The 1-2 November sees London host an international conference on cyberspace security.
Representatives from 60 nations are gathering to discuss how to tackle the increasing levels of cybercrime. Those attending include foreign secretary William Hague, EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes, a variety of leading cybersecurity experts and technology entrepreneurs such as Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, Cisco vice-president Brad Boston and Joanna Shields, a senior executive at Facebook.
The topics set to be addressed at the Cyberspace Conference include cybercrime, safe and reliable access, and international security. For full details of the conference, visit: http://www.fco.gov.uk/en/global-issues/london-conference-cyberspace/. With cybercrime estimated to cost £600bn a year worldwide, there is a huge economic incentive to invest in fraud prevention and eCrime deterrents. Convening the London Conference on Cyberspace, Foreign Secretary William Hague urged a "global co-ordinated response" on policy. "We want to widen the pool of nations and cyberusers that agree with us about the need for norms of behaviour, and who want to seek a future cyberspace based on opportunity, freedom, innovation, human rights and partnership, between government, civil society and the private sector. "The response does not lie in the hands of any one government or country but it is too important to be left to chance. This needs to be a collective endeavour, involving all those who have a stake in cyberspace" he said. William Hague added that the government has put aside £650m of additional funding to help tackle computer-based threats over the next four years.
The foreign secretary, in a direct challenge to China and Russia, told the conference that global treaties policing the web would be counter-productive, insisting that cyberspace must not be "stifled by government control or censorship" as "Nothing would be more fatal or self-defeating than the heavy hand of state control on the internet" going on to say that it was his his "passionate conviction that all human rights should carry full force online".
Mr Hague set out the varied problems the world was facing: "Rising costs to business from cyber crime … companies being held to ransom by hacktivists, and the theft of intellectual property sapping prosperity and innovation… "For individuals, a heightened risk of exposure to crime as efforts to clamp down on crimes such as child pornography in one part of the world are rendered ineffective by illegal practices on networks in other countries… "And for governments, threats to critical infrastructure, the loss of tax revenue or the defrauding of government services, the theft of confidential national information and vulnerability to attacks in cyberspace."
As Tero Pollanen, an expert in the prevention of cybercrime and fraud, points out: "crime statistics show a transition from traditional organised crimes to the new seemingly faceless cybercrime. The resulting loss for the financial services industry is astronomical."
As to the outcomes of the conference, Britain said it wanted to develop a set of international "rules of the road", establishing "norms of acceptable behaviour" in cyberspace. "The ideas and proposals we hope to emerge from the conference will develop into the 'London Agenda' - an inclusive and focused approach to help us realise the enormous potential cyberspace offers for a more prosperous, safe and open networked world."
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