A scoping study of crime facilitated by the metaverse

The metaverse is an emerging convergence of technologies (e.g., virtual reality and blockchains) that enables users to experience mixed/extended realities for various legitimate purposes (e.g., gaming, tourism, manufacturing and education). Unfortunately, the crime and security implications of emerg...

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Veröffentlicht in:Futures : the journal of policy, planning and futures studies planning and futures studies, 2024-03, Vol.157, p.103338, Article 103338
Hauptverfasser: Gómez-Quintero, Juliana, Johnson, Shane D., Borrion, Hervé, Lundrigan, Samantha
Format: Artikel
Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:The metaverse is an emerging convergence of technologies (e.g., virtual reality and blockchains) that enables users to experience mixed/extended realities for various legitimate purposes (e.g., gaming, tourism, manufacturing and education). Unfortunately, the crime and security implications of emerging technologies are often overlooked. To anticipate crimes that the metaverse might facilitate, we report the findings of a nominal group technique (NGT) study, which involved a state-of-the-art scoping review of the existing literature and elicitation exercises with two groups of experts (one a diverse group from the UK and Europe, the other representing international law enforcement) with a wide range of expertise. A total of 30 crime threats were identified in the literature or by participants. The elicitation exercises also explored how harmful, frequent, achievable and defeatable participants anticipated that the crimes identified would be. Ratings for these aspects were largely consistent across the two samples, with crimes of a sexual nature (e.g., child sexual abuse material), and crimes against the person (e.g., hate crime) being rated as presenting the highest future risks (i.e. being high harm and high frequency) and being the most difficult to address. The findings illuminate understanding of the most (and least) harmful and likely crime threats the metaverse could facilitate and consequently help stakeholders to prioritise which offences to focus on. In discussing how the crime threats might be addressed, we consider roles and responsibilities and how theory about the management of physical places might inform crime prevention in the metaverse(s). •There is significant investment in the metaverse and many legitimate use cases are being explored by citizens and industry.•All new technologies create crime opportunities, but these are often overlooked when the technologies are launched.•We survey the literature and experts to understand the crime threats that the (future) metaverse might facilitate.•30 threats were identified and rated in terms of likely harm, frequency, ease of commission and the difficulty of preventing them.•The research enables policy makers to consider how risks might be addressed to encourage a preferable future metaverse.•Approaches including “place management” are considered that may help to prevent the crimes identified.
ISSN:0016-3287
1873-6378
DOI:10.1016/j.futures.2024.103338