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Law Enforcement and Disruption of Offline and Online Activities: A Review of Contemporary Challenges

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Cybercrime in Context

Part of the book series: Crime and Justice in Digital Society ((CJDS,volume I))

Abstract

The digital world represents a new frontier for law enforcement operations. The virtual nature of online communications creates challenges regarding legal frameworks and sovereignty that are exacerbated by the inherent context of the digital world, the current state of policing expertise and resources and the detection and reporting rates of cybercrimes. This chapter presents an informed review of the current state of “what works” in policing both offline and online, providing at each step the context needed to understand how new technologies impact police operations. Our conclusion suggests that new models of policing are indeed needed to effectively police the digital world and that cooperation through nodal governance could improve the ability of police agencies to regulate cyberoffenders.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    A botnet is “[...] a network of computers controlled by a malicious hacker who uses them—without their owner’s knowledge—to commit a broad range of crimes. Because of their versatility and scalability, botnets provide the core infrastructure of many cybercrime operations” (Dupont, 2017: 98).

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Criminal Justice, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, USA

    Camille Faubert & Jerry Ratcliffe

  2. School of Criminology, Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada

    David Décary-Hétu & Benoît Dupont

  3. School of Criminology, Criminal Justice and Emergency Management, California State University – Long Beach, Long Beach, CA, USA

    Aili Malm

Authors
  1. Camille Faubert
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  2. David Décary-Hétu
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  3. Aili Malm
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  4. Jerry Ratcliffe
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  5. Benoît Dupont
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Camille Faubert .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Criminal Law and Criminology, Vrije Universiteit (VU) Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Marleen Weulen Kranenbarg

  2. Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR), Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Rutger Leukfeldt

  3. Centre of Expertise Cyber Security, The Hague University of Applied Sciences, The Hague, The Netherlands

    Rutger Leukfeldt

Additional information

This chapter is part of the research project “Disrupting the Darknet: Law Enforcement Operations and their Impact of Darknet Offenders,” funded by PMI IMPACT—a global grant initiative by Philip Morris International (PMI) to support projects dedicated to fighting illegal trade and related crimes. In the performance of its research, the authors maintained full independence from PMI. The views and opinions expressed in this document are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of PMI.

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Faubert, C., Décary-Hétu, D., Malm, A., Ratcliffe, J., Dupont, B. (2021). Law Enforcement and Disruption of Offline and Online Activities: A Review of Contemporary Challenges. In: Weulen Kranenbarg, M., Leukfeldt, R. (eds) Cybercrime in Context. Crime and Justice in Digital Society, vol I. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-60527-8_19

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