The taming of the Sleuth—problems and potential of autonomous agents in crime investigation and prosecution

Abstract

The paper analyses legal issues arising from the use of autonomous agents in crime investigations, in particular the question of evidentiary constraints on undercover operations and their applicability to computer programs. The paper is divided into three parts. First, we give a short introduction to agent technology. In the second part, some existing projects of agent technology for crime investigations are discussed, and one particular legal problem, the law on entrapment, is exemplarily introduced. In the final part, we very briefly indicate how agent communication languages would have to be extended to address some of these concerns.

Notes

1. See eg S Wettig and E Zehedner ‘The electronic agent: a legal personality under German law?’ in A Oskamp and E Weitzenboek The Law and Electronic Agents (LEA 2003), Unipub, Oslo, 2003.

2. See in particular the development in the discussion between the first LEA workshop and the most recent one: G Sartor and C Cevenini (eds), Proceedings of the Workshop on the Law of Electronic Agents (LEA02), 2002, at http://www.cirfid.unibo.it/∼agsw/lea02/online.html; G Sartor and C Cevinini (eds) Proceedings of the workshop on the Law of Electronic Agents (LEA04), Edizioni Gedit, Bologna, 2004.

3. See eg P Chen ‘An automatic system for collecting crime information on the Internet’ The Journal of Information, Law and Technology (JILT), 2000 (3). Available at: http://elj.warwick.ac.uk/jilt/00-3/chen.html

4. There might be a small difference here between Europe and the USA with its history of elected local police and the ‘deputy’. In Europe too, the tendency to privatise public services since the 1980s has seen the use of private firms to perform functions previously reserved to the police, eg transport of prisoners. In all these cases however, the ‘agent’ does not inherit automatically the legal competencies from his master. His legal rights and duties are fully determined by the statutory framework that creates his specific function.

5. S Franklin and A Grasser ‘Is it an agent, or just a program? A taxonomy for autonomous agents’ in J Miller, M Wooldridge and N Jennings (eds) Intelligent Agents III: Agent Theories, Architectures, and Languages, Springer Verlag, Berlin, 1997, pp 21–35.

6. H Maturana, Autopoieses and Cognition, Kluwer, Dordrecht, 1980.

7. Franklin and Grasser, op cit, note 5, also at at http://www.msci.memphis.edu/∼franklin/AgentProg.html

8. F M T Brazier, O Kubbe, A Oskamp and N J E Wijngaards ‘Are law-abiding agents realistic?’ in Sartor and Cevenini (LEA02), op cit, note 2, pp 151–155.

9. A S Tanenbaum and M van Steen Distributed Systems: Principles and Paradigms, Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ, 2002.

10. The resources of this data is the study of the Business Software Alliance, year 2001 available at: www.bsa.org.

11. Articles 424–429, available at: http://www.impi.gob.mx/web/docs/marco_j/3w002121.htm

12. D L Zimmerman ‘I spy: the newsgatherer undercover’ University of Richmond Law Review Vol 33, pp 1185, 1206, 2000.

13. See eg State v Hayes, 752 A.2d 16 (Vt. 2000); see also: B Bell ‘Theatrical investigation: white-collar crime, undercover operations, and privacy’ William and Mary Bill of Rights Journal pp 152–207, 2002.

14. See eg A Ashworth and M Strange ‘Criminal law and human rights’ European Human Rights Law Review Vol 2, pp 139–156, 2003.

15. See, eg E M Neafsey ‘Why a Division of Criminal Justice?’ Seton Hall Legis Journal Vol 25, No 107, pp 124–133, 2001; G T Marx Undercover: Police Surveillance In America University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1988, pp 37–40.

16. Marx, op cit, note 15, p 47

17. P J Henning ‘Testing the limits of investigating and prosecuting white collar crime: how far will the courts allow prosecutors to go?’ University of Pittsburg Law Review Vol 54, pp 405, 406, 1993.

18. Marx, op cit, note 15, p 8.

19. We did not encounter these techniques in software piracy cases, which are Flambeau's target application They have been reported though in networks exchanging illegal (child) pornography, a plausible extension of the technology discussed here.

20. See Teixeira de Castro v Portugal (1999) 28 EHRR 101.

21. See the update to A P Simester and G R Sullivan Simester Criminal Law: Theory and Doctrine Hart, Oxford, 2000 at http://www.hartpub.co.uk/Updates/upcrimlaw_entrapment.htm

22. Looseley and Attorney General's Reference 4 All ER 898-9, my emphasis.

23. A J Ashworth ‘Re-drawing the boundaries of entrapment’ The Criminal Law Review, 2002, pp 161–179.

24. See op cit, note 22, para 101.

25. R Roiphe ‘The serpent beguiled me’ Seton Hall Law Review Vol 33, pp 257–296, 2003.

26. F M T Brazier, O Kubbe, A Oskamp and N J E Wijngaards ‘Are law-abiding agents realistic?’ in Sartor and Cevenini (LEA02), op cit, note 2, pp 151–155.

27. C Krogh and H Herrestad ‘“Hohfeld in cyberspace” and other applications of normative reasoning in agent technology’ Artificial Intelligence and Law, Vol 7, No 1, pp 81–96, 1999.

28. M Sergot ‘Normative positions’ in P McNamara and H Prakken (eds) Norms, Logics and Information Systems IOS Press, Amsterdam, 1999, pp 289–308.

29. See in particular L Lindahl Position and Change: A Study in Law and Logic Reidel, Dordrecht, 1977.