UN rejects Russian cyber-crime treaty

World can't wait

The United Nations has rejected a Russia-backed treaty on cyber crime, preserving a deadlock that has hampered UK and US efforts to harmonise international computer law for the past 10 years.

Developments such as cloud computing, computer fraud, child pornography and fears of cyber warfare have increased pressure on countries around the world to give police powers to secure electronic evidence and pursue cyber crooks who operate across borders.

There is world-wide agreement that countries must urgently update and harmonise their statutes. But still no consensus on how it should be done.

The 12th pentennial UN Crime Congress in Salvador, Brazil, considered proposals for a cyber treaty but by Monday, after 10 days of talks, had failed to reconcile EU and US positions with those of developing countries and Russia.

The proposal was grounded by disagreements over national sovereignty and human rights. Traditional ideas of sovereignty are challenged when countries fall victim to trans-national cyber criminals and need to pursue them quickly into the foreign states where they hide.

Cloud computing similarly involves the relocation of data to servers in countries where police may not be regulated against unwarranted data access.

Rich countries said negotiations for a UN treaty would take years to tackle these thorny subjects. They insisted the Budapest Convention on Cyber Crime, introduced by the Council of Europe in 2001, already provided the desired treaty. States should concentrate scarce resources on adopting this into national law.

"The priority should be enhanced capacity building," said the US delegation, "not further delay in favour of lengthy negotiations for a new and unproven treaty."

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