 Cyber crime is a very important topic in today's date and time. The news reported that in Pakistan alone in the last three years, the number of cybercrimes have increased by 83%. Now with the advent of internet and internet becoming ubiquitous and becoming an essential part of the lives of almost each one of us, it is only understandable that that also led to an increase in cybercrimes. Now we want to look at in this lesson that what cybercrime is and you know what are its categories, what are its types and then what are some safety tips through which we can remain safe from the cybercrime. The main objectives of this lesson include an exploration of cybercrime, creating a basic awareness about cybercrime, gaining more knowledge about cybercrime and understanding the risks of harmful online behavior. Now let's, before we you know look at the downsides of cybercrime and how we can protect ourselves from cybercrime, let's first see that what exactly is cybercrime. Now as in regular societies and regular day-to-day lives, we have you know we were subjected to crime, we have robbery, we have theft. Similarly when the birth of internet gave birth to a cyber society which is the virtual variant of an actual society, naturally that cyber society is marked by cybercrime. Cybercrime can also be referred to as a computer crime and it is a crime which essentially involves a computer, a mobile and a network. The computer may be used as a weapon for crime or the poor computer may itself be a target. Now when we say that the computer itself is a target that means that we are you know using a computer to attack other computer and then when we say that computer is a weapon then we are actually using a computer to you know commit some real world crimes. Now who are, who is committing this cybercrime? The ones who are committing cybercrime are called cybercriminals. Now they are, they are those individuals who are doing crimes by using computer as a target or as an object. Again let's look into a bit more detail what exactly is cybercrime. Now for instance when you purchase a home it comes with a door and a lock. You always ensure that the door and the lock exist and are working properly. You may even purchase security systems. Likewise your computer system is almost like your house and security tools are needed just like how in an actual home you need a door and you need a secure lock. Similarly your computer which is synonymous with your home in order to protect it you require security tools as well and if someone breaches into your computer system you know and excesses all your personal accounts tempers your data it is the criminal who is committing that particular crime. Let's look at some of the categories of cybercrime but before doing so you know I want to share with you that the cybercrime first originated in the US in the 1960s. Types of cybercrime or let's say more specifically examples of cybercrime included that you know somebody broke into the system of Brooklyn College New York and tempered with the academic transcripts of students. Then moving on in year 1978 Pacific National Bank security database because it was hacked that led to a loss of millions and millions of dollars. So you know these are just some examples of cybercrime which started in 1960s. So technically cybercrime is not a new concept but its frequency with you know passing time has become much higher. So now let's look at the categories of cybercrime. Cybercrime can be against an individual which means that the type of crime is in the form of hacking, identity theft, bullying against a certain individual. Similarly cybercrime can be against property also which means that just like how in a real life you know a criminal can rob a bank can steal somebody of their money. Similarly in in the cyber world they can steal a person's bank detail and misuse the credit card details or you know to to take money out of someone's account. They can access someone's password and again you know use those passwords in order to let's say steal or rob money from them. Then moving on cybercrime can be against the government also. Now although this one is not as common as the first two where the cybercrime is committed against an individual or is committed against property however nevertheless it does exist. In this category the criminals they hack government websites, military websites or this circulate a certain propaganda. A cybercrime against the government is also referred to as cyber terrorism. After looking at the categories of cybercrime let's look at the types of cybercrime. Cybercrime can be in the form of hacking. Hacking you may have all heard this term is in simple terms illegal access into a computer system without the permission of the computer owner. Then the second type can be software piracy. This crime occurs when a person violates copyrights and unauthorized and you know and does an unauthorized use of software or someone's intellectual property. The third type could be cyber stalking. This is a crime in which the attacker harasses or threatens a victim using electronic communication such as email, instant messaging or messages posted to a website or a social networking site. Stocking, cyber stalking essentially means that you know somebody is following your activity or the internet or in the physical world and actually using that to blackmail you or harass you or misuse and abuse you. Moving on to other types of cybercrime that can include the use of a malicious software. Now malicious softwares are internet based softwares of programs that are used to disrupt a network. The software is used to gain access to a system to steal sensitive information or data or cause damage to software and hardware. You know malicious softwares could include you know sending in viruses, sending worms, sending Trojan horses, email bombings, sending you with a lot of spam emails, email and let's say you know finishing up the storage of your email. These are all forms of cybercrime as well. The fourth form can be an identity theft where a criminal assesses data about a person's bank account, about a person's credit card, debit card or his or her passport or other ID information and then uses that to you know to either to further commit a crime or you know uses that to steal money or valuable possessions from an individual. Another type of cybercrime can be cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is when the internet and related technologies are used to bully other people. What is bullying? It is a deliberate repeated and hostile manner in which you know a intimidation or fear is inculcated into a person. Cyberbullying can be done where text messages, images, personal remarks posted online as well as through hate speech. Moving on and looking into other types of cybercrime and other one includes denial of service attack. Now what is a denial of service attack? It involves flooding a computer resource with more requests than it can handle. This causes the resource example for instance a web server to crash thereby denying authorized users the service offered by the resource. This as especially the females may be aware that during sales seasons you know you have the website of certain big brands where certain individual mafias let's say or certain individuals send in so many requests or make so many attempts that to genuine buyers it when they try to access that website they're not able to and that is and then that prevents them from actually buying that thing firsthand and are then forced to buy that as in the black market. So that is just one example of a denial of service attack. Moving on and looking into other examples of cybercrime it includes email spamming and spoofing. You all may have experienced that sometimes there are emails random emails which are sent out to thousands of people. So you know those are the kinds of email that one can receive then it is so that you know that you receive an email that appears to have originated from one source whereas actually it was sent from another source. You may have you know seen those examples where you see that you know somebody from your friend's account on a social network site is asking you for money that too is let's say an example of a certain cybercrime. Another type of cybercrime is computer vandalism. Computer vandalism is that you're damaging or destroying data rather than stealing or misusing it. When you're damaging and destroying somebody's data this is called computer vandalism. Moving on well I could give you you know and more examples of cybercrime and list down various other cybercrimes but you know while crime exists it is important to look at some of the safety measures or precautions which individuals or individuals around them can take in order to prevent themselves from these attacks of cybercrime. For instance firstly on your computer systems use antivirus software. You know this is the basic fundamental step which actually prevents your computer system from a lot of attacks from viruses, trojan horses, worms then secondly insert firewalls. Thirdly uninstall any unnecessary softwares available. Fourthly always maintain backups especially of important crucial data especially of data which you had to which you had to create with a lot of effort. Further never send your credit card number or your passwords to any site which is not secure. Moving on avoid sending you know your photographs or videographs or videos especially those of a personal nature to to strangers. Lastly do not open emails from strangers or you know emails which from this subject or from the title seem to be suspicious. This especially prevents your system from unwanted attacks. Moving on don't respond to harassing or negative messages in comments. You know responding to harassing messages or you know cyberbullying does not solve the problem so do not do that it just makes you part of a certain vicious cycle. Further like anything educate yourself learn about safe use of internet, learn about internet privacy and try to implement it. Keep your operating system up to date. If you have any updates please do include them. Change your passwords frequently and use hard to guess passwords. Further don't share access to your computer with strangers and even with acquaintances. Sometimes you know we are often subject to cybercrime because those people who are not whom we do not get fully trust but their acquaintances and not realizing the threat of cybercrime we end up sharing our computer systems or passwords with them. So definitely do not share your computer systems and your passwords and your details with strangers but also be very careful and mindful when you are doing it with the acquaintances. If you have a Wi-Fi network please protect it using a password and disconnect from internet when it is not in use. So when we looked at this lecture or let's say this lesson which was an introduction to cybercrime we were able to realize that just how a regular society is subjected to crime a cyber society which is a virtual variant of a regular society is subjected to cybercrime. There are various types various kinds of cybercrime however in order to remain safe in order to protect yourself in order to protect your loved ones please make use of antivirus softwares firewalls security patches be careful with the you with with sharing your credit card details with opening suspicious emails with you know with the use of your passwords because it's always best to practice these safety measures then become a victim of a certain cybercrime.