The Convention on Cybercrime of the Council of Europe, known as the Budapest Convention, is the only binding international convention on the issue of cybercrime as of now. The convention provides guidelines for countries that are in the process of developing comprehensive national legislation against Cybercrime, and it also serves as a framework for international cooperation between the various States who have signed the treaty.

European Convention on Cybercrime

The Convention on Cybercrime, also known as the Budapest Convention on Cybercrime or just the Budapest Convention, is the first international treaty seeking to address Computer crime and Internet crimes by harmonizing national laws, improving investigative techniques, and increasing cooperation among nations.

It was drawn up by the Council of Europe in Strasbourg with the active participation of the Council of Europe’s observer states Canada, Japan and China.

It is open for ratification even to states that are not members of the Council of Europe.

What does the Budapest Convention cover?

The Budapest Convention provides for:

• Criminalisation of various illegal activities such as illegal access, data and systems interference, computer-related fraud, child pornography.
• Tools to make investigation of cybercrime and securing of e-evidence more effective
• International police and judicial cooperation on cybercrime and e-evidence.

Concern of Countries

Some countries, including India, have concerns over signing this agreement due to the following reasons:

• The Convention (through its Article 32b) allows for transborder access to data and countries like India feel it infringes their national sovereignty.
• The “the promise of cooperation is not firm enough” and it seems that countries could refuse cooperation on certain grounds.
• India is unwilling to sign the Budapest treaty because it was drafted without its participation.
• India has voted in favour of a Russian-led UN resolution to set up a separate convention.

Russia-led Resolution

The Russian proposal titled “Countering the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes” calls for the creation of a committee that will convene to discuss the creation of a new treaty through which countries can coordinate to prevent cybercrime.

Countries like Russia, China, and India questioned the Budapest Convention on grounds of national sovereignty issues.

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