Investigative Activities in the Conditions of Criminal Proceedings Digitization

Abstract

The modernization of pre-trial proceedings of criminal cases is impossible without adapting the procedural means of obtaining and recording evidence to the new digital reality. The author criticizes the opinions of some researchers in the sphere of criminal proceedings who claim that preliminary investigation and currently used investigative actions are inefficient, among other cases, for the investigation of “computer” crimes, and should be substituted by a universal “acquisition of digital information”. However, while analyzing the impact of modern information technologies on the investigative actions that use them, the author points out both to the extension of opportunities and the “blurring” of the established procedural boundaries. Another paradox is also of interest: all modern technical opportunities for getting new information organically “fit in” the existing system of investigative actions and, contrary to the expectations, do not result in the emergence of any new ones. The list of means for obtaining evidence provided for in the Criminal Procedure Code is characterized by a high adaptability to new conditions as it includes all the existing opportunities. Consequently, the digital modernization of the institutes of the law of evidence should be aimed not at the means of procedural cognition, but at the means of procedural recording of the process and results of investigative actions, where all the routine operations in need of modernization can be found.