Start Date

11-8-2016

Description

In the last decade, there has been an unprecedented global adoption of information and communication technologies. While developed countries are more attractive targets and suffer significantly higher losses to cyber-crime as a percentage of their Gross Domestic Product, developing and least-developed countries countries are more vulnerable. Phone-based scams such as phreaking and caller identity spoofing are instances of cyber-fraud, theft and forgery that are very widespread in these countries. Interestingly, deception is at the heart of these cyber-crimes. This paper acknowledges the extant literature on deception detection and the contribution of the related theories of deception, but proposes the development of a theory that treats cyber-deception and fraud as fundamentally socio-technical phenomena. Drawing on Humanities and the socio-anthropological concept of ‘cunning intelligence’, we aim to develop an explanatory lens of fraud that can be applied to different types of cyber-crime.

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Aug 11th, 12:00 AM

Building a Theory of Socio-technical Fraud

In the last decade, there has been an unprecedented global adoption of information and communication technologies. While developed countries are more attractive targets and suffer significantly higher losses to cyber-crime as a percentage of their Gross Domestic Product, developing and least-developed countries countries are more vulnerable. Phone-based scams such as phreaking and caller identity spoofing are instances of cyber-fraud, theft and forgery that are very widespread in these countries. Interestingly, deception is at the heart of these cyber-crimes. This paper acknowledges the extant literature on deception detection and the contribution of the related theories of deception, but proposes the development of a theory that treats cyber-deception and fraud as fundamentally socio-technical phenomena. Drawing on Humanities and the socio-anthropological concept of ‘cunning intelligence’, we aim to develop an explanatory lens of fraud that can be applied to different types of cyber-crime.