Law must catch up with cybercriminals

When the relevant reforms are in place, the police’s e-Hub unit should help ensure officers are well-placed to more effectively investigate offences and take action before scammers find their next victims

SCMP Editorial

Published: 8:00am, 23 Sep, 2022

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Cybercrimes are on the rise in Hong Kong even as figures for other types of major offences have fallen. That contrast puts a spotlight on the growing need to fight criminals who increasingly find easy targets through fast-changing technology such as smartphones.

In July, the Law Reform Commission launched a public consultation on its proposal to update laws and penalties related to such crimes. The update would be the first in more than two decades.

While waiting for sharper legal teeth, Hong Kong police this week announced that they were ready to snap back with new unit featuring an upgraded reporting system to analyse cybercrime incidents.

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In the first half of the year, police logged more than 10,600 online scams or other cyber offences, 46 per cent more than during the same period last year. Victims lost about HK$1.58 billion in total.

Among those reporting cybercrimes was Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu, who discovered his likeness was being used to lure people to offers of making “quick money” on a suspicious online cryptocurrency site.

The stakes are even higher when it comes to dangerous and possibly deadly human trafficking scams that lure jobless young people into forced labour for online or telecoms fraud rings across Southeast Asia.

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Police say their new e-Crime Processing and Analysis Hub (e-Hub) is a “one-stop platform to combat related syndicates and prevent the spread of scam cases” that will allow officers to more quickly process and confirm information from victims and informants.

The force is also looking at ways to enhance digital policing through a cooperation arrangement with the Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corporation.

Of course, long-overdue legal reform is still a needed deterrent tool for law enforcers.

As we have suggested before, those powers must be subject to safeguards to strike a balance of proportionality to other offences, and between effective law enforcement and the protection of individual rights.

But when balanced cybercrime laws are in place, the new police unit should help ensure officers are well-placed to more effectively investigate offences and take action before scammers find their next victims.

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