New Jersey State Police - Attacking Cyber Threats

     I just read some information from the New Jersey State Police site. It looks like they (NJSP) are taking an active role going after cyber threats. Here is the title of the cyber unit and an explanation of what their job entails.

•    Cyber Crimes Unit - "The Cyber-Crimes Unit (CCU) is composed of State Police enlisted detectives, civilian analysts, and task forces from other police agencies. The CCU has two investigative squads and additional personnel dedicated to the FBI Regional Computer Forensic Laboratory (RCFL). The mission of the CCU Investigation squad is to conduct and assist in investigations where computers, networks, telecommunication devices, and other technological instruments are the vehicle or target for the commission of criminal acts against network resources critical to the function of corporate or government entities". Here is a list of crimes the unit investigates. Computer Intrusions, Data theft, Online ID Theft, Unlawful Access, Account Hijacking, Cyber Terrorism, Cyber Stalking, Social Networking/Email account intrusions.

I read this site and it made me think; “now this is what police agencies should be doing”. I have to try to get someone from my Department Headquarters (Pennsylvania State Police), to take a look at this site maybe this will motivate them to imitate what NJ is doing.

Reference:

                        Special Investigations Section, Cyber Crimes Unit. Retrieved from                                                          http://www.njsp.org/divorg/invest/cyber-crimes-unit.html

Information Security Awareness Training

     Well my cyber training is still postponed with no reschedule date, as of yet, so I will discuss the importance of Information Security Awareness training. I believe this is an important subject for any organization to partake in, however, the training should coincide with what the organization is trying to accomplish. 

     I think police departments across the U.S. should send their officers to some form of security awareness training. The training can be accomplished online; this will prevent individuals from not being at work for an extended period of time. There are several private agencies that offer this training for a fee and there are some that are free. 

     If the organizations that accredit police agencies will add Information Security Awareness training as part of an accreditation curriculum then the police agencies will make it mandatory to attend these training. 

Still no date yet for my cyber training. However, I will continue to blog on this important subject. While my agency postponed my training the internet is growing and the thieves are learning new ways to commit cyber crimes. The addition of the new iPhone 6 and its new pay system will be another challenge for law enforcement. I hear that it will include some form of cloud system to access payment to merchants. Someone like myself without any form of cyber training will not know how to assist a potential victim. The newer the technology the more opportunity for hackers and cyber criminals to commit crimes.

Training postponed

My Cyber training that was scheduled was postponed. The training that was scheduled is exclusive to Law Enforcement and with the current issues in Pennsylvania it caused the training to be continued to another day.  I will update this blog when I have the date scheduled.

I am going to training

This is my third blog and I have to provide you with this important information. My organization is sending me to  “Gathering, Handling, Exploiting Cyber Evidence” training. This is my organizations first attempt at providing training to its officers. The sad thing about this, out of all the officers at my station only two of us singed up for this training. I guess some people think this is not an important issue.

            The training consists of: forensics summary, legal issues, changes/current technology, basic forensic tools, and forensics live demonstration, case/scenario and forensics misc. I am looking forward to this training and will update you on the completion of it.

Data from the FBI Crime Statistics report shows that from 2003-2011, traditional bank robberies has decreased, while data from the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) annual report from 2001-2012 have shown that cyber attacks has increased.

            Cyber crimes are a new kind of threat and this data should be an eye-opener for local police agencies to get on board with the training of their officers against the threats of cyber crimes.

Most police departments are equipping their Officers with the latest weapons or bullet proof vest. However, when it comes to Cyber Security most Officers have no idea what it entails. Cyber Fraud will be the greatest national threat to the United States, and I think local law enforcement should take the necessary steps in learning to defend themselves against it.

 I look forward to discussing this blog on a regular basis.