Cybercrime is one of the fastest growing areas of crime in the world today, and it affects millions of people. Recently, California Attorney General Kamala Harris created an eCrime Unit that will have a full staff of DOJ attorneys and professional investigators. They will spend their time identifying and prosecuting all types of cybercrimes including identity theft.
With the increase in these types of crimes, it’s good to see that some areas of the government are starting to take more proactive steps. Of course, California has been investigating these crimes before the creation of this unit. However, it seems that there will be more of a focus on this area of criminal activity now. Last year, out of the top 25 metropolitan areas for complaints regarding identity theft, 10 of those areas were in California. The FTC data shows that California has more incidents of identity theft than any other state, and it was the third highest per capita.
The criminals today are using the web, smart phones, and all of the other types of modern digital devices to cause some serious problems for people online and offline. The current eCrime unit includes 20 attorneys and investigators that will be working throughout the state to combat these crimes. The only question that remains is if this will be enough to handle all of the crimes that they are likely to start discovering.
Chances are that in a few years, if the unit has success, they will start to expand. In fact, if the rate of cybercrime continues to grow as quickly as it is right now, they will have little choice but to add more investigators and attorneys to the team.
Other law enforcement agencies and government bodies around the country are starting to develop their own cybercrime task forces. With enough investigators, perhaps they will be able to slow the growth of all of these computer related crimes.