Developments in cybercrime law and practice in Ethiopia

With increasing access to information and communication technologies such as the Internet, Ethiopia has recently taken responsive legislative measures. One such legislative measure is enactment of cybercrime rules as part of the Criminal Code of 2004. These rules penalize three items of computer crimes namely hacking, dissemination of malware and denial of service attacks. The cybercrime rules are however slightly outdated due to changes that have occurred in the field of cybercrime since the enactment of the Code. The surge of new varieties of cybercrimes previously uncovered under the Code and the need to legislate tailored evidentiary and procedural rules for investigation and prosecution of cybercrimes have recently prompted the Ethiopian government to draft modern and comprehensive cybercrime legislation, but the draft law still needs further work on cybercrimes in light of other major legislative developments at regional and national levels. This article closely examines major developments in cybercrime law and practice in Ethiopia since the enactment of the first set of cybercrime rules and proffers recommendations towards a unified cybercrime regime.     

The United Nations data privacy system and its limits

ABSTRACT

While the United Nations (UN) pioneered in recognizing the impact of modern technological developments on (data) privacy as far back as 1968, little has so far been achieved in terms of introducing a truly global data privacy framework. The present UN data privacy framework is by and large a mere patchwork of rules that exhibit a number of weaknesses. This weak structure of the present framework is a result of political and ideological controversies of the Cold War era. This article considers the extent to which the current UN data privacy system provides protection to data privacy and highlights its major limitations. It concludes that the discourse at the UN set in motion, particularly in the aftermath of the Snowden revelations, wields a potential to result in a major reform in the UN data privacy system.     

Education and development; females’ education and fertility reduction in Africa: The case of Tigray,Ethiopia

The livelihood of the population in general, and females in particular, is affected by different socio-economic, demographic, environmental, cultural and other factors. the three main demographic variables: fertility, mortality and migration, which are also functions of some other variables, determine the quality of women’s lives. Some of the variables that are expected to determine the levels of fertility, mortality and migration may include literacy status, educational level, occupation, income, place of residence, marital status and other factors. Fertility is the most important variable in the population dynamics. A study was made in tigray, ethiopia, that included 2290 individuals. Of these, 1371 (60%) were females. the method of enumeration was used in order to collect the necessary information from the target population. the age structure, household composition, place of residence, educational level and other background variables were analysed. Results show that the literacy status and educational level were important variables that determined the age at first marriage, the use of family planning services, and antenatal and postnatal care. thus, it was concluded that female education is a key variable that enhances the participation of women in the development process by improving their status through the reduction of fertility.