CYBERCRIME SIGNING CEREMONY – HANOI

PLENARY STATEMENT ON BEHALF OF THE GLOBAL INITIATIVE AGAINST TRANSNATRIONAL ORGANZIZED CRIME (GI-TOC)

• Excellencies, distinguished guests and thanks to the Government of Vietnam for their hospitality and inclusion of civil society perspectives in this event.

• The adoption of the UN Cybercrime Convention is a timely and important achievement for the UN and for multilateralism in general, at a time of significant strain for the system.

• The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized crime is committed to working with all relevant stakeholders to support the full implementation of all instruments to tackle organized crime, including this new Convention, as part of broader whole of society approaches.

• Our Global Organized Crime Index clearly supports the need for specific attention to tackling cybercrimes and cyber-enabled crimes. These crimes are on the rise globally – as shown in the continuing prevalence of financial crime (including online financial scams) as the biggest global crime, and cyber-dependant crimes growing across all regions of the world.

• Since this convention was negotiated, fraud and related cyber scams have become one of the most severe evolutions of transnational organized crime in recent years, with billions of US dollars defrauded annually worldwide. The scale of this and the urgent imperative to dig deep into the treaty provisions in order to find the relevant tools and pressure points for action cannot be overstated.

• At the Global Initiative we also see a disturbing and intensely harmful rise of organised crime involvement in child sexual exploitation and abuse. Treating it and tackling it as an organised crime, with due attention to finding and prosecuting perpetrators is essential.

• The Treaty provides measures to compel private sectors to act and respond to government and enforcement requests. I would urge parties to consider how to strengthen these provisions domestically, in line with human rights standards, in order to compel also prevention and proactive action against cybercrimes. In both of the pernicious forms of crimes I have referenced, the private sector, financial and technological, has a significant role to play and their engagement could be decisive in fighting cybercrime.

• International cooperation to address organised crimes has been limited – existing treaties have not being adopted globally, resources constrain pursuit of cross border crimes and political will and the role of state-embedded actors also impedes progress. This Treaty provides a further opportunity to overcome some of these challenges.

• Finally, the treaty must be implemented in line with its strong human rights safeguards and the rule of law, and with transparent and meaningful participation of non-governmental stakeholders, in with the modalities of the Ad Hoc Committee.

• Thank you