Anthony Giddens gave the concept of time and space distanciation. In our project we are going to apply his concept and theory on the cybercrime which is common, because of the globalized cyberspace. Cyberspace can be defined as ‘’the notional environment in which communication over computer networks occurs’’, and cybercrime can be defined as the ‘’Criminal exploitation of the cyberspace’’. We took the case study of ‘’ Sony Data play station outage’’ biggest data breached event in the history, and explained this case study through the Anthony Giddens concept of Time space distanciation.

INTRODUCTION

Cyberspace

The term cyberspace literally means "navigable space" and it is derived from the Greek word kyber (to navigate). In William Gibson's 1984 novel Neuromancer, the original source of the term, cyberspace refers to a navigable, digital space of networked computers accessible from computer consoles; a visual, colorful, electronic data-scape known as "The Matrix" where companies and individuals interact with, and trade in, information. As William Gibson explained cyber space as:

Cyber space. A consensual hallucination experienced daily by billions of legitimate operators, in every nation, by children being taught mathematical concepts... A graphic representation of data abstracted from the banks of every computer in the human system. Unthinkable complexity. Lines of light ranged in the non space of the mind, clusters and constellations of data. Like city lights, receding

Since 1984 the term cyberspace has been re-appropriated, adapted and used in a variety of ways that all refer to the computer-based conceptual space within information and communication technologies.

Cyber Crime

Cyber crime is relatively a new kind of crime which includes use of computers. As today’s world is technologically advance and our everyday lives are greatly dependent upon software’s and computers. This technologically advancement brought easiness in our life as well as increased rate of crime too. I.T has begun to produce criminal opportunities commonly known as cyber crime .Cyber crime can be defined as crimes committed on the internet using the computer as either a tool or a targeted victim (Joseph A E, 2006).Weapons used for cyber crime include hacking, data diddling, denial of service attack.

Globalization and Cyber Space

Globalization has become the most important economic, political, and cultural phenomenon of our time. This process is reshaping the world economy, creating new social classes, and reordering the lives of thousands and thousands of people. According to Giddens (1990, p. 64), globalization is “the intensification of worldwide social relations which link distant localities in such way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away and vice versa”, thereby changing all aspects of our everyday life. Globalization by its nature brings down these barriers and empowers the individual with "unlimited" choices. One can live in England but eat Greek food, read Suddeuche Zeitung on the Internet, buy books from Amazon.com in Seattle, and visit Egyptian pyramids without changing money or having a passport. All this increases people's freedom to shape their identities in a way that their ancestors could not have possibly imagined. (Dr. Mladen Milicevic)[1]. Actually cyber space is giving rise to a world with no barriers and no distance. For Frances Cairn cross (1997), this means the “death of distance,” Cyber space or virtual world is quite opposite to your physical world. You don’t have to be in place to experience things. Accepting this view, Kenichi Ohmae (1990;1995) celebrates a “borderless world” where any attempt to create boundaries is doomed to failure or what William Mitchell (1999) calls an “e-topia” of near boundless choices for where and how we live and work (see also Friedman, 1999). For him, the Net does not just extend geometry:

“The Net negates geometry. ... it is fundamentally and profoundly anti spatial. It is nothing like

the Piazza Navona or Copley Square. You cannot say where it is or describe its memorable

shape and proportions or tell a stranger how to get there. But you can find things in it without

knowing where they are. The Net is ambient-nowhere in particular and everywhere at once.”

(Mitchell, 1995: 8)[2]

CASE STUDY

Between 19 and 17^th April Sony play station data was accessed by illegal and unauthorized person. This person got access to people private data including user’s name, email ids, birthdates, passwords, security questions. It was informed by company that may be the credit card information may have been compromised also. Hackers deleted the original data files, took away private data and left messages on Sony website. Nearly 77 million accounts were affected because of this external intrusion. Sony play station is one of the biggest companies with credit card holders. At the time of the outrage, with a count of 77 million registered PlayStation Network accounts, it was one of the largest data security breaches in history. After this Sony changed his agreement policies, including that customer can’t sue them in future for any sort of security breach.

Chris Boyd, a senior threat researcher for GFI Software states “Nothing is ever 100% secure. Don’t assume someone won’t come after your data because you’re ‘just a games company’ or something similar, Everyone is a target, even if you can’t think of ways that your data could possibly be used for nefarious purpose,”

SONY PlayStation Network Hack Timeline

This is a timeline of major events associated with the attack on Sony's PlayStation. Dates are given relative to the location the events took place. Sony announcements, released globally, are listed according to their publication in the U.S.

Tuesday, April 19

Sony learned its PlayStation Network had been compromised. At the time, the company did not announce this. It was subsequently disclosed in a statement issued by the company's U.S.

Wednesday, April 20

Sony close down his two networks but news that system has been hacked was not announced. They gave public statement that certain functions of play station network are down.

Thursday, April 21

The company said it was still investigating the cause of the outrage and that it would be "a full day or two" before everything was back to normal. A posting on Sony Europe's PlayStation blog suggested the networks had been attacked. The posting was later removed, but numerous gaming news outlets reported it as saying, "Our support teams are investigating the cause of the problem, including the possibility of targeted behavior by an outside party."

Friday, April 22

Sony revealed for the first time the cause of the problems. "An external intrusion on our system has affected our PlayStation Network and Qriocity services. In order to conduct a thorough investigation and to verify the smooth and secure operation of our network services going forward, we turned off PlayStation Network & Qriocity services, “it . It offered no details on when services might return to normal.

Saturday, April 23

Sony decided to rebuild its network. They announced though this process is time consuming it worth’s the time. They further informed that they will increase security

Sunday, April 24

For the first time since the problems began, Sony went a day without releasing an update. It called in a second computer security company to determine what happened inside the company's servers.

Wednesday, April 27

Sony shares fell 2 percent on news of the potentially huge data leak, ending Wednesday trading in Tokyo at 2,366 yen, down 49 yen.

A class-action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. accusing Sony of not taking "reasonable care to protect, encrypt and secure the private and sensitive data of its users." It seeks monetary compensation and free credit card monitoring. Sony published Q&A section to clarify that no credit card data was compromised.

Sunday, May 1

Sony apologized and announced that play station network and Qriocity will be brought online in stages. Although services were completely back till mid may

Is North Korea Guilty?

Another news came forward that north Korea have contributed in Sony hack. It was suspected that attacker used destructive malicious software to disable company system and extract data. During investigation, some malware contained code in Korean language came. Other then this, certain component of this attack was similar to tat of attacks carried out in south korea in march last year,

According to Zaichkowsky( an expert in the field of cyber security),he details of the attack look like it was carried out by "hacktivists," which are hackers that breach computer systems to stress political issues that usually involve free information exchange over the Internet.

OBJECTIVES OF RESEARCH

Main objective of this research is to study the relation of globalization and cyber space and how Anthony Giddens explain this phenomenon. This relation is being observed by analyzing case of Sony Play Station outrage. Major concepts of Anthony Giddens are taken and applied on the case of Sony Play Station outrage.

METHOD

For this study Secondary data has been used and sources of gathering information were internet, articles, discussion and point of views of people and books from library.

RESEACH QUESTION

How does the case of Sony play station system outrage explain the process of globalization? What type of society is rising up because of increasing globalized cyberspace?

DISCUSSIN AND ANALYSIS

We are going to explain this case with the help of concepts given by Anthony Giddens.

New role of knowledge economy

Anthony Giddens highlights “the new role of knowledge as a factor of production…” He speaks of the “new knowledge economy that almost certainly operates according to different principles from the industrial economy….” Giddens accounts for revolutionary change in terms of something more broadly spread: “Most companies know pretty quickly what other companies are planning, because of the general profusion of information. Secrecy is much more difficult. Given the global nature of contemporary communications, there is no geographical isolation any longer”. (David Hakken)[3] . This concept of secrecy in this new globalized world can also be linked with the Sony incident. How in the era cyberspace nothing anymore is a secret, the hacker probably found out everything about how the technology of Sony play station’s user information operates and found a loop-hole in the system which gave access to the information.

Self-identity

One significant impact of the Internet is the creation of the virtual world of cyberspace with its multitude of virtual communities, online businesses and individuals. In cyberspace, new kinds of interaction between individuals are possible, along with the adoption of many identities. Opinions on the Internet have become polarized between those who see it as offering many new opportunities and others who see it as destructive of real social relations and home to new forms of criminality and abuse (Anthony Giddens and Philip W. Sutton Sociology 7^th edition)[4]. Sony incident is a perfect example of such crime which can be referred to as cybercrime. This type of crime is different and difficult to tackle because it does not have any geographical boundaries. The non-factor of geographical boundaries also creates a problem for law-enforcers because they are usually bounded by geographical boundaries. This implies that international cooperation and a lot more effort is needed to identify these cybercriminals. They can take on any identity or can easily make themselves disappear from the virtual space that is cyberspace.

Time space distanciation

Time space distanciation is an acute characteristic of online spaces in relation to criminal activity this means that individuals are able to attack their victims at a distance and in compressed and extended periods of time (Criminology)[5]. Like in the case of Sony play station network outrage that was the result of an "external intrusion" on Sony's PlayStation Network , in which personal details from approximately 77 million accounts were stolen and prevented users of PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Portable consoles from playing online through the service. The outrage lasted 23 days. Sony is a company that has had a major impact all across the world. Many households have had Sony products for years and it is a well-known name all over the United States (Wikipedia)[6].

Science and Technology as Sources of Risk

Science and technology are often offered as the source of society’s salvation, yet a generation of sociological work on risk seems to reverse this stance. Science and its technological application are positioned as today’s greatest sources of ruination. Put differently, our biggest threats and gravest disasters seem to be internal to society itself. Anthony Giddens (1990) suggests that they are nothing less than the side effects of industrial modernity. We now dwell in an era of “manufactured uncertainty” in which various risks keep accumulating and threatening (Giddens 1995). To make sense of contemporary reality Anthony Giddens (1990) sketched out the differences between traditional times and our own times thus:

Table 1. Risk in Traditional and Modern Societies

Traditional Society	Modern Society
Reference to the past	Constant scrutiny of the present: reflexivity
Slow pace, limited scope	Rapid pace, global scope
Social activity localized	Activity disembedded from social environment
Unity of time and space	Separation of time and space
Expert knowledge peripheral	Expert knowledge central
Threats from nature	Threats from reflexive modernity
Emphasis on fortune (fate)	Emphasis on risk
External risks	Manufactured risks

(Steve Matthewman)[7]

Like in the case of Sony, the company had suggested that an “unauthorized and unknown person” carried out the attack against its servers, during which “usernames, passwords, credit card details, security answers, purchase history and addresses” are believed to have been stolen. The precise method by which the hacker broke into the systems “has not been revealed”. The detail stolen through this breach was said to be worth tens of millions of dollars if sold on the “thriving online black market for credit cards and personal information”. Thousands of gamers and Sony product users were livid that their details had been compromised, but the company “briefly addressed the question of refunds” on subscriptions and purchases through an FAQ about the security breach (theguardian.com)[8]. So, throughout this scenario we can see that how uncertain and risky today’s world has become. The title of Giddens’ accessible modern classic ‘Runaway World’ immediately suggests to the reader that he perceives globalization as an unpredictable, destabilsing process. In Giddens’ own words: “We are the first generation to live in global society, whose contours we can as yet only dimly see. It is shaking up our existing ways of life, no matter where we happen to be. This is emerging in an anarchic, haphazard, fashion it is not settled or secure, but fraught with anxieties, as well as scarred by deep divisions. Many of us feel in the grip of forces over which we have no control” (Giddens 2002). He argues that there is a “new riskiness to risk” in that these new technologies could have catastrophic consequences for humanity. (realsociology)[9]

Nation-state

Globalization has undermined the ability of institutions such as the Nation State, the family and religion, to provide us with a sense of security and stability. These institutions are no longer able to offer us a clearly defined norms and values that tell us how we should act in society.

Giddens notices that transnational corporation growth reduces the strength of nation states. This is the cause of deeper social unevenness (risk). In this case now the people whose accounts were hacked could not be provided security by the nation states they belong.

CONCLUSION

Cyberspace refers to a navigable, digital space of networked computers accessible from computer consoles. Since 1948, tem cyber space has been used in variety of ways. Type of crime that has been done in cyberspace is cyber crime. This is relatively a new way of committing crime as tool that is used in it is computers and victims are computers too. Globalization where helped to flow that cultures from one end of world to another similarly it is playing its role in making crime easy to commit. Globalization is reshaping the world and forming a new world which is without any borders as Giddens called its “borderless world” Actually cyber space is giving rise to a world with no barriers and no distance. For Frances Cairn cross (1997), this means the “death of distance,” case study that has been discuses is of Sony play station system outrage, where Sony system was hacked and credit card of 77 million people were compromised. This was a case of hacking involved identity theft. Theory of Anthony Giddens has been used to explain this phenomenon. Basic concepts such as nation state, time space distanciation, knowledge as a risk, new role of knowledge economy and self identity has been discussed. Concluding concept of Anthony Giddens, he explained that today’s world is borderless where space has been separated from time and knowledge is becoming riskier. Nation states are becoming weaker as they have no control on global virtual world as well as your identity is what you carry in form of credit cards and it’s not your nationality. Giddens explains it through concept of Runaway society that globalization is unpredictable and it’s reshaping our lives making it more insecure and open to risk.

[1]Cyberspace and Globalization by Dr. Mladen Milicevic, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California, USA

[2] Cairncross, F. (1997). The Death of Distance. Boston: Harvard Business School Press

[3]The Knowledge Landscapes of Cyberspace by David Hakken

[4]https://www.polity.co.uk/giddens7/studentresource/summaries/Student_Summary_18.asp

[5]Criminology edited by Chris Hale, Keith Hayward

[6]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation_Network_outrage

[7]Journal of IDRM (Dealing with Disasters: Some Warnings from Science and Technology Studies (STS) by Steve Matthewman Received: 18/11/2013 / Accepted: 21/12/2013 / Published online: 24/07/2014

[8]http://www.theguardian.com/technology/gamesblog/2011/apr/27/playstation-network-hack-sony

[9]http://realsociology.edublogs.org/2010/10/23/summary-of-runaway-world-by-anthony-giddens/

EXPLORE the world of behavioral sciences

Wednesday, 28 January 2015

analysis of sony play station outage- anthony giddens- globalization an cyber space

Abstract