Cybercrime in the Republic of Serbia: Prevalence, Situation and Perspectives

Abstract

The year 2022 was marked by anonymous reports of bombings in schools and other important institutions across Serbia, spread via computers. These events have triggered a public debate on whether the authorities responsible for combating cybercrime can adequately respond to such attacks. As the number of internet users increases, so does the number of potential victims of cybercrime and the obligation of states to protect citizens. Recent events have shown the vulnerability of society to high-tech crime and the risks it poses. The paper analyses the normative and institutional framework for combating cybercrime and data from the Ministry of Internal Affairs on cybercrime. The paper aims to suggest possible changes, based on the analysis of existing cybercrime legislation and the analysis of the institutional framework here and in some European countries, to ensure more effective protection against cybercrime. The paper uses both a normative and a comparative method to present the measures taken in other countries. Descriptive analysis was used to analyze the data collected. The conclusion is that despite a good normative framework, the fight against cybercrime is not adequate, mainly because of the far too small number of staff in special departments and sections of the prosecutor's office and the police compared to the number of crimes, which is increasing year by year. The danger is also that many people are not educated about the dangers of using the internet. Therefore, more attention should be paid shortly to educating citizens of all ages about the dangers and the types of cybercrime.

Cyber-victimization and Its Impact on Victim’s Psychosomatic Status

“…Based on previous research on traditional school victimization and cyber-victimization (Bjelajac, Filipovic and Stosic, 2022), the present study found that higher levels of general emotional intelligence were significantly associated with lower rates of cyber-victimization. Our findings in this case are consistent with the assumption that "peer cyber-victimization propensity is to some extent related to emotional maturity or lack thereof" (Stosic and Jankovic, 2022).…”

Exploring the prevalence of internet crimes among undergraduate students in a Nigerian University: A case study of the university of Ilorin

“…They also have a low level of perception that internet crime engagements are believed to be the only source of meeting academic demands and lastly, they have a low level of perception that internet crime engagements are only common among male than the female. This result is in tandem with the findings of [2,3,12] who confirmed the prevalence and involvement of youths in cybercrimes in their respective sample areas including Nigeria. From Table 4, the result of data analysis shows that the majority of respondents perceived that high rate of internet crime among students in the University of Ilorin is as a result of greediness, poverty and social influence.…”

“…A qualitative research approach was employed by [3] to compare and analyze the normative and institutional framework provided by the Ministry of Internal Affairs on cybercrime to combat the prevalence of cybercrimes in the Republic of Serbia and other European countries. The result of their analysis shows that despite a good normative measure, more efforts still need to be put in place in order to combat cybercrimes in the Republic of Serbia.…”

“…It has contributed to the invention of other Information and Communication Technology (ICT) solutions and services such as emails, e-commerce, social media, Internet of Things (IoTs) and its smart services, among others. Aside the numerous positive aspects of the internet such as social networking, worldwide linkages, job creation, improving medical and education access, expansion of commercial landscape and so on [1], it has also contributed to series of criminal activities in our society in form of Internet crimes or cybercrimes [2,3].…”

“…Internet crimes are complex and dynamic in nature, but broadly referred to as online based criminal activities conducted through the use of ICT tools such as computer and Internet [4]. More so, it is a computer or internet-enabled crimes and encompasses series of Cybercrimes activities, some of which include financial fraud, cyber stalking, identity theft, email spamming, cyber bullying, phishing, cyber pornography, network intrusion, hacking, cyber extortion, malware attack, copy right infringement, plagiarism, and defamation [3,5]. Internet crime has devastating effects on the victims, including financial losses, nonfinancial losses such as emotional trauma and damage of reputation by individual, governmental and corporate organizations across the nations [6,7,8,9].…”