SIR - I'm glad that Prime Minister Tony Blair is planning to make life Hell for gangsters, drug traffickers and fraudsters with the help of the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) (‘SOCA: is this Britain's FBI?', SMT, September 2005, ) and the Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 (‘Maltby claims "victory" over Powers of Arrest', News Update, SMT, May 2006, ). However, I'm deeply concerned that e-crime seems to have been lost in the mix.

The National High Tech Crime Unit has been discreetly swallowed up by SOCA. In my time as a Scotland Yard detective, a number of police officers (including myself) and their forces who were dealing with computer crime worked extremely hard to raise awareness of the need for establishing such a Unit to fight cybercrime. Most of those same officers consider the current move to be a step back, not a step forwards. Not good news, then.

Without the National High Tech Crime Unit in place, high tech crimes will have to be dealt with by local forces unless the crime meets SOCA criteria (which will probably require the cases in question to involve thefts totalling many millions of pounds). Local police forces are unlikely to have sufficient time, funds, skills and relevant experience to hand such that they can deal efficiently and effectively with hardened cyber criminals. That is a real concern for many.

Moreover, the ‘Confidentiality Charter' - which allowed businesses to report cybercrimes to the National High Tech Crime Unit with a guarantee of privacy - will disappear. Businesses rely on information being kept confidential. Without it they will be even less inclined to report serious crimes to the police. Rumours and leaked information can - and will - result in severe damage to their reputation and the bottom line. So why should they take the risk?

We know that SOCA has a £416 million budget to play with, but how much of that sum (if any) will be diverted to fighting e-crime?

The Government must address this issue now. If Parliament doesn't do so, the public's belief in the police services' ability to tackle cybercrime - developed by the hard work and insight shown at the Unit - will be lost.


Simon Janes, International Operations Director, Ibas

Source

SMT