“Blue (Masculine) Guys” Versus “Techno Girls”: Up-Against Cybercrime

• In Event: Contemporary Issues in Police Organizations

Abstract

Women have paved their way to law enforcement in the eighteenth century, however their growth rate remained alarmingly slow. Police work because of its perceived unique nature and distinctive subculture revolving around “authoritarianism” and “toughness” has remained a male-domain and status quo.
However, with the rising cyber space connectivity, cybercrime and cyber-victimization, it has become imperative for law enforcement agencies to re-examine and replace their subcultural traits of “toughness” with “smartness/techno-ness” and “authoritativeness” with “critical thinking.” The emerging new requirements of the cyber society and gender neutrality of cyber victimization have challenged the continuity of established gendered ideologies in the police. Thus, a way has been provided to gender neutrality & gender convergence, roles for women as good communicators & negotiators and need for high tech professionals such as “Techno Girls” in the police.
This paper lies on the border of two research fields of gender issues & policing of cyber spaces. By discussing the widening scope of women in policing caused by changing nature of crime from physical to cyber, paper attempts to add to the theoretical development as well as depicts the necessity of women in the role of cyber crime fighters for law enforcement.

Authors

• Shanta Goswami Varma, Auburn University Montgomery

• Prit Kaur, Auburn University Montgomery