THE DIGITAL SPACE AS A CRIME SCENE UNDER GLOBAL CONSTRAINTS

COVID-19 pandemic has challenged many countries. Restrictive measures to curb the spread of the new coronavirus infection included self-isolation of citizens, as well as working and studying online, which was possible thanks to the development of information technology. However, the digital space has always attracted criminal attention. The pandemic was no exception: the number of cybercrimes has increased significantly. The digital space has no state borders, and locating the crime scene might be difficult. The concept of a “crime scene” is absent in criminal legislation that generates controversy in criminal legal science. The authors consider digital space as a criminal concept, analyze scientific views on the problem of determining the crime scene, highlight the features of the digital crime scene, and reveal the main types of cybercrimes. They conclude that the crime scene in the digital space is the place of information input and entrance into the information and telecommunication network with the subsequent implementation from this scene of the criminal act, regardless of the location of socially dangerous consequences. The research methodology includes traditional for criminal law science. The comparative legal approach allowed identifying the features of scientific and legal definitions, to define the digital space as a crime scene. The statistical method, through the analysis of crime statistics in the Russian Federation, helped showing the dynamics of crimes committed in the digital space, including during a pandemic. Using the method of analysis, the authors have studied the cybercrime cases