Just as the Internet creates new forms of commerce, it also facilitates new forms of crime. So debate is underway on just how much government intervention -- in terms of new laws and regulations -- is warranted or necessitated to protect this newest technological forum.

Analysts point out that prior advances in developing goods and services have generated warnings that they would be misused with criminal intent.

• The advent of the automobile gave rise to fears that it would be used to facilitate flight by bank robbers and murderers.

• Then police got their own cars and motorcycles.

• The introduction of the credit card coincided with dire warnings of the potential for fraud and mischief.

• But legislation in the 1970s limited a person's liability to $50 if his card was lost and used fraudulently -- and today credit card fraud amounts to only nine cents per $100 charged.

When President Clinton met last Tuesday with more than two dozen representatives of the Internet community, none of them asked the federal government to step in and fix their problems, according to those at the meeting. The industry said it was an industry problem and the industry would solve it.

Cracking down on Internet crime is not an insurmountable task, experts say. Combating it will require some new tools, new skills and new relationships with federal and state agencies. The issue appears to be one of enforcement -- not the need for new laws of policies.

Industry self-regulation is more flexible and thus preferable to direct government intervention. And that is the stance not only of industry leaders, but the stated policy of the Federal Trade Commission.

Source: Steve Lohr, "Policing the Internet: Anyone But Government," New York Times, February 20, 2000.