TY - JOUR
T1 - Discerning Novel Value Chains in Financial Malware
T2 - On the Economic Incentives and Criminal Business Models in Financial Malware Schemes
AU - van Wegberg, R. S.
AU - Klievink, A. J.
AU - van Eeten, M. J G
PY - 2017
Y1 - 2017
N2 - Fraud with online payment services is an ongoing problem, with significant financial-economic and societal impact. One of the main modus operandi is financial malware that compromises consumer and corporate devices, thereby potentially undermining the security of critical financial systems. Recent research into the underground economy has shown that cybercriminals are organised around highly specialised tasks, such as pay-per-install markets for infected machines, malware-as-a-service and money mule recruitment. Setting up a successful financial malware scheme requires the aligning of many moving parts. Analysing how cybercrime groups acquire, combine and align these parts into value chains can greatly benefit from existing insights into the economics of online crime. Using transaction cost economics, this paper illustrates the business model behind financial malware and presents three novel value chains therein. For this purpose, we use a conceptual synthesis of the state-of-the-art of the literature on financial malware, underground markets and (cyber)crime economics, as well as today’s banking practice.
AB - Fraud with online payment services is an ongoing problem, with significant financial-economic and societal impact. One of the main modus operandi is financial malware that compromises consumer and corporate devices, thereby potentially undermining the security of critical financial systems. Recent research into the underground economy has shown that cybercriminals are organised around highly specialised tasks, such as pay-per-install markets for infected machines, malware-as-a-service and money mule recruitment. Setting up a successful financial malware scheme requires the aligning of many moving parts. Analysing how cybercrime groups acquire, combine and align these parts into value chains can greatly benefit from existing insights into the economics of online crime. Using transaction cost economics, this paper illustrates the business model behind financial malware and presents three novel value chains therein. For this purpose, we use a conceptual synthesis of the state-of-the-art of the literature on financial malware, underground markets and (cyber)crime economics, as well as today’s banking practice.
KW - Cybercrime
KW - Financial malware
KW - Transaction cost economics
KW - Underground markets
KW - Value chain
KW - Vertical integration
UR - http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:f5d757b9-b2f7-4583-923c-28750f501466
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85011665592&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10610-017-9336-3
DO - 10.1007/s10610-017-9336-3
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85011665592
SP - 1
EP - 20
JO - European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research
JF - European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research
SN - 0928-1371
ER -