Learn English with the News: Cyber Crime

Hi. This is Rebecca. In today's English In the News lesson, we're going to talk about

cyber theft. So what does "cyber theft" mean? The word "cyber" has to do with computers.

And the word "theft" has to do with stealing. All right? So let's look at three headlines

that were in the news recently regarding this subject of cyber theft. You'll also learn

lots of other vocabulary related to the same theme.

So the first headline said, "Target data theft affects 70 million". "Target", you should

know, is the name of a very large retail store in the United States and Canada and some other

places, perhaps. I know they are in Canada and the U.S. "target payment card heist."

"Target security breach." Okay? These were three different headlines in three different

newspapers about the same situation, the same story. Let's see what words they chose to

use. So here, we have "Target data theft." So that means data -- or "data" -- was stolen, and

it affected 70 million people. Here, they said "Target payment card heist". So what's

a "heist"? "Heist" is another word which means "robbery" or "stealing". Another way is "Target

security breach." So what's a "breach of security"? A "breach" is a kind of violation, when somebody

does something illegally that they are not allowed to do. They go over some limit that

they were not allowed to pass; that's a "breach". And in this case, it was a breach of -- or

violation of -- security. All right? So you have three different ways that they refer

to it already. "Data theft", "payment card heist", "security breach". See how you can

pick up these expressions -- all right? -- to improve your English?

Let's look out at a paragraph about that story. I'll just read it for you first. "Retail giant

Target confirmed a pre-Christmas cyber attack at over 1700 U.S. stores, resulting in payment

card and identity theft of over 70 million customers." Okay. A lot of information. A

lot of journalistic writing -- packs in a lot of information, especially in the first

paragraph. They're supposed to tell you who, what, when, where, why -- if they can -- or

how in that one paragraph because in case you don't have time to read the rest, at least

you've got the main information.

So let's see if we can figure out what that information was. So who were the victims here?

Who was affected by this crime? Well, "Retail giant Target" -- Target store was affected,

and as a result, their customers were affected. These were the victims of this attack, this

cyber attack.

Who were the criminals? Well, those who did the cyber attack. They're sometimes known

as cyber thieves; they're known as cyber hackers. But you'll see this term "cyber" because they're

not just regular thieves. They steal through the means of the computer. Okay?

What was the crime? You've now learned many expressions to describe this crime. But let's

see what we've found here. We have also found here "cyber attack", "payment card theft",

"identity theft", along with what we had up here, "data theft", "heist", and "breach".

Right? "Security breach." So what is "identity theft"? What does it mean to steal somebody's

identity? Well, it means to take all of their personal and private information -- their

name, perhaps their email address, their credit card information, their address, things like

that, phone number. And then, they might try to use your credit card and give your information

in an illegal way. So that's called "identity theft", stealing somebody's identity, pretending

to be that person, to do a fraudulent or illegal kind of transaction. Okay?

And when did this happen? Okay. Did you find the information in this paragraph to tell

you when it happened? It said "pre-Christmas cyber attack." Pre-Christmas" means "before

Christmas". Okay.

And where did it happen? Which places were affected by it? Here. 1700 U.S. stores.

All right? We can say the number like that, "seventeen hundred". You can also say "one thousand seven

hundred". All right?

So here, if you continue to read the story, you would find more vocabulary that you could

pick up. So here are three things that Target did after that -- after this happened -- and

three things that they asked the customers to do. So let's look at vocabulary they used here.

So Target confirmed the unauthorized access. They confirmed; they said, "Yes. It really

did happen." Some people accessed or gained illegal -- they managed to reach illegally

information that was not supposed to be theirs." "Unauthorized" -- it wasn't allowed. Okay.

Then, Target alerted the authorities. They warned the police, let's say. They got in

touch with the police. They investigated the incident. They probed further; they tried

to find out more information about what happened. "Incident" is any kind of occurrence, anything

that happens. Then, they asked their customers to do certain things. They asked them to monitor

their account information. "To monitor" something means to pay attention to what's happening

to it, to -- it's sort of -- yeah. Watch, watch what's happening. All right? "To remain

vigilant for fraud" -- look at all the vocabulary here. Not necessarily beginner vocabulary.

Quite advanced in some cases. "To remain vigilant" means to be on the lookout for, to watch out

for, to pay attention to what's happening. And what is "fraud"? "Fraud" is any kind of

cheating or lying or somebody gains a benefit through that. So somebody lied or cheated

in order to get something for themselves. That is "fraud". And here, we see another

form of the word "fraud". The customers are also told to report fraudulent activity. "Fraudulent"

is the adjective from the word "fraud". Any kind of improper activity. Okay?

So look at all the different kinds of vocabulary that you've got just from this one news story.

So remember; the news -- whether it's something you watch, whether it's something you read

or something you listen to -- is a great way to improve your English vocabulary. You'll

have a chance to review this vocabulary and listen to it again and read it again. And

you can pick up that vocabulary. Try to use some of this after this lesson. Try to write

out some sentences of your own regarding something else. And you could say -- you can use the

same vocabulary. You don't always have the use it for the same purpose. For example,

here, they confirmed the unauthorized access. But you might want to confirm a reservation,

right? You can confirm many things. You can alert the authorities. You can alert the police.

You can investigate an incident. You can investigate an accident. You can monitor account information,

or you can monitor your children when they're playing outside. Okay? Keep an eye on them.

You can remain vigilant for fraud. You can remain vigilant for any kind of suspicious

behavior on anybody's part. And you can report fraudulent activity, or you could report a

crime or an accident, right? So you can use these verbs for all kinds of purposes.

If you'd like to do a quiz on this, please go to our website, www.engvid.com. You could

also subscribe to my YouTube channel and get lots more English lessons. Okay?

So all the best with your English. Bye, for now.