On the crime of assisting in information network criminal activities as an undercover charge
With the rapid development of the Internet industry in the new era,the number of convictions for assisting in information network crimes in China has been increasing year by year,which has sparked widespread and intense reflec-tion and questioning on the legislative setting and judicial application of this crime.Opinions criticizing assisting in infor-mation network crimes as an undercover charge have emerged one after another.In order to standardize the practical oper-ation of this crime and release its intrinsic value,China should base itself on the essential meaning of this crime,affirm the legislative essence of the criminalization of this crime,candidly acknowledge the nature and characteristics of its undercover charges,re-examine the previous label of completely denying undercover charges,and clarify the positive sig-nificance of this crime.In terms of legislative design,the crime of assisting in information network crimes aims to address the characteristics of non-contact,non-regional,and discrete division of labor in network crimes,with the core purpose of cutting off criminal support for information network crimes such as telecommunications network fraud,reflecting the crim-inal strike strategy of"encirclement and support",realizing the punishment and governance of cybercrime itself,and having full rationality in legislative technology and strategies.In judicial practice,the first step is to ensure the legitimacy of the punishment applied to the charges,accurately determine the equivalent degree of the charges,and achieve the le-gitimacy of the punishment for the charges.Secondly,a classification model for conviction and sentencing should be es-tablished to classify and analyze behavior conviction and sentencing,and a structural model should be constructed to unify legal order.Thirdly,the applicable conditions for different levels of crimes should be standardized to reject arbitrary and expansionary criminal identification.Finally,the applicable conditions for knowing elements should be accurately grasped to prevent the crisis of legal principle caused by insufficient typification characteristics of assisting behavior itself,fully release the positive value of this crime in information network crime governance,and achieve a dynamic bal-ance between protection function and safeguard function of criminal law.
crime of assisting in information network criminal activitiesundercover chargesassisting in the criminaliza-tion of behaviorprinciple of legality of crime and punishmentjudicial restriction