Electronic Crimes Act, illegal access and related computer-misuse offences
Electronic Crimes Act (Cap. 4.41; Act 27 of 2009, as amended by Act 26 of 2012), ss. 4, 5, 6, 11
A citation is an address, not a summary. The first part names the law; what follows narrows it to the exact section, article or paragraph.
In force since 26 November 2009.
A computer misuse rule binding public and private bodies.
As of 7 September 2026.
What it requires
- Do not access a computer system, or any part of it, without lawful excuse or justification, including to copy, transfer or output data from it.
- Do not interfere with data on, or the operation of, a computer system without lawful excuse or justification.
- Do not access a computer system the Minister has designated as restricted; a heavier penalty applies where access to a restricted system occurs in the course of another offence under this Act.
If you get it wrong
Criminal exposureYes
Criminal exposure note
Illegal access, interfering with data, and interfering with a computer system (ss. 4, 5, 6) each carry, on summary conviction, a fine of up to XCD 5,000 or one year's imprisonment for a first conviction, rising to XCD 10,000 or two years for a subsequent one. Unauthorised access to a restricted computer system (s. 11) carries, on conviction on indictment, a fine of up to XCD 75,000 or five years, rising to XCD 100,000 or seven years where the restricted-system access occurs in the course of an offence under ss. 4 to 7.
Penalty structure
Multiple tiers apply. Ordinary illegal access, data interference or system interference (ss. 4-6): XCD 5,000 or 1 year (first conviction), XCD 10,000 or 2 years (subsequent conviction), each on summary conviction. Unauthorised access to a Minister-designated restricted computer system (s. 11): XCD 75,000 or 5 years on indictment, rising to the XCD 100,000 or 7 years recorded here where the restricted-system access occurs in the course of an offence under ss. 4-7.
- Rule
- Fixed only
- As of
- 7 September 2026
- Currency
- XCD
- Fixed cap
- 100,000
What this law does
Drafted with AI from the cited sources under the direction of UnGovr staff. UnGovr holds editorial responsibility for this page.
Section 4 makes it an offence to knowingly access the whole or part of a computer system without lawful excuse or justification, or in excess of one, punishable on summary conviction by a fine of up to five thousand dollars or one year's imprisonment for a first conviction, rising to ten thousand dollars or two years for a subsequent one. Sections 5 and 6 similarly criminalise interfering with data and interfering with a computer system.
Section 11 creates a heavier offence, up to seventy-five thousand dollars or five years for gaining access to a restricted computer system (one the Minister has designated by Order), rising to one hundred thousand dollars or seven years where the access occurs in the course of an offence under sections 4 to 7.
Unlike a computer-misuse offence conditioned on infringing a security measure, section 4's trigger is accessing a system without lawful excuse or justification, which does not by its own terms require circumventing a technical control, so whether reading a public, unauthenticated page falls inside or outside a plain reading of the section is less clear-cut than in a jurisdiction with an explicit security-measure element, and no reported Kittitian or Nevisian case construes the point.
When LexLint raises it
crawls_webtrains_models
Read the law
Electronic Crimes Act
Chapter 4.41, Revised Laws of Saint Christopher and Nevis (2017 revision), Saint Kitts and Nevis Law Commission text, preserved on archive.org