There was a 5-hour Senate Meeting in Belmopan today.
The parliamentarians of the Upper Chamber had quite a large volume of House business to tackle. After all, the House of Representatives had met and passed several, important pieces of legislation in 2 consecutive meetings since the last time the Senate met.
We have a few important highlights to report on tonight, but, our first story from the Senate is about the debate on the Cybercrime Bill of 2020. This the first very serious piece of legislation to address criminal offences that are committed with the use of computers and the internet.
Very soon, it will be illegal for predators and cyber bullies to release videos and pictures of adults or minors engaged in private sexual acts. But, the law goes further and addresses the criminal practices of identity theft, child solicitation on the internet, electronic fraud, and the infringement of copyright patents, designs, and trademarks.
In very much the same way that the House of Representatives had a bipartisan embrace of the law, the Senate also congratulated all the persons and organizations who were involved in its production:
Hon. Osmany Salas, NGO Senator
"The community I represent, NGO's were consulted during this, I must say we had the opportunity to express whatever comments and points we had so I want to say thank you for the opportunity for that. For too long people have gotten away with some horrific activities that sharing without your permission of people some images and videos and others that really have affected and traumatized those that have been targeted so I fully support this."
Hon. Ashley Rocke
"I think for too long in Belize, people have gotten away with cybercrime and because many of us are not sure how it really works, all we know is that we send pictures and videos across the internet and we hide behind these very pseudo names and frames and we think that nobody know who we are, nobody will catch up with us. One of the things I think we fail to understand is that with every person that is part of the internet system there is a digital finger print."
Hon. Michel Chebat, PUP Senator
"As much as I believe it was a good start, I believe attorneys are going to have a field day with this Mr. President, because many of the provisions in here will have to be tested against the freedom guaranteed by the constitution so I want to congratulate those who have worked to bring this to the fore I think it is a good start."
Hon. Micheal Peyreffite, UDP Senator
"No matter what freedoms the constitution gives you, the fundamental principal is that you have the right to swing your arm in any direction you want but your right to swing your arm ends where my face begins and so then you can no longer hide behind that PC, you can no longer hide behind that computer, if you put something out there about a particular person that will lead to injury to that person, to try to incite injury to happen to that person then this is saying you have committed an offense."
The Senate has passed this bill, and so, as soon as it gets the Governor General's assent, it will become the law.
