“Submitting to the UN General Assembly a joint resolution of Russia and the United States on a responsible behavior of both states in cyberspace is an important step towards cyber stability. The document appeared unexpectedly, but it is a kind of diplomatic breakthrough against the background of a long rivalry between the two powers.” This opinion was expressed in an interview with the Information Agency “External Economic Relations” by Chairman of Fund for Protection of Investors’ Rights in Foreign States Yaroslav Bogdanov.

Submitting to the UN General Assembly a joint resolution of Russia and the United States on a responsible behavior of both states in cyberspace is an important step towards cyber stability. The document appeared unexpectedly, but it is a kind of diplomatic breakthrough against the background of a long rivalry between the two powers.” This opinion was expressed in an interview with the Information Agency “External Economic Relations” by Chairman of Fund for Protection of Investors’ Rights in Foreign States Yaroslav Bogdanov.

Russia and the United States have submitted to the UN General Assembly a joint resolution on responsible behavior of states in cyberspace, “Kommersant” reports. Moscow and Washington hope that by joining forces they will be able to make the process of implementing voluntary rules of responsible behavior of states on the Web more effective. At the same time, it follows from the resolution that in the future we may talk about mandatory norms.

- It is worth noting that, for instance, a year ago, Russia and the United States submitted two competing resolutions for consideration. As a result, both were adopted, since most countries supported both documents, deciding not to quarrel with anyone. However, this created a space for rivalry and behind-the-scenes intrigues, had a negative impact on the effectiveness of both mechanisms. So the development of a joint resolution can be considered a diplomatic breakthrough,” Yaroslav Bogdanov said.

The expert added that the issue of introducing an international moratorium on use of digital weapons, the use of which makes it possible to replicate an attack by an unlimited number of people, is now relevant.

- We must admit that the world is not ready to face a global cyber threat. Most companies and even states believe that nothing threatens them, but this is a dangerous misconception. It’s just that no one has ever attacked them in reality.

It is necessary to change international legislation in the field of cybersecurity right now, without waiting for any major tragedies and victims. Russia and the United States should take the leading role in this. At the same time, it is necessary to involve the leaders of the crypto industry and the Global Digital Alliance (GDA), an international digital alliance based on the principles of transparency, equality and independence from national governments. It is also necessary to create an alternative to the United Nations - the “Digital UN”, since recent events show that traditional institutions themselves can be attacked by cybercriminals.

There should be no easing for countries,  all computer attacks should be strictly criminalized. Cybersecurity should be outside politics, and the key to international stability should be interstate exchange in the field of data on cybercriminals,” concluded Yaroslav Bogdanov.