SAYING that the problem “is already in our midst,” Philippine National Police Criminal Investigation and Detection Group chief Director General Samuel D. Pagdilao Jr. yesterday called on Congress to immediately pass tougher laws against cyber-crimes particularly when the offenders are foreigners.
“It’s something that we really have to focus on because it would really be a big, big problem for the government. We have to tell the people what’s this all about,” said Pagdilao, a lawyer from Philippine Military Academy Class 1979.
According to him, the Philippines’ weak laws against cyber crimes have made the country attractive to foreign cyber-crime syndicates which have been establishing their base of illegal operations in the locality.
“This is likely to go on unless the inadequacies in the legal framework are addressed accordingly. We need to pass tougher laws and for other branches of the government to help take on the problem since it is already taking place,” Pagdilao said.
The CIDG chief revealed that the situation has become alarming as the country is now becoming a safe haven for cyber crime operators involved in cyber pornography, cyber sex den, illegal gambling, and credit card fraud and identity theft.
“If there’s no tough law to address the problem, the probability is that foreign syndicates will come here knowing that the Philippines is a safe haven for cyber-criminals,” he said.
Pagdilao emphasized that the country’s law enforcement units including the CIDG could hardly deal with these syndicates because “cyber crime operators, many of them foreign mafias, are aware of the present organizational and technical incapability of the country’s law enforcement agencies.”
He said that cyber crime is now the crime of the future because syndicates are utilizing sophisticated technology in which law enforcers in the country are lagging behind in terms of training and equipment.
Pagdilao urged Congress to prioritize the passing of the Cyber Crime Prevention Bill and also asked the PNP leadership to support the organizational and technical capability build-up of the CIDG Cyber Crime Unit in order to efficiently and effectively address the problem of cyber crimes especially those involving transnational organized groups.