E-commerce sites are sprouting out everywhere. People are encouraged and tempted to shop online for their commodities because of the convenience. However, most of these transactions are credit card transactions. The credit card numbers of all the customers are stored in a database within the system. If this database is hacked into successfully, the hacker would have access to all the credit card numbers. The hacker could use the credit card numbers to carry out his or her own transactions. The credit card owners would have to bear the costs at the end of the day. Such an incident would greatly shake the faith of consumers in online shopping (Ben Fox, Is Online Shopping Safe?).

             The hacker could also blackmail people based on the information, such as personal history and medical information, gained from computerized files (David L. Carter, Computer Crime Categories) . The victims have to live in fear of having their disgraceful history being exposed if they refused to accede to the hacker’s demands. Hackers could also hack into government files to change or erase criminal records. If this happens, real criminals could walk free in the streets and continue doing harm while the innocent could be framed and put behind bars