Most Cyber Crimes Are Federal Offenses

Lakeland, FL (Law Firm Newswire) January 8, 2015 – Victimization via computer is a growing problem for law enforcement.

It is not easy to track cybercrimes, and the more sophisticated cybercriminals become, the harder it is to keep up with the latest in technology to catch them.

“More often than not, cybercrimes have been perpetrated against children,” says Thomas Grajek, a Lakeland, Fla. criminal defense attorney. “However, over the course of the last few years, crimes against older teens and young adults have also been on the rise. Consider the case of the male nurse who counseled at least two people on how to commit suicide or the cyberbullies who drove several young teens to commit suicide.”

Cyberstalking is another form of computer assisted criminal activity, and is comparable to physical stalking. It involves similar harassing activities, such as unwanted emails, text mails, and voice mails. Although this form of stalking usually does not involve face-to-face contact, it may evolve into that. This particular activity may also manifest as someone spreading erroneous, spiteful and less than flattering comments about someone else using social media.

Other cybercrimes may include, but not be limited to, identity theft and deliberately letting a virus or other type of malware loose on the Internet.

Computer crimes against children often involve the predator stalking a child online and attempting to lure them into a sexual liaison offline by chatting with them, flattering them and slowly, over the course of several weeks or months, grooming the child as potential prey. For those who watch television regularly, the Dateline: To Catch a Predator TV series may be familiar. It captures predators on camera as they are supposedly meeting a young teen at a home for sex. In some of the sting operations, the police were involved, and arrested the men as they left the rendezvous home.

“Individuals charged with a crime such as luring need a criminal defense attorney. Child endangerment is a grave crime and considered to be a felony, whether the predator/prey relationship was online only or not. If convicted, an adult may spend life in prison, where child predators do not fare well,” said Grajek. Prosecutors often add computer crimes to child endangerment when it comes to charging and trying cases.

For a complete list of laws that exist in each state relating to cybercrimes, visit: http://www.haltabuse.org/resources/laws/