
Police blame law for cybercrime
Date: April 09, 2006Source: China Daily
China's police are struggling to clamp down on rampant Internet crime in the face of vague and inadequate laws, senior police say.
"The most common crimes involve theft, racketeering, fraud of on-line resources and services, mass disruption and inconvenience to the public," said Xu Jianzhuo, deputy director of the Internet security bureau under the Public Security Ministry.
More than 100 million Chinese have Internet access.
Xu said police investigated more than 20,000 complaints of online theft last year, but very few resulted in prosecutions.
He said actual cases of Internet theft from online banks and games accounts alone could be in the millions.
"But just a handful of people have been convicted in recent years," said Xu, attributing the low prosecution rate to inadequate legislation.
Chinese law only forbids hacking into the classified information networks concerning state affairs, national defense, and high-end technology development and stipulates a maximum penalty of three years' jail.

