Dear Mr. Sharkovski, I do understand perfectly your frustration, yet don't share your opinion - or perception - that there are just some powerful anonymous groups out there, which intentionally try to harm Macedonia by putting it on a black list. Why should they? (And by the way, this IMHO applies to almost any developing country, therefore Macedonia may serve just as an example).
Under current conditions, there are just 2 "recognized" public entities that - on the state level - may give you "credentials": (a) the US-government (Departments of State and Commerce in their country-profiles and related info, see for instance <http://www.mac.doc.gov/ceebic/countryr/Fyrm/MARKET/Macedonia%27s%20Informa ti on%20Technology%20Sector.pdf> which in fact makes quite critical observations with respect to laws and ICT in Macedonia). (b) the EU-commission (Commissioner for commerce) in Brussels. Even though not publicly admitted, both are obviously say "modulated" by general political interest, yet they don't operate anonymously. And there are the private risk-assessment agencies like Standard & Poors or the respective risk-assessment departments of banks and [public] trade- or export-risk assurance companies. Hence the only way out - in your situation and similar situations in other countries - is to engage at least one of these public entities and at least one of the private ones in a more formal assessment of your conditions and then distribute their assessment (like percentage of risk-penalties in trade-assurance contracts etc.). Unfair? Yes! Avoidable? Definitively no! Yours sincerely, Cornelio On Friday, October 1, 2004, L Sharkovski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I think perhaps some on the GKD list have missed the problem that my > compatriot in Macedonia is describing. The point, for us at least, is > not that there is rampant cyber-criminality in Macedonia that the > government has failed to prevent. The point is that it is just as safe > to buy from Macedonia, or sell to Macedonians online, as it is from any > other country. Yet the organization Exportbureau.com has alleged that > there are online fraud schemes based in Macedonia and has placed > Macedonia on their list of Suspect Shipping or Contact Addresses. There > is no contact address or information listed on THEIR website, so it is > extremely difficult to determine who this group is and where they reside > (although, after some research, we believe they reside in Taiwan). ..snip... > It is bitterly ironic that Macedonia -- a very small country with > relatively low cyber-density compared with the industrialized countries > in Western Europe and the US -- is accused of being major sources of > cyber-fraud. In a world of cyber-criminality, what percentage of that is > Macedonian? I will tell you: Zero. > > Yet our companies are shut off from access to major e-commerce channels. > So it is not an issue of lack of laws or lack of enforcement. It is an > issue of too much power in the hands of groups that seem to be informal > arbiters of which countries are "secure" enough for e-commerce. > Furthermore, they are completely inaccessible and unaccountable. They do > not reply to our requests for evidence of their accusation. And there is > no way for us to counter their accusation other than trying to publicize > our security through discussions like this one. It is difficult for us > to convey how frustrating and damaging this situation is for us. In many > ways, this type of baseless accusation, which harms our economy, is just > as lawless as the accusation they are making. ..snip... ------------ This DOT-COM Discussion is funded by the dot-ORG USAID Cooperative Agreement, and hosted by GKD. http://www.dot-com-alliance.org provides more information. To post a message, send it to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To subscribe or unsubscribe, send a message to: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>. In the 1st line of the message type: subscribe gkd OR type: unsubscribe gkd For the GKD database, with past messages: http://www.GKDknowledge.org
