Metaverse could open new kinds of cybercrime, Interpol warns, with scams operating differently in virtual reality
- Global police agency Interpol is preparing for virtual worlds opening the possibility for cybercrime on a larger scale
- The metaverse could also help facilitate planning and simulating attacks in the real world, Interpol said
Interpol’s member countries have raised concerns about how to prepare for possible metaverse crime, Madan Oberoi, Interpol’s executive director for technology and innovation, told Reuters.
“Some of the crimes may be new to this medium, some of the existing crimes will be enabled by the medium and taken to a new level,” he said.
Phishing and scams could operate differently when augmented reality and virtual reality are involved, Oberoi said. Child safety issues were also a concern, he said.
Virtual reality could also facilitate crime in the physical world, Oberoi said.
“If a terror group wants to attack a physical space they may use this space to plan and simulate and launch their exercises before attacking,” he said.
Earlier this month, the European Union’s law enforcement agency Europol said in a report that terror groups may, in the future, use virtual worlds for propaganda, recruitment and training. Users may also create virtual worlds with “extremist rules”, the report said.