Through its resolution 74/247, the General Assembly decided to establish an open-ended ad hoc intergovernmental committee of experts, representative of all regions, to elaborate a comprehensive international convention on countering the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes, taking into full consideration existing international instruments and efforts at the national, regional and international levels on combating the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes, in particular the work and outcomes of the open-ended intergovernmental Expert Group to Conduct a Comprehensive Study on Cybercrime.
Pursuant to General Assembly resolution 74/247, the ad hoc committee convened a three-day organizational session in May 2021, in New York, in order to agree on an outline and modalities for its further activities, to be submitted to the General Assembly at its seventy-fifth session for its consideration and approval. The organizational session was originally scheduled to take place in August 2020 but due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the General Assembly decided through first its decision 74/567 of 14 August 2020 and then 75/555 of 15 January 2021 to postpone the organizational session of ad hoc committee to 10-12 May 2021.
The ad hoc committee elected the Officers of the Committee and discussed an outline and modalities for its further activities at its organizational session.
On May 26 2021 the General Assembly adopted resolution 75/282, entitled "Countering the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes."
In the same resolution, the General Assembly decided, inter alia, that the Ad Hoc Committee shall convene at least six sessions, of 10 days each, to commence in January 2022, a concluding session in New York, and conclude its work in order to provide a draft convention to the General Assembly at its seventy-eighth session; it further decided that the Committee shall hold the first, third and sixth negotiating sessions in New York and the second, fourth and fifth sessions in Vienna.
The first session of the Ad Hoc Committee will be held in New York from 17 to 28 January 2022.
A Frequently Asked Questions document with information on a new United Nations convention on cybercrime is available here.
At the first meeting of its organizational session, held on 10 May 2021, the Ad Hoc Committee elected the following officers:
Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Vice-Chair
Rapporteur
African Group: Algeria
African Group: Egypt
African Group: Nigeria
Asia-Pacific Group: China
Asia-Pacific Group: Japan
Eastern-European Group: Estonia
Eastern-European Group: Poland
Eastern-European Group: Russian Federation
GRULAC: Dominican Republic
GRULAC: Nicaragua
GRULAC:
WEOG: Australia
WEOG: Portugal
WEOG: United States
Asia Pacific Group: Indonesia
H.E. Ms. Faouzia BOUMAIZA MEBARKI
H.E. Mr. Mohamed Hamdy ELMOLLA
Mr. Terlumun George-Maria TYENDEZWA
Mr. WU Haiwen
Mr. Chitaru SHIMIZU
Mr. Markko KÜNNAPU
H.E. Ms. Dominika KROIS
Mr. Dmitry BUKIN
Mr. Claudio PEGUERO CASTILLO
Mrs. Sabra Amari MURILLO CENTENO
Vacant
Mr. Emil STOJANOVSKI
H.E. Mr. Antonio DE ALMEIDA RIBEIRO
Mr. James WALSH
Mr. Arsi Dwinugra FIRDAUSY
UNODC, through the Organized Crime and Illicit Trafficking Branch, Division for Treaty Affairs, serves as Secretariat for the Ad Hoc Committee and can be contacted at CybercrimeAHC@un.org
