Computer-related Crime in Asia: Emergent Issues

Abstract

The rapid development of computer connectivity and the role of the Internet in the emergence of new e-commerce markets have increasingly attracted the attention of national governments and international agencies. Hyperbole aside, the astonishing reach of these tools has changed the way a large part of the world communicates and does business. It may be too early to evaluate claims that this medium ushers in an irresistible phase of a global ‘information revolution’ and with it a ‘new economy’. However, we can be certain that with the erosion of traditional barriers to communication, our concepts of time and place have irrevocably changed and the process of ‘globalisation’ has accelerated.

The convergence of computing and communications and the exponential growth of digital technology have brought enormous benefits to modern society. Along with these new benefits, however, come greater risks. As never before, and at negligible cost to themselves, lone offenders can inflict catastrophic loss or damage on individuals, companies, and governments from the other side of the world. With these developments has come the awareness that ‘information security’ is no longer a matter for the technical and computer specialist, but for millions of people who now engage these new media every day for business, communications and leisure. The continued prosperity of industrial nations, and the economic development of the world’s less affluent societies, seems likely to depend increasingly on electronic commerce. To the extent that public confidence in e-commerce is jeopardised by criminal activity, so too will economic well-being be threatened.