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United States Ratifies International Cybercrime Treaty

The Council of Europe Convention on Cybercrime, the first and only international treaty designed exclusively to combat computer crime, won approval last week from the U.S. Senate. The treaty was created to streamline computer crime laws globally, especially those in smaller or less developed nations that may not have updated their legal framework to reflect the complexities of the Internet. The treaty requires participating countries to target a broad list of activities, including unauthorized intrusions into networks, child pornography, the release of worms and viruses, fraud and copyright infringement.

The Council consists of 45 member states, including all of the European Union, and five nonvoting members, of which the United States is one. Negotiations on the treaty began in 1997. So far, 15 European nations, including Albania, Denmark, France, Norway and Ukraine, have fully ratified the final document. Read more about the treaty in the article Senate ratifies controversial cybercrime treaty.