By Staff Writer – Boonsri Dickinson (@boonspoon)

Cybercrime has become so organized lately. And criminals certainly don’t discriminate. Anyone with a computer is fair game for an attack.

The criminals have been known to target banking institutions, military programs, and utility companies. Not only are hackers committing these armed digital robberies on individuals, they are causing societal disruption by hacking into a country’s infrastructure. For instance, an attack on a utility company caused power outages in several cities.

Companies aren’t safe either.

ABCNews.com reports:

Industry, however, has been a half-hearted collaborator. Last year, 85 percent of big companies and government agencies said they were victims of cyber attacks — and private industry spent $300 billion to fight hackers.

And worse, companies are shy about reporting a security breach. They would rather take care of the problem themselves. Even if they did want help, who would they call? Would they call 911?

The Wall Street Journal reported that the FBI is looking into a security breach at Citigroup Inc. The hackers who stole tens of millions of dollars may have been linked to the Russian cyber gang. However, the banking company claims this is not true.

One thing is for sure, criminals know how to steal money from people who use online banking without ever holding a gun to their heads. Recently, it was reported that thieves stole $1 million from Robert Blanchard’s Citibank account. Luckily, authorities were able to recover most of Blanchard’s money, while Citibank took care of the rest. Blanchard isn’t the only victim. In 2008, there were 270,000 complaints made about cyber crimes.

The cyber arms race is here to stay as the incidence of cyber crime steadily increases. (Corporations and government organizations suffer thousands of attacks each day).  The New York Times reports:

Many countries, including the United States, are developing weapons for use on computer networks that are ever more integral to the operations of everything from banks to electrical power systems to government offices. They include “logic bombs” that can be hidden in computers to halt them at crucial times or damage circuitry; “botnets” that can disable or spy on Web sites and networks; or microwave radiation devices that can burn out computer circuits miles away.

The new cybersecurity chief, Howard Schmidt, will navigate this fuzzy world of cyberspace. There are many gray areas to investigate. For instance, when a country launches a cyber attack, how do we know when to declare war?

Image: flickr/ Mikey G Ottawa

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