Chapter 3 - Crime Areas

3.2 Malware - Law enforcement considerations

Often law enforcement services direct their resources to different priorities than those identified by the Internet security industry. This is due in part to the high level strategic view of the security industry compared to the more granular, ground level viewpoint of law enforcement. Many police forces often do not have the capacity, capability or the resources to tackle a global cybercrime threat, and are limited to simply dealing with the cases presented to them by victims.

There is also a natural time-lag between the Internet security industry identifying a threat within the broader user community and it subsequently registering on law enforcement’s cybercrime radar. For example, from the viewpoint of the security industry, mobile malware is very much a current problem, whereas much of law enforcement still considers this a future threat.