Need for Debate on the Implications of Honeypot Data for Restrictive Deterrence Policies in Cyberspace

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/1745-9133.12322
• Date: 01 August 2017
• Author: Adam M. Bossler
• Published date: 01 August 2017

EDITORIAL INTRODUCTION

SANCTION THREATS ON ONLINE

BEHAVIORS

Need for Debate on the Implications

of Honeypot Data for Restrictive Deterrence

Policies in Cyberspace

Adam M. Bossler

Georgia Southern University

From the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the pursuant release

of confidential information during the 2016 U.S. presidential election to megadata

breaches of financial, insurance, and communication giants (Anthem, Yahoo, etc.)

to thousands of cases of identity theft, the United States has been significantly harmed in

both financial and security aspects over the last several years with little-to-no reason to expect

the situation will improve in the short term (Holt, Bossler, and Seigfried-Spellar, in press).

In an ideal world, criminologists would be the go-to source for their expertise and insights

on the causes of various types of crimes, including cybercrime, and on the best practices

and policies to address them. One could even imagine criminologists as lighthouses that

provide light and direction in uncertain, dark, and stormy times when little is known about

a phenomenon and how to address it. Unfortunately, we are not succeeding in providing

that service in the area of cybercrime policy.

One avenue that criminologists have had for nearly 20 years has been to publish their

policy-related findings in Criminology & Public Policy. Even with defining cybercrime as

broadly as possible, such as “theuse of special knowledge of cyberspace to perpetrate a crime”

(Holt et al., in press: ch. 1), and taking into consideration Wall’s (2001) cybercrime ty-

pology,including cybertrespass, cyberdeception/theft, cyberporn, and cyberviolence, which

demonstrates that cybercrime is truly a massive umbrella term that encompasses a wide

variety of many forms of crime, some dependent on technology, whereas others are simply

enabled by it, an examination of previous issues of Criminology & Public Policy indicates

that only one study on cybercrime, defined broadly, has been published. This was in the

latest issue (February 2017) in which Gill and colleagues (2017) examined terrorists’ use

Direct correspondence to Adam M. Bossler, Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology, Georgia

Southern University, P.O. Box 8105, Statesboro, GA 30460 (e-mail: abossler@georgiasouthern.edu).

DOI:10.1111/1745-9133.12322 C2017 American Society of Criminology 681

Criminology & Public Policy rVolume 16 rIssue 3