THE increased use of cyber technology in financial crimes has pushed the Major Organised Crime and Anti-Corruption Agency (MOCA) to bolster its digital forensics capability in a bid to nab high-tech criminals.

“What we have realised is that as MOCA has evolved over the last 10 years the small cyber forensic capabilities we had — which were essentially there to support our cases, being able to get evidence from devices for operations — we found that, that was not of the right capacity to meet the challenges of the environment. All criminal enterprises that we investigate have a cyber component,” said director general of MOCA Colonel Desmond Edwards, who was among the guests at this week’s Jamaica Observer Monday Exchange.

Edwards pointed out that criminal activity has changed drastically over the years, with “paper trails” of all crimes handled by MOCA being more readily traced through online mediums.

“So there are two types of crimes through which law enforcement operates — you have cybercrimes, which is the denial of service, ransomware, and malware attacks; and then you have cyber-enabled crimes — which is everything else. We have had to grow things like our analytics to handle 17 terabytes [just over one million megabytes of data]. So, we have dedicated staff with the requisite software to help to navigate through those bulk of data to find the evidence we need for cases,” said Edwards.

He pointed out that MOCA has focused on expanding its capacity to handle issues such as financial forensics and other cyber deviances, as most crimes investigated by the agency have financial motivations.

The MOCA head expressed confidence that despite the overwhelming and vast amount of data the agency peruses to handle each case with integrity, it has the ability to stay ahead of criminals and their schemes within the cyberspace.

“The environment is such that all crimes are being committed with the use of cyber capacity. So if you’re looking at money laundering, for example, they’re using cyber means to hide the money or move the money. They are using — if it’s trafficking or fraud — they are using cyber methodologies.

“We have evolved into the experts looking at cyber-related offences and also cyber-offences at large. We have been building our capacity in that regard, and we are getting better at it,” Edwards said.

According to Edwards, in addition to staff expansion, MOCA has launched collaborations with other law enforcement and intelligence agencies to tackle the increased use of the cyberspace to conduct criminal activity.

“Every day the cyber techniques evolve. By partnering and working closely with each other, we keep each other on the same side in terms of what is new, what’s coming, what’s out there,” he said, adding that entities such as Jamaica Customs Agency, Registrar General’s Department, Port Authority of Jamaica, are partners.

“It may not be as tight in the law enforcement capacity but we see them as partners, so whenever they engage and interact with us on these cases, they are able to share with us what criminals are doing. We can then integrate that into how we work so [that] we know what to look out for. There’s also one project in particular that we did in conjunction with FID [Financial Investigations Division] which has really expanded our capabilities. We host that capacity at MOCA, but it is used across all the law enforcement — the JCF, FID, and ourselves — in enhancing our case as we go forward,” said Edwards.

He told Observer editors and reporters that MOCA has also launched campaigns targeting schools, to educate vulnerable children who use cyberspace and to work as a deterrent for those who are considering getting involved in criminal activity.

“The preventative piece is also a major feature of that collaboration, and sometimes we don’t appreciate it enough. We go to the schools and speak on the responsible use of the digital space. So, we go to the high schools and we talk to the vulnerable kids, because a lot of them will engage online and post stuff that is out there forever and affects them,” said Edwards.

Senior director of the Legal and Prosecutorial Services Unit at MOCA, Nigel Parke told the
Monday Exchange that the agency’s public education campaign includes giving advice to institutions that may be vulnerable to cyber attacks due to their heavy involvement with sensitive data.

“From our various investigations, particularly as it relates to the phishing scams and so on, we sometimes engage entities that are potential victims of these attacks, so we try to have an outreach. We don’t have the full capacity to do it but, where we can, we actually reach out. We try to show them the weaknesses or gaps in their systems that they need to tighten,” he explained.

“So whether it’s technical- or human resource-related or just procedural, we try to point it out. And our cyber people also do proactive threat assessments, particularly government agencies, to say, ‘You’re vulnerable to this kind of attack,’ ” said Parke.

The environment is such that all crimes are being committed with the use of cyber capacity.