Experts object to Europe's cybercrime treaty

[InfoSec News <isn () C4I ORG>]

http://www.nandotimes.com/technology/story/0,1643,500460485-500701461-503820232-0,00.html

By ANGELA DOLAND
Associated Press

PARIS (March 6, 2001 1:37 p.m. EST http://www.nandotimes.com) - Amid
concerns raised Tuesday that it might endanger users' privacy, Europe
moved closer to finalizing an ambitious international treaty on
cybercrime.

Four years in the works and now in its 25th draft, the Council of
Europe's treaty is likely to be ready for signature by year's end. But
some industry observers say the convention could stifle the Net's
free-for-all nature by giving governments too much power.

On Tuesday, the Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly convened a
panel of private Internet experts, police officers and academics in
Paris to debate the controversial text in front of reporters for the
first time.

The treaty, drafted by representatives of the 43-nation Council of
Europe, covers the destruction of data or hardware - such as the
damage caused by the Love Bug virus - as well as online child
pornography, copyright theft and other Internet crimes.

Computer attacks still are not universally recognized as crimes. The
speakers agreed that the council's work was an important step toward
standardizing laws on cybercrimes.

But Fred Eisner, a consultant for the Dutch government and private
companies, said the draft made unfair demands on Internet service
providers by asking them to track Web users' online movements.

"This draft convention lacks balance," Eisner told the assembly. "The
convention explicitly gives much more power to law enforcement
agencies and it has no system of checks and balances."

Bruce McConnell, president of McConnell International, a
Washington-based consulting firm, said the treaty should be more
forceful in protecting the privacy of Web users - who are already
worried about being spied on.

"There is concern that the powers of surveillance ... are not balanced
by comparable protections for individuals' privacy," he said.

When the draft convention was declassified in April 2000, concerned
Web users flocked to chat rooms and set up newsgroups to talk about
what they perceived as a threat to Net freedom.

The council has addressed many of their concerns in more than two
dozen version of the text, and it is not likely to evolve much before
it is ratified and opened for country signatures, said Guy de Vel, the
council's director of legal affairs.

"Everything has been so carefully weighted, I don't really see
important parts of it changing," he said.

Some critics say the treaty doesn't go far enough. They have slammed
it for focusing on financial measures such as copyright infringement
while leaving out provisions to fight online racism. The United
States, which often stresses freedom of expression over measures to
fight hate speech, had pushed to keep such anti-racism measures out of
the treaty.

"You're stopping short of protecting human dignity," lawyer Marc Levy
told the group. Levy has represented one of several French advocacy
groups that sued California-based Yahoo! for hosting online auctions
of Nazi memorabilia.

The United States, along with Canada, Japan and South Africa, has been
working with the Council to develop the treaty, and will have a right
to sign on once it is ratified.

Though the U.S. government has endorsed the gist of the treaty, it is
unclear whether the Bush administration might have objections with the
final version, McConnell said.

"The new administration is becoming very interested in the treaty but
is not yet up to speed," he said in an interview. "We still need to
see how it will play out."

ISN is hosted by SecurityFocus.com
---
To unsubscribe email LISTSERV () SecurityFocus com with a message body of
"SIGNOFF ISN".