Abstract
In December 2019, the UN General Assembly adopted resolution 74/274, establishing an open-ended ad hoc intergovernmental committee of experts tasked with elaborating a comprehensive international convention on countering the use of information and communications technologies for criminal purposes. It is not clear whether the negotiations will result in a global cybercrime treaty; however, there are already concerns that the outcome could potentially deviate from widely accepted standards such as the Council of Europe Cybercrime Convention and, instead of harmonising approaches to cybercrime, fragment them. The paper focuses on this possibility of misalignment between existing and new approaches and its potential ripple effects, which could go beyond the issue of cybercrime. The analysis looks at the UN cybercrime negotiations from two angles. First, the potential deviation of the future UN cybercrime treaty from existing standards on cybercrime and the consequences of this lack of harmonisation. As the ability to investigate crime and exchange digital evidence cross-border concerns not only high-technology crime but any crime leaving digital traces, the outcome of the UN process, if it creates a 'parallel' set of standards, can affect criminal justice systems in various countries and globally for years to come. Second, while the processes related to cybercrime and international cybersecurity are separated on the UN level, the link between the two should not be underestimated. The UN cybercrime negotiations can result in a set of rules that potentially affect the outcome of the work of the OEWG and GGE. As the goal of negotiations is a binding treaty, the paper examines whether there is a possibility for the UN cybercrime process outcome to override the non-binding nature of some of the existing cyber norms.