The Ministers for Foreign Affairs of the 43 member states of the
Council of Europe yesterday adopted the Convention on Cybercrime,
the first international treaty on criminal offences committed on
the internet and other computer networks. The Convention will now
opened for signature at a cybercrime conference in Budapest on 23rd
November.
The adoption follows approval of a final draft in September by
the Council’s Deputy Ministers. However, the Convention can only
become legally effective when at least five countries, three of
which must be Council of Europe members, ratify it. This
ratification process, which will involve some changes to domestic
laws, is expected to take at least two years. Some non-European
countries, including the US, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, are
also party to the Convention.
The Convention aims to harmonise laws on crimes such as hacking
and on-line piracy, fraud and child pornography. The Convention
faced much criticism from privacy groups during its long drafting
process. Council of Europe representatives dismissed these
criticisms, dubbing the Convention as “the first ever international
treaty to address criminal law and procedural aspects of various
types of criminal behaviour directed against computer systems,
networks or data and other types of similar misuse.”
