Mapping and Measuring Cybercrime (Invited Forum)

Policing practices, such as the allocation of personnel, are often shaped by incident reports and evidence of shifting patterns of crime, making the collection and analysis of crime statistics of great value. Cybercrime is no exception. Statistics are being collected on cybercrime, such as by the Internet Crime Complaint Center, and many police forces around the world.

However, the distributed nature of the Internet makes it challenging to examine the specific geographies of cybercrime. Furthermore, given the comparatively recent rise of criminal threats online, there are few agreed standards over the best ways to map and measure the nature and incidence of crimes perpetrated over the Internet. As with other crime, there can be disincentives to report cybercrime, such as fears that reports could undermine public confidence in a business enterprise.

This was an invited forum to discuss the most appropriate ways of measuring and mapping Cybercrime to inform legislative, research and policy debates. The forum’s invited participants include:

• members of police forces involved in serious and technology crime policing
• members of UK Parliament and Council of Europe governments
• leading computer security firms
• leading academics in UK and US universities involved in allied research from areas across disciplines including law, criminology, sociology, and cyber geography

This forum is supported by a grant from Nominet Trust.