A EUROPEAN TREATY on cybercrime and policing the Internet is expected to nearly double its number of signatory members this year according to members of the Council of Europe.

The Council first announced its proposed legislation for cracking down on cyber crime back in 2001, but was disappointed at the lack of mass enthusiasm for the treaty. The purpose of the treaty is supposedly to prosecute cyber criminals quicker and promote improved cooperation between the world’s various law enforcement agencies. But only 43 countries decided that the treaty was even worth signing in the first place, whilst only 22 of those bothered to actually modify their laws and ratify it, according to the Council’s web site.

The US, which tops the leader board of IC3’s Internet crime table, has already ratified the treaty, proving that its worth about as much as the paper it’s printed on. Taking note of this, and realising that it probably makes no difference whatsoever, the Philippines, Dominican Republic, Mexico, Costa Rica, South Africa and Brazil have all decided that they may as well just sign the no-teeth treaty and get the council off their collective backs.

Meanwhile, while Europe frets about cybercrime and how to get small and relatively harmless countries like Romania (1.5 per cent of online crime, as opposed to the USA’s 63.2 per cent) to ratify its little treaty, the U.S. military has hinted that it will expand its cyber crime to cyber warfare in the near future.

Lt. Gen. Robert J. Elder Jr., who heads the Air Force's cyber operations command told the press that the military was currently developing ways to launch virtual attacks on enemies. The seemingly flower-powered general even reckoned that if cyber squaddies could use the Net to scramble an enemy's communications system, they might even be able to do away with heavy handed conventional weapons like bombs.

Whether this method would work in rural areas of Afghanistan, Pakistan or any other places where internet coverage is sparse, the general didn’t mention.

What he did mention was the fact that cyber attacks were used early on in the Iraq war, to electronically jam Iraqi military systems and prevent Iraqi ground units from communicating with one another, but judging by the "success" of the US military campaign still raging there, it’s hard to imagine the Americans trading in their weapons for wi-fi just yet. µ

L’Inqs
AP
2007 Internet crime report

Council of Europe