How is Cybercrime Evolving? (editorial)
Jean-Loup Richet, Sorbonne Business School (IAE de Paris)
Abstract
Firms spend enormous resources on digital advertising and promoting their brand online. In the meantime, ad-fraud undertaken by cybercriminals cost $42 billion in 2019 and could reach $100 billion by 2023. However, while digital advertisers continue to wrestle with how to effectively counteract ad-fraud, the topic of advertising fraud itself has received little academic attention. Here, we investigate this gap between practice and research through an exploration of ad-fraud communities. Our research implemented a multimethod approach for data collection in a longitudinal (18 months, October 2017 to April 2019) online investigation of this phenomenon. Integrating qualitative and quantitative analysis, we examined (1) internal interactions within ad-fraud communities and (2) ad-fraud communities’ performance and growth. Our online investigation extends our conceptual understanding of ad-fraud and explains how ad-fraud communities innovate. Our findings indicate that capabilities enacted by some communities foster requisite variety and enable the coordination of complex, iterative, and incremental dynamics (cocreation of artificial intelligence-based bots, customer involvement, and reinforcing capabilities). This research has both theoretical and practical implications for innovation in cybercriminal communities. Furthermore, we provide practical guidance for policy-makers and advertisers regarding how to improve their response to business threats. Indeed, a better understanding of how ad-fraud communities innovate enables organizations to develop countermeasures and intelligence capabilities.
Highlights
- • This is one of the first studies documenting the way ad-fraud communities innovate and create value for their criminal customers.
- • A multimethod approach was applied for data collection, integrating qualitative and quantitative assessment of six cybercriminal communities.
- • Specialized ad-fraud communities provided a wealth of knowledge and incremental innovations in ad-frauds.
- • General and customer-oriented ad-fraud communities showcased the most internal interactions, as well as exhibiting better performance and growth.
- • General and customer-oriented ad-fraud communities have developed specific capabilities, focusing on innovation through artificial intelligence, which fuels customer engagement and fosters (criminal) attractiveness.
Reference
Richet, J.-L. 2022. “How Cybercriminal Communities Grow and Change: An Investigation of Ad-Fraud Communities,” Technological Forecasting and Social Change (174), p. 121282. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021….)
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
2022 is shaping out to be a great year for the Darknet Market community. With almost no exit scams or seizures, 2021 was one of the most stable periods in the dark net markets community. It will be interesting to see how 2022 will shape out to be, and if any new market that was predicted here will indeed become the top leading dark net market.