White House Agonizes Over UN Cybercrime Treaty (politico.com) 19
The United Nations is set to vote on a treaty later this year intended to create norms for fighting cybercrime -- and the Biden administration is fretting over whether to sign on. Politico: The uncertainty over the treaty stems from fears that countries including Russia, Iran and China could use the text as a guise for U.N. approval of their widespread surveillance measures and suppression of the digital rights of their citizens. If the United States chooses not to vote in favor of the treaty, it could become easier for these adversarial nations -- named by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency as the biggest state sponsors of cybercrime -- to take the lead on cyber issues in the future. And if the U.S. walks away from the negotiating table now, it could upset other nations that spent several years trying to nail down the global treaty with competing interests in mind.
While the treaty is not set for a vote during the U.N. General Assembly this week, it's a key topic of debate on the sidelines, following meetings in New York City last week, and committee meetings set for next month once the world's leaders depart. The treaty was troubled from its inception. A cybercrime convention was originally proposed by Russia, and the U.N. voted in late 2019 to start the process to draft it -- overruling objections by the U.S. and other Western nations. Those countries were worried Russia would use the agreement as an alternative to the Budapest Convention -- an existing accord on cybercrime administered by the Council of Europe, which Russia, China and Iran have not joined.
While the treaty is not set for a vote during the U.N. General Assembly this week, it's a key topic of debate on the sidelines, following meetings in New York City last week, and committee meetings set for next month once the world's leaders depart. The treaty was troubled from its inception. A cybercrime convention was originally proposed by Russia, and the U.N. voted in late 2019 to start the process to draft it -- overruling objections by the U.S. and other Western nations. Those countries were worried Russia would use the agreement as an alternative to the Budapest Convention -- an existing accord on cybercrime administered by the Council of Europe, which Russia, China and Iran have not joined.
Treaty? (Score:4, Insightful)
Doesn't a treaty need 67 votes in the senate?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:1)
Anyway premise of TFA makes little sense:
The uncertainty over the treaty stems from fears that countries including Russia, Iran and China could use the text as a guise for U.N. approval of their widespread surveillance measures and suppression of the digital rights of their citizens.
Biden administration has been doing just as bad than the mentioned countries, pressuring social media like facebook and others to censor, spreading lies and misinformation about and even trying to jail and in some cases even succeeding to do so with their political opponents.
Re: (Score:2)
This one makes more sense:
U.N. Ad Hoc Committee Vice Chair Claudio Peguero Castillo, cyber ambassador for the Dominican Republic, argued that the country would need a court order to spy on civilians, saying that âoethere is no single provision in the conventionâ that would explicitly allow for surveillance by member states.
Oh noes! We won't be able to spy on our own citizens!
Re: Treaty? (Score:1)
It also needs trustworthy partners. The UN is a pointless organization, Russia and China will sign just for the PR of the US not doing it and then completely ignore what it says anyway, as they have done with every single UN treaty and resolution since its establishment.
Re: (Score:1)
The US is actually the worst violator of UN and other international treaties in the world, with Israel being a close second.
Oh, it's guruevi, never mind.
Prep to be sold into UN slavery. (Score:2)
Sweet Jesus
Re: (Score:3)
Kofi Annan still haunting your nightmares?
Re: (Score:1)
Did you forget the /s at the end? If not, then you're too late.
https://consortiumnews.com/202... [consortiumnews.com]
Earlier this month, the Department of Justice secured indictments of Americans and Russians for advancing “Russian propaganda” in America. The feds claim that articulating views of the war in Ukraine from a Russian perspective and holding out those views to be fact are somehow criminal.
Re: Oh like censoring speech online.... (Score:2)
Those people are being paid to spread those ideas, which is illegal not to disclose. You left out the good part. I wonder why...
Meh (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The chains of international law are entirely imaginary, but when one side treats themselves as bound no more is needed. They can have the US tie themselves in chains.
Re: (Score:2)
That's by design and why the entire concept of the Security Council exists, because if you can't actually get the nuclear powers to agree to agree to something if is effectively just words on paper.
However if the SC is unanimous on this it can have some teeth since everything is actually saying they will do a thing and it can work in those rare cases where everyone actually agrees: Montreal Protocol [wikipedia.org]
Grotesque projection (Score:3)
Hesitation is not a good look (Score:2)
The way to prevent cybercrime is to legislate for far better software and hardware standards, and meaningful practices by corporations, but no government is going to risk alienating their own police and security services.
All countries prefer being able to shout at other countries for not doing the right thing/enough, because it's cheaper, easier, and politically less risky to sacrifice the occasional company or a few million bank records than it is to secure a nation and reduce the underlying causes of dome