MOSCOW, September 12. /TASS/. Cyber crimes may be equated to theft, the Izvestiya daily wrote on Monday.

The Russian Interior Ministry and Sberbank took part in developing the corresponding draft law together with the Central Bank, the daily said citing Artyom Sychev, deputy head of the Main Department for Security and Protection of Information of the Bank of Russia.

This is "one of the most important current legislative initiatives," Sychev said. "In accordance with the existing legal practice, the punishment is not compatible with the inflicted damage. People steal hundreds of millions of rubles and get three years on probation," he noted.

The draft law contains two main amendments — the cyber crime is recognized as theft, and more serious punishment is established for it, Sychev explained.

Cyber fraud is currently punished by up to five years in prison in Russia, up to 25 years in the United States and up to 10 years in China.

Elvira Nabiullina, head of the Bank of Russia, said at the forum "Russian Banks -21st Century" that one of priorities of the Central Bank is to protect the financial sphere from cyber crime. According to Central Bank’s forecasts, nearly four billion rubles will be stolen by cyber criminals by the end of 2016, in comparison to 1.14 billion rubles in 2015.