Legal amendments needed for online crime, PG says
Naufal said the evidence is difficult to obtain from foreign service providers because Maldives is not a party to the Budapest Convention on Cyber Crime.
By
Fathmath Ahmed Shareef
The Prosecutor General's Office (PG) on Monday said it is important to pass amendments to the cybercrime bills sent to Parliament as soon as possible to curb anonymous cybercrime using social media platforms.
The Judiciary Committee of the Parliament is currently studying three bills related to cyber crime. These include:
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1-
Penal Code Amendment Bill
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2-
Criminal Procedure Code Amendment Bill
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Criminal Assistance Transfer Act Amendment Bill
The Prosecutor's Office on Monday participated online in the Judiciary Committee to share details of the proposed amendments to the three bills. Public Prosecutor Ahmed Naufal attended the meeting on behalf of the Prosecutor's Office to share the information through a presentation.
Naufal said the main reason for proposing amendments to laws to prevent cybercrime is that the current laws make it difficult to obtain electronic evidence from abroad for investigations into cybercrime-related offences and such evidence is becoming increasingly important in cases.
"Whether it's drug cases, blackmail cases, a lot of them are using various social media platforms, whether it's Facebook or Google. The evidence for those cases is in the hands of overseas service providers. In a lot of cases we don't get evidence like this," Naufal said.
Naufal said the evidence is difficult to obtain from foreign service providers because Maldives is not a party to the Budapest Convention on Cyber Crime.
According to Naufal, Maldives is currently not participating in the convention due to:
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The current cybercrime laws in Maldives do not meet some of the requirements of the Convention
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The current proposed amendments will incorporate them; these amendments will be passed to participate in the convention
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Once these laws are amended, Maldives can ask to participate in the convention, but the Maldives has requested to participate after fulfilling the requirements of the legal system.
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Countries with the highest availability of electronic evidence are the countries that have participated in these conventions
"We find that it is very difficult to proceed with these types of cases without obtaining this type of evidence from abroad. A lot of cases, especially cases like blackmail, have to be filed by the police because there is no way to get more evidence on them," Naufal said.
"It's sent from a Facebook account and we can't find the related content. We have to file cases without knowing who sent what”..
Naufal further noted:
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Cyber crime is not a criminal offence in Maldives and it is difficult to fall under the existing Penal Code
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There are technical and legal barriers to accessing electronic evidence in Maldives under the current Criminal Procedure Act
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There are also current legal restrictions on obtaining phone number information or subscriber information and communication data required for investigations
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The laws will be amended and Maldives' accession to the Budapest Convention will make it easier to obtain this information from foreign service providers without a court order
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Service providers are no longer mandated by the law to retain data, so when they go to seek information related to investigations, it is sometimes difficult to access it; so it has now been proposed to make it mandatory in the Criminal Procedure Code
Naufal added that the amendment bills on cyber crime were also introduced in the last session of parliament. Noting that these amendments have been under discussion for a number of years, Naufal said the 241 Committee had already highlighted the lack of secure information storage for investigative purposes as a threat to national security as well.
Citing an example of how this is done in other countries, Naufal said that even in countries in the Caribbean, which are smaller than the Maldives, electronic data is collected, stored and provided to police investigations.
“So it's always a struggle for service providers, it's something you had to spend in terms of money, but this is something that had to be done many years ago,” Naufal said.
“The burden has to be borne now. If we don't do that, we'll have to file and backlog cases like child abuse that we now get, as I mentioned earlier. It's because we can't figure out who's doing it”.
