IGF 2010, 14-17 September 2010, Vilnius (Lithuania)

Workshop: Cybercrime: common standards and joint action

Council of Europe workshop discusses need of mechanism to assess progress against cybercrime

 
 
[15/09/2010] The workshop discussions underlined the value of the Council of Europe Budapest Convention as a common standard and framework for joint action against cybercrime at the global level, in particular for developing legislation, investigations and international cooperation.  Experiences in  Georgia, Estonia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka as well as private sector initiatives, such as Microsoft, discussed during the meeting showed the potential of Budapest Convention to extend its reach further.

Based on the experience of the Council of Europe`s monitoring bodies or of the Financial Action Task Force, participants discussed the eventual creation of a mechanism (“Cybercrime Action Task Force”) to identify needs, mobilise resources for capacity building and assess progress made by countries, and agreed that this initiative could be given further consideration.

Other tools and instruments can complement the Budapest Convention, such as the Convention on Prevention Terrorism, Convention on Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse, Data Protection Convention). Additional tools have been developed to ensure adequate legislation, training for judges or prosecutor and public-private cooperation.

There was agreement that countries worldwide need to be supported through technical assistance in order to establish the necessary capacities to apply existing standards and tools. Official development aid agencies need to make cybercrime a topic of development cooperation. The workshop identified the need for stronger commitment from political leaders with regard to measures against cybercrime.
Some 90 participants were in the workshop and many had joined through remote hub and raised questions from countries such as Argentina, Burundi, Cameroon and Pakistan.