Criminology and Cybercrime

This is a Connected Degree

Portsmouth is the only University in the UK with the flexibility to choose when to do an optional paid placement or self-employed year. Either take a placement in your third year, or finish your studies first and complete a placement in your fourth year. You can decide if and when to take a placement after you've started your course.

Overview

Join the global mission to stop criminals exploiting the internet. On the UK’s first BSc (Hons) Criminology and Cybercrime degree, you'll explore the future of policing and how criminal organisations operate online. You'll learn to make a difference, not by fighting tech with tech, but by understanding the human aspects of cybercrime.

Cyber is always evolving, so this course does too. You can choose from wide range of innovative and topical modules – from cybersecurity, online terrorism and digital forensics, to cyberdeviance and cyberpsychology.

Course highlights

• Learn from cybercrime, criminology, probation and policing experts whose expertise is requested by organisations around the world

• Tailor the course to meet your interests, by studying modules that match your career aspirations

• Explore up-to-the-minute topics based on our own team’s research, including hacktivism and the incel subculture

• Investigate issues as varied as cyber fraud, cyberbullying and online piracy, to discover how they affect people, organisations and government

• Work with practitioners providing professional cybersecurity advice in our award-winning Cybercrime Awareness Clinic

• Practise digital investigative techniques and develop transferable skills in analysis, research and new technologies

• Meet visiting professionals who work in areas of cyber like the dark web and penetration testing

Careers and opportunities

Employers around the globe are very interested in graduates with cybercrime expertise. In our increasingly digital world, the demand is likely to grow.

You'll be well prepared for a wide range of roles, especially those focused on the human side of cybercrime.

What areas can you work in with a criminology and cybercrime degree?

You'll graduate ready for opportunities in the police force, policy making organisations and new technology. Specialist areas for you in the public and private sector include:

• specialised cybercrime units

• crime prevention

• criminological research

• intelligence analysis

• digital investigations

• security consultancy

• the prison system

You could also progress to postgraduate study in criminology or cybercrime.

What jobs can you do with a criminology and cybercrime degree?

You could have a career in digital investigation, crime prevention, and security consultancy. With skills that are in high demand, potential roles could include:

• chief infosec officer

• security consultant

• incident responder

• security analyst

• digital forensics expert

• penetration tester

• vulnerability assessor

Professional recognition

If you're interested in probation work or community justice, you can graduate from this course with pre-entry qualifications for a career in those fields. This can give you a real advantage when applying for jobs. Your lecturers can advise you on the right modules to choose.

Ongoing careers support

Get experience while you study, with support to find part-time jobs, volunteering opportunities, and work experience.

Towards the end of your degree and for up to five years after graduation, you’ll receive one-to-one support from our Graduate Recruitment Consultancy to help you find your perfect role.

Year 1
Core modules in this year include:

• Criminal Justice (20 credits)
• Cyberspace, Subcultures and Online Deviance (20 credits)
• Essential Skills for Criminologists (40 credits)
• Introduction to Digital Forensic Investigations (20 credits)
• Understanding Criminology (20 credits)

There are no optional modules in this year.

Year 2
Core modules in this year include:

• Contemporary Terrorism and the Global Response (20 credits)
• Cyberlaw Governance and Human Rights (20 credits)
• Online Activism, Cyberterrorism and Cyberwarfare (20 credits)
• Researching Criminology (20 credits)

Optional modules in this year currently include:

• Crimes of the Powerful (20 credits)
• Cybercrime Clinic (20 credits)
• Drugs and Society (20 credits)
• Empire and Its Afterlives in Britain, Europe, and Africa (20 credits)
• Engaged Citizenship in Humanities and Social Sciences (20 credits)
• Forensic Linguistics: Language As Evidence (20 credits)
• Fundamentals of Forensic Investigation (20 credits)
• Gang Crime (20 credits)
• Global Environmental Justice (20 credits)
• Global Security (20 credits)
• Hate Crime (20 credits)
• Intercultural Perspectives On Communication (20 credits)
• Marketing & Communication (20 credits)
• Modernity and Globalisation (20 credits)
• Nationalism and Migration: Chaos, Crisis and the Everyday (L5) (20 credits)
• News, Discourse, and Media (20 credits)
• Penology and Prison (20 credits)
• Policing and Society (20 credits)
• Principles of Economic Crime Investigation (20 credits)
• Professional Experience L5 (20 credits)
• Psychology and Security (20 credits)
• Puritans to Postmodernists: American Literature (20 credits)
• Questioning Criminology (20 credits)
• The Dark Web: Threats, Freedoms and Responses (20 credits)
• Transitional Justice & Human Rights (20 credits)
• Victims of Crime: Key Players in Criminal Justice (20 credits)
• Wildlife Crime: Threats and Response (20 credits)
• Youth Crime, Youth Justice (20 credits)

Placement year (optional)
Have the opportunity to do a criminology work placement year after your second or third year on this Connected Degree - we're the only UK university to offer flexible sandwich placements for undergraduates

Year 3
Core modules in this year include:

• Cybersecurity: Theory and Practice (20 credits)
• Dissertation (Criminology) (40 credits)
• Information Security Management (20 credits)

Optional modules in this year currently include:

• Black Criminology, Race and the Criminal Justice System (20 credits)
• Contemporary Terrorism and the Global Response (20 credits)
• Crime and New Technologies: Theory and Practice (20 credits)
• Cyberpsychology (20 credits)
• Dangerous Offenders and Public Protection (20 credits)
• Economic Crime and Fraud Examination (20 credits)
• Forensic Linguistics: Language and the Law (20 credits)
• Forensic Psychology: Investigation (20 credits)
• Gender and Crime (20 credits)
• Green Crime and Environmental Justice (20 credits)
• Introduction to Teaching (20 credits)
• Miscarriages of Justice (20 credits)
• Money Laundering and Compliance (20 credits)
• Policing: Law, Policy and Practice (20 credits)
• Policing: Communities, Intelligence and Information (20 credits)
• Professional Development: Recruiters and Candidates (20 credits)
• Professional Experience L6 (20 credits)
• Treatment and Rehabilitation of Offenders (20 credits)
• True Crime - the Making of a Genre (20 credits)
• Understanding and Addressing Sexual Offending (20 credits)

We use the best and most current research and professional practice alongside feedback from our students to make sure course content is relevant to your future career or further studies.

Therefore, some course content may change over time to reflect changes in the discipline or industry and some optional modules may not run every year. If a module doesn’t run, we’ll let you know as soon as possible and help you choose an alternative module.

You’ll be assessed through:

coursework
examinations
presentations
group projects
dissertation

You’ll be able to test your skills and knowledge informally before you do assessments that count towards your final mark.

You can get feedback on all practice and formal assessments so you can improve in the future.

The way you’re assessed may depend on the modules you select. As a guide, students on this course last year were typically assessed as follows:

Year 1 students: 18% by written exams, 7% by practical exams and 75% by coursework
Year 2 students: 10% by practical exams and 90% by coursework
Year 3 students: 8% by written exams, 13% by practical exams and 79% by coursework