It's time for CyberCrime law - that works

The current position is that South Africa is lagging behind the world in terms of Cyber-Law. Within our Forensics practice we regularly use the ECT Act, (particularly Section 86), ICASA regulations, The Prevention of Harassment Act and a few others to help people find redress when they're scammed, phished or hacked.

The reality is that these laws are outdated and have not advanced with technology. What we need are laws that deal with the daily stuff. Gumtree scams, WhatsApp extortion, dating scams, reverse invoicing and invoice interception, data theft and even ransomware.

The exciting news, is that we're almost there!

https://www.justice.gov.za/legislation/bills/CyberCrimesBill2017.pdf

When the above CyberCrimes Bill (2017) is eventually signed off and enacted we're going to be able to see real change. We'll see SAPS obliged to roll out more Cyber training, proper laws and penalties that will make it unappealing to even attempt the regular scams that do the rounds.

Yes, it's only a start. The detection and tracing of Cyber Criminals will still remain an issue, but with the changes to how preservation orders are served and the responsibilities placed on Internet Service Providers we're optimistic. In that area alone, we'll see much more responsibility fall to Hosting Providers in authenticating clients (proper kyc) to prevent scammers from picking up cheap hosting and domain packages with rogue domains.

The future remains optimistic for the fight against Cyber Criminals in South Africa!