A Model of E-Fraud

E-fraud is an e-crime that affects society, as a whole, impacting upon individuals, businesses and governments. Recent studies suggest that e-fraud is on the increase and that a lack of awareness, and inappropriate, limited or absent countermeasures have only exacerbated the negative impact of E-fraud to society. The response to e-fraud has concentrated on context specific technical solutions being narrowly focused, and typically dealing with only a few of the numerous factors and dimensions that may be seen to be constituent to e-fraud. A review of the literature suggests that e-fraud is, at a very basic level, poorly understood, which may in go some way to explain the above-mentioned difficulties in addressing e-fraud. Fundamental to this poor understanding is the lack of a theoretical basis upon which a comprehensive understanding may be built and from which a co-ordinated response may be made. This study seeks to redress this situation through the development of a model of the process of e-fraud, using the existing literature as a guide. Based on a broad definition of both e-crime and e-fraud, the resultant model describes the five key elements of e-fraud: perpetrator, mode of attack, target system, target entity and impact. It is envisaged that the model will allow the mechanics and context of e-fraud to be more fully understood, thus assisting in the development and implementation of effective countermeasures.