Cybercrime: a longitudinal register-based study on demographic, socio-economic and technological determinants

Strengthening public security and protecting institutions are crucial to society and of great concern to the Swedish government.Given an increased use of internet in daily life,which is positive per se, the negative impacts of cyber threats on people’s integrity and economic consequences are inevitable.

While good preventive strategies should target particular risk groups for various types of cybercrime, yet research on the risk factors of cybercrime is insufficient.

Understanding the risk factors of susceptibility to cybercrime and the context in which cybercrime occurs would offer a way to exploit preventive strategies for the most effective outcomes.

We will provide an empirically grounded knowledge on risk factors for three main elements of cybercrime:offenders,victims and the Information Technology(IT) environment. Our project is based on longitudinal register-based data and qualitative documents.

First, we will identify demographic and socioeconomic predictors of cybercrime among offenders and victims using national registered data from the National Council for Crime Prevention and Statistics Sweden.

Second, we will explore the cybercrime’s IT components which are possessed by the victims and offenders(computers,smart devices,hacking tools).

In line with the national policy to strengthen public security our multidisciplinary study aims to improve the effectiveness of crime prevention in Sweden and provides scientific knowledge to combat such threats to societal security