Today, the European Commission proposed to establish a
European Cybercrime Centre to help protect European
citizens and businesses against these mounting
cyber-threats.
The centre will be established within the European Police
Office, Europol in The Hague (The Netherlands). The
centre will be the European focal point in fighting
cybercrime and will focus on illegal online activities
carried out by organised crime groups, particularly those
generating large criminal profits, such as online fraud
involving credit cards and bank credentials.
The EU experts will also work on preventing cybercrimes
affecting e-banking and online booking activities, thus
increasing e-consumers trust. A focus of the European
Cybercrime Centre will be to protect social network
profiles from e-crime infiltration and will help the
fight against online identity theft. It will also focus
on cybercrimes which cause serious harm to their victims,
such as online child sexual exploitation and
cyber-attacks affecting critical infrastructure and
information systems in the Union.
"Millions of Europeans use the Internet for home banking,
online shopping and planning holidays, or to stay in
touch with family and friends via online social networks.
But as the online part of our everyday lives grows,
organised crime is following suit - and these crimes
affect each and every one of us," said Cecilia Malmstrom,
European Commissioner for Home Affairs. "We can't let
cybercriminals disrupt our digital lives. A European
Cybercrime Centre within Europol will become a hub for
cooperation in defending an internet that is free, open
and safe."
The centre is expected to start operations in January of
next year.
For the Centre to be established, the European
Commission's proposal now needs to be adopted by the
budgetary authority of Europol.