Singapore Computer Crime Laws OK Preemptive Arrest 35
^^MAg^^ points to this Reuters story on CNN which begins "Ultra-strict Singapore has passed some of the world's toughest laws against computer hackers and virus writers, allowing police to arrest suspects before they strike, official documents show."
Re:Sounds like American rhetoric (Score:2, Interesting)
Exactly, they don't! So if you are only allowed to arrest them after the crime is committed, they don't really care. However, if they are locked up behind bars right before they are about to commit a crime, you avoid the potential disaster that follows.
Aren't you arguing FOR preemptive arrest then?
Re:Sounds like American rhetoric (Score:3, Interesting)
Best of times, worst of times. (Score:5, Interesting)
a) Existing Law:
sg's CMA (Computer Misuse Act) was already draconian before this Amendment, when compared to its American counterpart (sorry, forgot the name of the law; I'm sure an American lawyer/lawyer-wannabe can cite the right reference here). For a similar type of offence, the maximum penalty prescribed under American law was 1 year, while under the CMA, it was 10 years (and some S$10,000 or so in fines).
Moreover, it was a classic example of what you Americans apparently call as a "catch-all" law; it was written in so general terms that just about any and every computer crime could be prosecuted under that. For instance, one Singaporean legal expert I was speaking to a few weeks back suggested that the Government could easily have prosecuted spammers under the old law (the article doesn't mention it, but I understand that the new one has now specifically banned spamming)
The general opinion, then, among academia and policy makers in sg is that the CMA has been a resounding success; they keep pointing out to the fact that incidents of computer crime are remarkably low in sg compared to neighbouring countries (In particular, most people compare it with the high cybercrime rate in Phillipines, which only has a law on e-commerce, not cybercrime in general)
This, however, misses the fact that Singaporean policy-makers have long had issues in promoting creativity and innovation among the local populace; one of the reasons that's usually pointed out is sg's highly regulated environment. Which, of course, is to not say that cybercrime should be legalised, but instead to suggest that, perhaps, a repressive legal regime stifles creativity; I, for one, really think a 10 year jail term for cracking is a bit too much, and does not promote the sort of freedom that creativity apparently needs.
(I'm refraining from commenting on the current Amendment 'coz I haven't gone through it)
b)Geo-politics: .au-ians lampooning your current administration, but let's face facts, people:- respect for citizens' privacy and liberties is at an all time low in just about any country these days.
I guess some of you Americans must be feeling scared and all that, and no doubt, there will be reactions from EU-ians (to use K5-lingo) and
Yup, that's right; you'll be just kidding yourself if you believe that just because your country has law X, you're free from being snooped upon.
The current theme, apparently, is informal agreements between governmental agencies; so if, say, the CIA can't legally snoop on a suspicious American citizen, it will send an informal request to, say, MI-5 (or whatever the Brit Secret Service is) and ask them to snoop on the said citizen. The Brits will do so vice-versa, and so far, the requests have been honoured by whatever countries are in the loop. And trust me, you'll be amazed if you see the list of countries with such informal agreements; there are some hitherto un-obvious names out there.
All this, of course, is what I've been gathering in seminars on cybercrime for the last few weeks, and obviously, I can cite these up with actual examples if anyone is interested.
Which, of course, doesn't mean that Big Brother is out to get you or anything, and frankly, I really detest the way in which Slippery Slope arguments are tossed here on /.; my real point is that borders are less sacred these days than they used to be, even among law enforcement agencies.
Or in other words, it's plain stupid to think that these draconian laws don't affect you; they do, and for all you know, sg's law enforcement is informally helping your own country's law enforcement as a result of this.
(Okay, that was extra-ordinarily incoherent, but need some serious sleep asap. Which is also the reason why I could be wrong in a few details, and why I haven't given any links; willing to be corrected/challenged on this)
none of you get it (Score:1, Interesting)
in terms of size, singapore is no US. (it is the size of washington dc, however.)
which means, incidentally, that the misconduct of just a small group of people will affect the rest in a much larger fashion.
and of course, there is no space at all for corporate competition. linux users in singapore are virtually non-existant, and almost everyone uses a nokia handphone. the newspaper and television media have an almost exclusive monopoly, despite some attempts to promote competition.
and every damn government's servers (web or file or print or whatever it is), for good or for bad, runs on windows. the person in charge of the latest mass rapid transit link talked about the "reliable microsoft technology" and how he crashes his pc routinely by clicking too many times, which is quite ridiculous to think of it.
did we have a choice? no. i do wish we had better, more neutral press [which seems to be quite pro-Bush, and anything that happens to the senior minister makes the headlines] and telly, but once you've made the economic choke on the exploitable locals like us, it's not lucrative to enter our market any more.
needless to say, that's what will happen if just about any party came into rule here. how many very small countries are known for liberal rule and are similarly prosperous and orderly?