Social networks users will help the police and Security Service of Ukraine. In the meantime, they are fighting against cyber-criminals using antediluvian computers

Evidence of improvement of the fight against cyber crime in Ukraine began shortly after the close of Ukrainian file-exchanger EX.UA in January 2012 and the massive DDoS attacks on major government sites. At the Main Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) they have created a Department for Fighting Cyber ​​Crime, which became a part of the Department for Fighting Economic Crimes.

These departments have appeared in every region and in the structure of the Security Service of Ukraine, in particular, in Transcarpathia too. However, the employees of these departments complain of lack of funds and technology necessary to fight cyber-criminals.

Site of fighting against cyber-crime is not working

January 25, 2012 in Ukraine, the President issued a decree establishing the counterintelligence protection of state interests in the field of information security within the Security Service of Ukraine Department.

However, the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security and Defense did not support the bill. The Head of the Committee Anatoly Gritsenko said that there are no clearly defined responsibilities and tasks of the department, hence there is danger of an expanded interpretation of "information security."

Ex-deputy head of the SSU Alexander Skipalsky believes that there is indeed the need for information security since modern communication technologies, in fact, are sometimes used as an undercover network. Certain authorities are needed to control them. However, it’s easy to turn against ordinary citizens to monitor their movement or talks on a cell phone. Also, according to the expert, "with today’s approaches, it can be used to fight the opposition."

Office for Fighting Cyber Crime and human trafficking appeared in the structure of Ukrainian Interior Ministry in September 2009. And before that the fighters with cyber criminals had already shown a loud case of closing Ukrainian file exchanger INFOSTORE.ORG (in particular, for distribution of pornography). Now this is not just a department, but an office with a long name, headed by Maxim Litvinov. According to him, he created a team of specialists who can really resist IT and telecommunications offenses, to fight cyber-fraud, and together with that – human trafficking. The new administration has even got a web resource – CYBERCRIME.GOV.UA. However, for several weeks all attempts to enter it have been unsuccessful – the site is not working…

The law is not familiar with the concept of "hacking"

By the way, the war with anti-government sites is not something new. In 2010 and 2011, the SSU opened 120 criminal cases dealing with ​​cybercrime.
But this kind of violations in Ukraine was remembered only after the scandalous closure (January 31, 2012) of the file exchanger EX.UA (allegedly for the failure to comply with intellectual property rights). Outraged users called on people using social networking sites to attack the government’s sites as a protest. In early February, 2012, because of DDoS-attacks, Web resources of the central authorities of Ukraine did not function or worked intermittently. On February 2 and 3, 2012 the sites of Interior Ministry, National Bank of Ukraine, Antimonopoly Committee, froze. The pages of the SSU, the Party of Regions, the State Tax Administration, Cabinet of Ministers, President of Ukraine etc. were difficult to open.

But Vladimir Polishchuk, the head of press service of the Ukrainian Interior Ministry, said that the concept of "hacking" in the legislation of Ukraine does not even exist. Although for the unauthorized intrusion into the work of electronic systems or computers one may face up to 3 years imprisonment or a fine (up to 17,000 hryvnia). For a crime committed by a group of people the imprisonment is for up to 6 years (Criminal Code, Art. 361). According to the MIA statistics  in 2011 in Ukraine there were reported 85 crimes in the sphere of high technologies, 72 hackers were arrested and 23 of them were even sentenced.

Population will be involved in fighting cyber-crime

On March 25, 2012 a chairman of the Security Service of Ukraine Igor Kalinin said that to fight cyber crime in SSU does not have enough facilities. Modern equipment is needed, which cannot be found in the established offices. The only hope is due to Euro 2012 in Ukraine, these proposals will be supported by the government.

Ukrainian blogger Oleg Pilipenko calls another reason why we lag behind in this matter. In particular he points to the fact that the salary of the Director of Fighting Cybercrime department in Ukraine is… 1400-1500 UAH ($ 177), and his subordinates earn even less. Therefore, a good specialist would never work for such money. Therefore, in cases of emergency, police and Security Service have to involve part-time employees. According to some information, only five people are now working in Kiev at the department of fighting cyber-crime.

Maxim Litvinov considers that in this struggle ordinary citizens will help. The management wants to make contact with each user of social networks (Twitter, Facebook, Vkontakte, Odnoclassniki) to prevent cyber-crime in time or to make criminal activities on the Internet public.

From Internet publications