‘OM and the police lack people and expertise to handle cybercrime cases’

In 2016, according to the agreement, the police should have submitted 190 suspects of cybercrime to the Public Prosecution Service, but this turned out to be 171. The Public Prosecution Service attributes the failure to meet the standard to the fact that there is still too little expertise and manpower available in this area. terrain.

The Public Prosecution Service says in the annual report that it is catching up to increase its expertise and capacity for combating cybercrime, which includes computer intrusion. The number of cybercrime cases submitted to the Public Prosecution Service in 2015 in order to further prosecute the suspects was 125. Compared to this figure, the number of cybercrime cases increased by 37 percent in 2016 to 171 cases, but it lagged behind. to the target of 190.

The standard for the number of complex criminal investigations in the field of cybercrime that the Public Prosecution Service had to conduct in 2016 has been met. It had to be 30 and 34 complex criminal investigations were actually carried out. In 2014 there were still 19 and in 2015 a total of 21.

Last year, the Public Prosecution Service indicated in an internal memorandum that it was short of millions of euros to combat certain types of crime, such as cybercrime. The conclusion was that due to this lack of extra budget, the Public Prosecution Service cannot effectively combat cybercrime. An additional EUR 26 million would eventually be needed to increase the capacity of experts. The Public Prosecution Service said in the internal memorandum that it would like to make improvements in the fight against cybercrime.