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You and the Cybercrimes Act

The Cybercrimes Act

The Cybercrimes Act was signed into law in South Africa on the 26th May 2021 and comes into effect the beginning of July 2021.   Complying to this law applies to both individuals and companies and non-compliance has severe consequences ranging from hefty fines to imprisonment or both!

Although Cybercrime is on the increase and the aim of the Act is to keep people safe from criminal activity, most of the Act has a negative practical impact on all organizations and individuals.

What is the impact on you?

Private Organisations (including Insurance providers, Media Houses and Direct Marketers)

  • If you do not process any data as prescribed by any law, or without the authorization of one that can do it lawfully, you could be fined or face imprisonment for up to 5 years.
  • If you access personal information unlawfully, even if it is contrary to the conditions of the POPI Act, or alternatively possess personal information that someone else acquired unlawfully, you could be fined or imprisoned for 10 years.
  • If law enforcement finds you in possession of data, like personal information, that they think was acquired unlawfully by anyone, and you cannot explain it, you could be fined or imprisoned for 5 years.
  • If you do anything with software or hardware tools that could be used to commit a Cybercrime, you could be fined or imprisoned for 10 years.
  • You must help law enforcement to catch cyber criminals at your own cost or else you could be fined or imprisoned for 2 years.
  • A court can order you to preserve any evidence at your cost.

Financial Institutions (including Banks)

  • As for the Private Organisations as well as,
  • If you become aware that a crime has been committed, you must report the offense to the SAPS and preserve any evidence in the manner prescribed by the Minister of Police at your costs.  If you do not, you could be fined R50 000.

ICT Companies (Service Providers, ISP’s, Network Operators, Vendors)

  • All the above as well as,
  • If you sell a tool that could be used to commit a cybercrime, you are probably going to have to shut down the business, as selling such a tool is a cybercrime.
  • You are going to have to initiate an extensive compliance program to ensure you process data in accordance with the law because your customers are going to look to you if they get into trouble.

Individual users of computers

  • If you send a message, via e-mail, another messenger app or on social media, that is harmful (directly or indirectly) you could be fined or imprisoned for 3 years.
  • If you have a tool ( eg an app on your phone that bypasses WiFi passwords) that could be used to commit a cybercrime, you could be fined or imprisoned for 10 years.
  • If you share your password or access code, you could be fined or imprisoned for 10 years.
  • If law enforcement finds you in possession of a password that they think you are going to use to commit a cybercrime and you cannot explain why you have it, you could be fined or imprisoned for 5 years.
  • If you commit an offence with regards to the computer system of a financial institution or the state, you will be fined more or imprisoned longer.
  • Law enforcement has extensive powers to search, access and seize your data, computer, or phone.

Parents

  • If your child is cyberbullied, you will have a better chance of getting law enforcement to help you to stop the bully.  On the flip side, if your child is accused of cyber-bullying, the consequences could be severe.
  • If someone is distributing nude pictures of your child, you will have a better change of stopping them and could get an interim order preventing anyone else from sharing the pictures online.

 

Reference: The practical impact of the Cybercrimes Act on you – Michalsons

A Decade of Technology – 2014

Continuing our 10 year anniversary celebrations, this month we take a look at 2014.

The biggest story for 2014, was the stepping down of Bill Gates as CEO of Microsoft.  His successor, Sadya Nadella took over on the 4th of February.  On April 25, the Nokia/Microsoft deal was completed, making Nokia now Microsoft Mobile in a deal totalling $7.17 billion.  On September 15, Microsoft announced that it purchased Mojang, the makers of Minecraft, for $2.5 billion.

Some other noteworthy events, products and services:

  • Information on the Shellshock vulnerability was first released to developers in September.
  • The largest bug bounty was awarded, when Unix specialist Stéphane Chazelas discovered the Shell Shock vulnerability in the widely used Bash shell.
  • The FIDO Alliance released their first official specification on December 9.
  • Apple introduced the Swift programming language on June 2.
  • Android TV was released on June 25.
  • Google announced on January 13, that it had reached an agreement to acquire Nest for $3.2 billion in cash. Nest was the manufacturer of the Nest thermostats and smoke alarms.
  • On January 26, Google announced it had agreed to acquire DeepMind Technologies for $650 million.
  • Google announced on June 20, that it would acquire Dropcam, the video home monitoring company for $555 million.
  • On September 30, Google announced it would stop the Orkut social networking site.

Fun Facts:

The ALS Ice Bucket Challenge went viral in July.

On October 1, a Japanese man was sentenced to two years in prison for manufacturing 3D printed guns. He becomes the first person to serve time for a 3D printed gun.