A Note on POSTNotes

Last month, the United Kingdom's Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (POST) issued what it calls a "POSTNote" (i.e., a briefing paper) on computer crime. In this POSTNote, POST -- which bills itself as "the UK Parliament’s in-house source of independent, balanced and accessible analysis of public policy issues related to science and technology" -- offers an elementary but useful overview of significant trends in computer crime and legislative, enforcement, and user responses to the problem.
For those interested in a U.K. perspective on science and technology issues, POST has been publising POSTNotes and longer papers online since 1995 in four areas: biological sciences and health; environment and energy; physical sciences and information technology; and science policy. Other IT POSTNotes in the last six months include data encryption; pervasive computing; and information and communications technology in developing countries.