Legal Issues - Criminal Law

CRIMINAL LAW

Crimes committed in connection with the Internet (commonly called "cybercrimes") have attracted widespread attention. Cybercrime encompasses an enormous range of offenses, from hacking to online fraud to child pornography. Generally, cybercrimes either involve traditional crimes committed with computers or crimes in which the computer serves as the "victim" of the illegal act, as in hacking or virus attacks.

The Internet has made certain kinds of criminal activities much more attractive, since cyberspace possesses unique characteristics that may actually encourage the commission of criminal acts. For example, identifying and apprehending an offender is more difficult in cyberspace than in real space; cyber-crimes are often far cheaper to carry out than traditional offenses; the physical risk and expense required to commit crimes are often reduced when they occur in cyberspace; and the impersonality of the Internet may diminish the perpetrator's perception of the impact his or her actions have on the victim of the crime, as well as limit the opportunities that victim has for retaliation. Finally, computers cloak the identity and location of the perpetrator and erasure and encryption software can obliterate virtual evidence. Cybercrimes may also implicate third parties, such as Internet service providers (ISPs).

Though reliable statistics are hard to find since cybercrime incidents are under-reported, many believe cybercrime is accelerating. Recorded computer security breaches increased from six in 1988 to more than 8,000 in 1999, while ten to 15 new viruses appeared daily by the early 2000s. In 2000, the U.S. Department of Defense recorded over 22,000 attacks against its computers.

The basic federal statute, the Federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, prohibits unauthorized access to any "protected" computer (basically any computer connected to the Internet) for purposes of espionage, accessing unauthorized information, fraud, and damaging the computers. Online dissemination of child pornography was the focus of much controversial federal legislation, including the Child Pornography Prevention Act (1996). Many state laws criminalize various cybercrimes, among them e-mail crimes and cyber-stalking. The attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on September 11, 2001 swiftly drew international attention to the threat of cyber-terrorism, and the Bush administration enacted sweeping online-surveillance legislation that supporters argued was essential for enhanced national security, but that critics charged ran roughshod over fundamental civil liberties.

European nations were moving toward more comprehensive, anti-cybercrime legislation by 2000. The EU's controversial proposed cybercrime treaty, made public in April 2000, was designed to harmonize European criminal laws on a wide range of computer-related offenses. Any nation's enforcement officials could gain online access to other states to pursue cybercrime investigations. The treaty would also grant European governments extensive powers regarding wiretapping, real-time collection of traffic data, and the search and seizure of digital information.

The global interconnectedness of computer systems and the specter of international terrorism prompted calls for greater cooperation in the fight against cybercrime. In 1998 Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, and the U.S. agreed to coordinate efforts to investigate and prosecute cyber-crimes. Proposed solutions included a broad, international treaty that could bring all domestic anticybercrime laws into agreement. But nations differed on the extent to which data encryption should be permitted, since it simultaneously protects the privacy of individual and business information, but may aid cyber-criminals in hiding their activities. They also debated increased governmental surveillance of online communications, a particularly sensitive topic in the aftermath of the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks of 2001. Such monitoring could help identify cyber-criminals and terrorists, but was construed by privacy advocates and members of various ethic and racial groups as a means of fostering the growth of "police" states and the illegal targeting of specific groups ("profiling"). Finally, digital-content regulation, which might help suppress hate speech or child pornography, is seen as endangering freedom of expression and promoting state-sponsored censorship.