Criminal Profiling Final

Victimology is a process in place to investigate and evaluate victim traits. (Turvey, 2012) This means that the victim’s behaviors and everyday life must be investigated. This is to find out demographic information as well as the type of person they were/are, hobbies, work, social life, family, friends, and many other aspects of everyday life. The idea is to understand how the victim lived, what their vices were, if there was any history of alcohol or drug abuse, physical and mental health issues. This is to understand the victim. It also helps create the initial suspect pool.

In the last twenty years technology has evolved. It has evolved and made it easier for a person to become victimized. Before the internet was invented suspects had to come in contact with victims at some point and time. Now that the internet exists this is no longer true. It is extremely possible for a criminal to commit a crime against a person without having been face to face with them. This has become possible through phishing and data mining. Criminals can gather information on people and use it to steal their identities. They can take personal information and open accounts or steal money from people with a simple click of a button, even from halfway around the world. The military has annual training on phishing. It is easy to protect oneself from being victimized because of the internet or phones.

Very little of the general public know not to give personal information out to people through email or phone. Anyone that is computer savvy can create a fake website or email pretending to be a company that is requesting information from people. It is also easy for the criminal to mask the trail they leave. The way to track the criminals is best done by tracking the IP address of the computer terminal being used. Unfortunately, it is possible to route the IP address through many servers.

Technology has made it possible to share information at an almost instantaneous rate.