Britain has decided against tough new measures to regulate the potentially lucrative e-commerce industry, opting instead to cash in on future growth, a powerful group of MPs said on Wednesday.
The cross-party Trade and Industry Committee said the government had jettisoned burdensome regulation which may not necessarily offer complete security and moved towards a minimalist and pro-industry approach.
"The emphasis of legislation is likely to change away from security issues to . . . developing commerce," committee chairman Mr Martin O'Neill told a press conference. MPs hope the toning down of draft laws will help Britain cash in on a global e-commerce boom, expected to be worth up to £500 billion sterling (€758 billion) a year by 2002.
Key escrow - originally the British government's central proposal designed to police potential security risks or fraud - will not go ahead, said the report, which responded to plans for draft laws, due to be released in June.
Key escrow is a procedure under which encryption keys used to protect information have to be registered with a third party. These can then be accessed by law enforcement agencies and other authorities holding a warrant.
Instead of key escrow, the police should be able to obtain a warrant for access as and when they need to, said MPs. This will be less bureaucratic and burdensome to legitimate e-commerce.
