As Cyber Crimes Originate at Home, China Tightens its Laws

According to various security companies, China is under severe pressure from malware and spam attacks that emanate from the country itself, compelling the nation to strengthen its cyber crime laws.

Zhao, CEO of Knownsec, a security consultancy, described China as the malware factory of the world and stated that the nation had turned into a dominant source of zero-day attacks that targeted newly disclosed software vulnerabilities and other online attacks, as reported by Ecommerce Journal on May 12, 2009.

Zhao added that the Chinese hackers had become well-known during the past few months for widely attacking applications like Adobe Flash and IE.

Moreover, a new report from Fortinet states that China has suffered the backlash of malware attacks it launched during April 2009.

Therefore, to stop China from becoming a haven for Internet crime, Man Qi, a co-writer contributing to a new paper relating to the Chinese cyber legislation, disclosed that although the country had progressed considerably in cyber crime laws, it was further striving to toughen them, as reported by PCWorld on May 11, 2009.

As per reports, China has introduced three new articles to its criminal code based on which online criminals could be sentenced to 7 years of imprisonment. Earlier, computer crimes summoned a sentence for up to 3 years of incarceration. Further, the country has also broadened its definition of crime committed by computers.

These changes in China's criminal code, according to Qi, are essential to bust and arrest cyber criminals as well as to increase people's protection with regard to their private property and privacy.

However, the security specialists state that the harshness of Chinese cyber laws can't be compared with those in the United States, where computer criminals are sentenced to 20 years in jail. Further, cyber crime in China is not only rising but also not getting adequate attention from law. Hence, additional acts specifically cracking down on cyber crimes need to be considered, the specialists suggest.

Meanwhile, security specialists striving to mitigate cyber threats in China is facing a major challenge of a huge population of broadband users. Rising number of broadband users is responsible for augmenting Internet crime in China.

Related article: Asia the new breeding ground for spam

» SPAMfighter News - 5/18/2009