If you have been thinking a career in criminal justice, it's about time you learned about the newest kinds of crime that are a threat to individuals, businesses, and governments. As a matter of fact, these crimes, which are computer crimes, have become a major focus of the Department of Homeland Security. The types of computer crime that have become the largest threats are those that have been putting down commercial websites and compromising sensitive information, such as credit card numbers and social security numbers. In this article, you will get the basic information you need in order to keep on top of the major issues in today's computer security landscape.

When you are learning about types of computer crime, you probably are going to think first about hacking. This makes perfect sense. The thing you should know about hacking, however, is that it is a broad term and basically describes an action in which a computer criminal breaks into a website that he or she does not have privileged access to. For example, if someone breaks into your social networking page, such as a Facebook page, you can say that you were hacked. Yes, this is a crime, but think about the implications of a computer criminal hacking a government page. Surely, you can see why this is problematic.

Another of the most common types of computer crime is phishing. This is a more complicated crime and requires a little bit of social engineering. In this crime, someone sends you a request from a fake page that is designed to look like a page that you trust. For example, imagine that you get an email from your bank asking for your account number. You enter your account number only to learn that the message was not from your bank, but from a criminal posing as a bank representative. This is a way in which criminals fool people into giving them valuable information.

People who are thinking of types of computer crime also might think of downloading materials that are not authorized. For example, a person who downloads movies, books, and music that are supposed to be for sale, for which they are not paying a cent are actually committing a computer crime. While this often is not considered a focus of homeland security professionals, it can be so when people download materials that are actually illegal, such as certain kinds of pornography and political propaganda that spreads hate and violent ideas. When this is the case, criminal justice professionals need to make sure that they are on top of the case.

If you have been reading about types of computer crime because this is a criminal justice area that you are interested in, you should be happy to know that this is one of the most quickly growing criminal justice topics in the country. This is especially true because of the growing concern over homeland security. If this is a field in which you are interested, it might be time for you to begin studying for your degree, which you can begin studying for online.