A comparative study of cybercrime in criminal law: China, US, England, Singapore and the Council of Europe

The development of information technology provides new opportunities for crimes. Firstly, it facilitates traditional crimes such as fraud, and secondly, it breeds new crimes such as hacking. The traditional crimes facilitated by information technology and the new crimes bred by it are the so-called cybercrime in this book. To regulate cybercrime, legal regimes have developed countermeasures in the field of criminal law at different levels. At the national level, China, the United States, England and Singapore have all undergone reforms to adapt their criminal law. At the international level, the Council of Europe has drafted the Convention on Cybercrime and opened it for signatures. However, the still commonly committed cybercrime, such as DDoS attacks and online fraud, indicates the insufficiency of these countermeasures. In this background, this book intends to answer the research question: how can the criminal law be adapted to regulate cybercrime? By using doctrinal research and comparative study as the main methods, this book firstly explores and analyses the approaches of cybercrime legislations in the selected five legal regimes both in the past and in the present, and secondly, compares the different approaches and concludes with respect to the following aspects: Aspect 1: Do we need a cyber-specific legislation to regulate cybercrime? Aspect 2: If we do need a specific legislation, what approaches are more systematic for it? Aspect 3: What principles are sufficient and appropriate to determine jurisdiction over cybercrime? Aspect 4: What is the function of the Convention on Cybercrime in shaping appropriate legislation against cybercrime?