Defining and Registering Criminal Offences and Measures - Oapen

Computer Offences 133
The evaluation of the trial questionnaire showed that the definition of computer
offences worked well for almost all the countries. They were able to follow almost
all the include rules. However, illegal downloading of data and programs was not
included in the data reported for the majority of countries (see tables G.1 and
G.2). Data availability on computer offences was very good. Only France and UK:
England and Wales stated that data were not available. The same was true for Switzerland
on Police level.
The results of the subsidiary questionnaire can be found in table G.3. The results
show that computer offences in some countries, like France, are not separate
ones according to the law, but considered as another offence. Especially, “theft”
of electronic data or software is actually considered “real” theft in some countries,
like Finland, France and UK: England and Wales. Even more interesting were the
results for illegal downloading. Only Switzerland stated to have a separate legal
provision for this. All the other countries consider this as another offence, typically
as a copyright violation, fraud or theft.
In countries where certain computer offences are not covered by special legal
provisions, they are consequently not counted separately in statistics. Apart from
this, in France even the offences of hacking and damaging electronical data, although
separately identifiable in criminal law, are not counted individually in statistics,
but only under the heading “other offences”. In Switzerland and UK: England
and Wales, computer offences are not included in police data, according to the
answers to table G.3.