The Experience of E-Crime: Findings from the New Zealand Crime and Safety Survey 2006

Appendix C Other estimates

Box C1 shows other New Zealand surveys which have covered some of the same e-crime ground as NZCASS 2006.

Box C1 Other New Zealand surveys of personal ICT users

Survey	Source	Sample	Relevant coverage	Referred to as
Household Use of Information and Communications Technologies (2006)	Statistics New Zealand (2007)	c. 15,000 households and 30,000 individuals. (Supplement to the Household Labour Force Survey.)	See text below Virus (causing loss/ damage) Internet fraud (causing financial loss) Harassing/threatening mobile text, pixt or other messages	Household Use of ICT Survey: 2006
NetSafe mobile phone users surveys	NetSafe (2005)	c. 1,500 decile 4 high school pupils aged 12–19	Own and others’ crime and harassment	The NetSafe young mobile phone users survey
NetSafe Internet users surveys	NetSafe (2002)	c. 2,600 pupils in primary, intermediate and secondary schools in Auckland	Broad crime and safety issues	The NetSafe young Internet users survey
Auckland University survey of access to government information	Curtis et al. (2004)	Telephone survey of 5,000 respondents aged 18 or older (mid-2004).	Virus; spam; theft of bank details (phone or email)	The Auckland University survey

Statistics New Zealand survey

Probably the most important other New Zealand survey is by Statistics New Zealand, carried out in the last quarter of 2006 (Statistics New Zealand, 2007). With a large sample size, its main purpose was to collect information from New Zealand households and individuals about the access to and use of ICT. It included three questions on e-crime over the previous 12 months.

Whether someone in the household experienced loss of data, time and/or damage to the household computer because of a virus or something of a similar nature. This is most equivalent to Question 1 in the NZCASS 2006 e-crime module (see Box 1.1), although the latter does not mention damage or loss of time or data. The Statistics New Zealand survey also refers to anyone in the household, rather than just the respondent (as in NZCASS 2006), and to a home computer, rather than any computer the respondent might have used, as in NZCASS 2006. (The question was in the household questionnaire and was completed by one member of the household.)

Whether an individual home computer user had been victim of a fraudulent activity that resulted in some loss (e.g. money). This is most similar to Question 9 in the NZCASS 2006 module.

Whether an individual mobile phone user had received text, pixt or other messages that were harassing or threatening.[17] This is most similar to Question 8 in the NZCASS 2006 module, although this specifies a phone call or text message, whereas the Statistics New Zealand question referred to other messages rather than calls.

The US National Crime Victimization Survey

The NCVS also provides comparative measures of some of the forms of e-crime against householders covered by NZCASS 2006. The NCVS carried a special component in 2004 which asked householders about identity theft and its consequences (Baum, 2006).

There were three questions, covering credit card thefts, thefts from existing accounts, and misuse of personal information.[18] However, it is difficult to draw comparisons between NZCASS 2006 and the NCVS results.

Only those aged 18 years or older were questioned in the NCVS.

More important, the NCVS questions asked about the experience of the respondent or anyone else in their household.

Also, the NCVS asked about incidents which had occurred over the previous six months. While the longer ‘recall period’ used in NZCASS 2006 (approximately three times longer than in the NCVS) will mean a higher count, it is unlikely to be commensurately higher. This is because the longer the recall period, the less complete the reporting of incidents will be because of memory loss (see, e.g., Cantor and Lynch, 2000).

British Crime Survey

The BCS has also used a household sample to look at some of the e-crimes covered by NZCASS 2006.

There are results reported from the 2005/06 BCS on misuse of credit and bank cards (Hoare and Wood, 2007). The question is similar to NZCASS 2006 Question 6 (see Box A2).

There are also results from the 2005/06 BCS on forms of identity fraud other than through the misuse of credit and bank cards. The question, however, is rather different in form from the one used in NZCASS 2006, which asked whether someone has used personal information without permission to obtain new credit cards or loans, run up debts, open other accounts, or otherwise commit theft, fraud, or some other crime.

There are results from the 2003/04 BCS on computer viruses, computer hacking, and receiving harassing or offensive email messages (Wilson et al., 2006).

Allen et al. (2005) report results from the 2002/03 survey on a question about whether mobile phone users had received any voice or text message that they considered offensive or a form of harassment. It subsumes the coverage of questions 6 and 8 in NZCASS 2006.

The other estimates

Table C1 shows NZCASS 2006 estimates alongside those from other surveys.

Table C1 NZCASS 2006 estimates of e-crime compared to other estimates

	NZCASS 2006	Statistics New Zealand	British Crime Survey	US National Crime Victimisation Survey	Auckland University Survey
Computer e-crime
Computer virus, worm, or spyware	53%	17% Causing damage or loss	27% Virus only		62%
Hacking	6%		2%
Offensive web material	15%		25% Receipt and unintentional encounter
Fraud over the computer	1.8%	1.1% Causing loss
Harassing emails	10%		12%
Mobile phone e-crime
Offensive calls or texts	8%		9% Offensive or harassing
Harassing mobile phone messages	5%	4% Slightly more restricted
Identity theft
Card misuse	2.3%		4%
Identity theft	2.8%		2% Different form of question	3% Broader range of questions, but over shorter time frame.

Footnotes

17 There were follow-up questions on whether anyone was told about this, and who it was. Results will be published in the ICT in New Zealand: 2006 report, due by the end of 2007.

18 The three NCV S questions were:

During the last 6 months, that is since --/20--, have you or anyone in your household discovered that someone:

(a) used or attempted to use any existing credit cards or credit card numbers without permission to place charges on an account

(b) used or attempted to use any existing accounts other than a credit card account—for example, a wireless telephone account, bank account or debit/check cards—without the account holder's permission to run up charges or to take money from accounts

(c) used or attempted to use personal information without permission to obtain NEW credit cards or loans, run up debts, open other accounts, or otherwise commit theft, fraud, or some other crime?

Question (a) is similar to NZCASS Question 10, although the NCVS question is restricted to credit cards (rather than other bank cards as well). Question (c) is the same wording as Question 11 in NZCASS, although NZCASS might have picked up some incidents that might have been reported in the NCVS in Question (b).

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