SINGAPORE Trends and Developments Contributed by: Rajesh Sreenivasan, Steve Tan, Benjamin Cheong and Lionel Tan, Rajah & Tann Singapore LLP
• designating higher protection standards for children’s personal (thus, sensitive) data; and • how may children’s data/profiles be used? Cybercrime Advancements in TMT, while seeking to benefit society as a whole, also carry an unfortunate side effect – criminal actors may utilise them to facilitate their malicious activities. With more advanced tools at their disposal, the threat of criminal harm has become a prime concern. In particular, the past year has seen the intro - duction of new legislation in Singapore aimed at dealing with online criminal activities and digital - ly-enabled scams. These novel pieces of legisla - tion are notable for the scope of power granted to the relevant authorities, allowing them to take preventative action against such criminal activi - ties and enabling a more proactive approach towards protecting individuals from falling prey to scammers and threat actors. Online Criminal Harms Act The Online Criminal Harms Act (“OCHA”) was passed in Parliament in July 2023. It seeks to enable the relevant authorities to deal more effectively with online content or activity that is criminal in nature or used to facilitate or abet crimes. In 2024, the OCHA was implemented in two stages. The OCHA partially came into force on 1 Febru - ary 2024. The measures that came into effect involve (primarily) the powers of authorities to issue directions and orders outlined below. • Directions – Directions can be issued to online services where there is a reasonable suspicion that online activity is in furtherance of the commission of a specified offence, a scam or malicious cyber activity.
• Orders – If an online service does not com - ply with the above directions, orders may be issued to restrict access to the service. • Powers to require information – Designated authorities may require persons to provide any information necessary for the administra - tion of the OCHA and to facilitate investiga - tions and criminal proceedings. The remaining provisions of the OCHA came into force on 24 June 2024, allowing the issuance of Codes of Practice requiring providers of des - ignated online services to implement appropri - ate systems, processes or measures to disrupt scams and malicious cyber activities. Pursuant to this, the following Codes of Practice have been implemented: • Online Communication Code – This is appli - cable to designated online communication services, which must implement appropriate systems, processes or measures to achieve the prescribed objectives of: (a) quick disruption of malicious accounts and activities; (b) deployment of safeguards to prevent the propagation of malicious activities; and (c) measures to ensure accountability. • E-Commerce Code – This is applicable to designated e-commerce services. It contains the same requirements as the Online Com - munication Code, with additional require - ments to: (a) subject users who advertise or post about the sales of goods or services to verifica - tion against Government-issued records; and (b) provide, as an option for users, payment protection mechanisms that require deliv - ery of goods or services to be verified, before payment is released to the sellers.
435 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook