03rd July, 2017 A Joint Press Conference was held in the MEIDECC’s Headquarters last Saturday, 01st July 2017, between the Deputy Prime Minister, Hon Siaosi Sovaleni, Head of Cybercrime – Council of Europe, Mr. Alexander Seger, Acting Attorney General, Mr ‘Aminiasi Kefu and the CEO for the Ministry of MEIDECC, Mr. Paula Ma’u discussing the Budapest Convention after Tonga’s accession to the convention after being invited in 2013.
The Deputy Prime Minister, Hon Siaosi Sovaleni stated that Tonga is very proud to be the first in the Pacific Islands to sign the Budapest Convention and will play a crucial role in advocating for the convention in the Pacific.
“This is an opportunity to strengthen the partnership between the Council of Europe and Tonga especially when moving forward; we have other developments such as capacity building, developing a new computer crimes bill. It is quite relevant to a small island such as Tonga which is why we are putting that effort to be a party to the convention”.
Hon. Sovaleni stated that Cybercrime and Cyberspace is not just a government matter, but it’s everyone’s responsibility.
“We need to work together in order to actually try and address this new cybercrime. The government of Tonga will host programs such as; more educational aspects especially the technical issues. Also to notify the public to know about the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) PHONE No: 2378 under MEIDECC Ministry. We can also put more publication and news media coverage into it”.
Head of Cybercrime – Council of Europe, Mr. Alexander Seger said Tonga being the Fifty-fifth party to sign the Convention. Tonga can cooperate with the other Fifty Five parties of the BUDAPEST Convention in assistance to technical issues, legislative advice and so forth.
Mr Seger told the media that the Budapest Convention deals with negotiating protocols that deal with accessing evidence in the cloud, cooperating lawfully with Social media (jurisdictions), National sovereignty, human rights, data protection and lots more and Tonga is a part of this.
“I’m very happy to see Tonga in the driver seat along with the United States, Canada, Australia and many other parties take part to this treaty”.
Mr Seger also urges users to be more proactive when using the internet;
- Use Common Sense
- Update your computer all the time and invest in the safety of it
- If you have a problem – report it
The Acting Attorney General, Mr. ‘Aminiasi Kefu said they have been involved from a law enforcement perceptive in developing legislations which is one of the core activities in becoming a member of the Budapest Convention to ensure that we have the appropriate legislation agreement to combat cybercrime.
“We are part of the projects that are funded by the Council of Europe called the GLACY + where technical assistances are provided to the countries that are given priorities to become parties of the Budapest Convention. The assistance in developing our legislation, developing our law enforcement mainly for police, also interactive gatherings from our Tonga CERT with the developing capabilities to cooperate with the other parties of the Budapest Convention”.
Mr Kefu said the main work of the Attorney General’s Office is to develop the new computer crime bill to be updated with the new technologies being introduced since it was established in 2003.
Mr Kefu said, “You may not be literate dealing with computers but you have a mobile phone that you user for mobile banking or communications, internet like emailing and Facebook and so forth are all vulnerable to different sources of attack. Dealing with cybercrime is like a holistic approach not only with the law enforcement, the prosecutors, and the judiciary but also with the service providers because they are the front line. Because now it has become a life necessity that we rely on technology just like how we rely on water and food. We also have to rely on maintain these technologies for the benefit of everyone”.
The Chief Executive Officer for the Ministry of MEIDECC, Mr. Paula Ma’u concluded the Press Conference with acknowledging the workshop on cybercrime reporting systems, collection and monitoring of criminal justice statistics on cybercrime and electronic evidence to be carried out this week, Thursday 6th of July 2017.
ENDS
Issued by the: Ministry of Meteorology, Energy, Information, Disaster Management, Environment, Climate Change & Communications.