NCJ Number
218028
Date Published
2007
Length
25 pages
Annotation
This chapter discusses how new technologies are used to facilitate the commission of crimes and manage the proceeds of crime.
Abstract
As an example of modern technology's effect on criminality, the chapter presents a case study of pedophilia. Pedophiles tend to collect and disseminate child pornography as part of their sexual obsession with children. This has been influenced throughout the years by advances in image technology. The most significant technological impact on this class of criminality has resulted from the related innovations of the digitalization of images and their anonymous transmission to multiple users through the Internet. The Internet has increased pedophiles' communication with one another and with their potential victims. Regarding the general role of technology in crime commission, it serves three broad functions: communication; the production and storage of information, the marketing of goods and services; and the packaging and concealment of crimes. This chapter explains how these general uses of technology in crime commission apply in particular types of crimes, for example, command and control of terrorist operations, money laundering, identity theft, extortion, embezzlement, and stalking. The chapter notes that the single largest category of crime under new technologies is occupational fraud. The Enron case is cited as an example of such crime, whereby technology is used by individuals and/or groups of employees to commit fraud and other types of offenses. As technology offers new opportunities to commit and conceal crime, it alters the weight of factors that induce persons to commit crimes under the belief that they can succeed in achieving crime-related goals without being caught. An implication of the use of new technologies to perpetrate and conceal crimes is the adjustments that must be made in the allocation of crime-control resources. 4 notes and 13 references