from effective and regular tests to the dissemination of free security updates in case of a cybersecurity breach. This should ensure a base level of cybersecurity throughout the product’s lifetime. Unfortunately, there is a catch: not all products with digital elements fall within the scope of the proposed CRA. For instance, vehicles are not subject to the proposed Act. The exclusion of this category of products with digital elements seems to be based on the premise that ‘the sectoral rules achieve the same level of protection as the one provided for by this Regulation’ (recital 14). This contribution is challenging this premise, as it explores the level of cybersecurity as laid down in the proposed CRA and compares it to the level of cybersecurity ensured by the sectoral rules in vehicle regulation. Could this mean that your smartphone is going to be more cybersecure than your car?
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