New legislation to combat identity theft could be introduced by the European Commission (EC).

Although the EC said that it did not believe that new legislation would be useful at this stage in stopping the fast growth of cybercrime, it said it will consider anti-ID theft laws later this year.

"No general legislation on the fight against cyber crime can be expected to be effective at this moment," said an EC statement.

"However… targeted legislative actions may also prove to be appropriate or needed in specific areas. As an example, the Commission will consider an initiative regarding European legislation against identity theft in 2007.

Also under investigation is the use of privacy enhancing technologies (PETs) to battle identity theft and surveillance. They include systems such as encryption tools and ways of automatically stripping personal details from data after a certain period of time.

The EC said it will actively promote the research and development of PETs. And although it state bodies in Europe are often reluctant to share personal information with the private sector, the it wants to prove the value of PETs by running large-scale pilots in industry and public sectors, to create an European Union-wide privacy seal system.

All the proposals are contained in the latest policy document on EU-wide plans to fight cyber-crime which focuses on greater cross border cooperation and communication between law enforcement forces across Europe.

The EC said its new policy therefore included "actions to improve exchange of information" between law enforcement agencies.

In a statement, the EC said: "The policy instrument includes actions to improve exchange of information and best practices, initi atives to improve training and awareness-raising within law enforcement authorities.

"The main feature of this policy instrument is a proactive policy in reinforcing the structures for operational law enforcement cooperation. The Commission will launch a reflection on how this co-operation can be strengthened and improved."

However, already attempts to share increasing amounts of information between police forces in Europe have met with opposition.

Europe's privacy watchdog the European Data Protection Supervisor recently warned of his "grave concern" that data sharing plans was a "lowest common denominator approach that would hinder the fundamental rights of EU citizens".

Earlier this week the European Parliament voted to support the reinstatement of data protection principles into a European plan to share data across police forces.