What's Wrong With the New UN Cybercrime Treaty

Authoritarians love it!

Photo by Muha Ajjan on Unsplash

Cybercrimes can impact nearly anyone on the planet and are exactly the kind of problem that international cooperation can help solve. Ransomware attacks, malicious hacking, phishing operations, and data theft are global problems that require global solutions. They are a good example of what former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan used to call “problems without passports.” Like climate change, collective action is needed to confront the global scourge of cybercrime.

Because cybercrimes are often the remit of organized criminal groups in one country targeting entities in another, it makes sense to agree on common rules and procedures for going after these groups. And this is precisely how international treaties can help. Treaties spell out a country’s obligations to take certain actions under certain circumstances, and treaties create mechanisms for countries to readily meet their obligations. Basically, treaties make cooperation easier and lower the transaction costs for cooperating.

So, it is no wonder that countries would want to come together and hash out a treaty on tackling cybercrimes. And earlier this month at the United Nations, UN member states did just that.

But the resulting UN Convention on Cybercrime is…pretty bad!

On August 8th, a committee representing most UN Member States approved the draft text of the formally titled “United Nations Convention Against Cybercrime: Strengthening International Cooperation for Combating Certain Crimes Committed by Means of Information and Communications Technology Systems and for the Sharing of Evidence in Electronic Form of Serious Crimes.” (That is the actual title of the treaty, seriously).

Despite the fact that this proposed treaty has the support of most UN member states, many civil society and private sector groups are arguing against its adoption. In fact, the proposed Convention on Cybercrime has the dubious distinction of being opposed by industry titans like CISCO and Microsoft, as well as major industry and human rights watchdogs like the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Human Rights Watch, to name a few.

So, what is the problem with this convention? And how did an idea that originated with Russia (with backing from China, North Korea, Myanmar, Nicaragua, Syria, Cambodia, Venezuela, and Belarus) end up gaining the support of most other UN member states, including the United States and Europe? What exactly does this proposed treaty actually do?

Today’s episode of To Save Us From Hell takes a deep dive into how the UN Convention on Cybercrime went off the rails. Anjali Dayal and I discuss the roots of international efforts to create a treaty on cybercrime and explain why this proposed treaty is getting so much pushback from human rights groups and the tech industry.

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