Rethinking the features of the object of a criminal offence in the digital age

The paper develops the author’s concept of “rheme” as a new optional feature of the object of a criminal offence. The initial position of the study is the recognition that the contemporary criminal law theory, built on materialistic ideas about the subject of a criminal offence, loses its explanatory power in the conditions of digitalisation, virtualisation, and dematerialisation of public life. Offences in the field of information technology, cybersecurity, digital assets, and in the field of intellectual activity often do not have a material subject in the classical sense, but cause real damage to protected social values. This necessitates an update of the theoretical model of the composition of a criminal offence. Based on linguistic and semiotic concepts and interdisciplinary approaches, a three-level model of the object of the composition of a criminal offence was proposed: social relations (basic level), subject (material level), and rheme (semantic or non-material level). This model provides a holistic coverage of both material and informational forms of socially dangerous influence. The result of the research was the formulation of the concept of rheme of a criminal offence as a semiotic category that reflects the transition of criminal law thinking from the material to the information and semantic level. Influence on rheme was interpreted as an informational or energetic form of illegal action that changes the state of social relations without physical contact with material objects. As a result, it was proved that the introduction of rheme into the system of optional features of the object of the composition of a criminal offence deepens the methodology of criminal law, expands its conceptual framework, and contributes to the adaptation of the criminal law doctrine to the realities of digital civilisation. The concept of rheme opens up new opportunities for the qualification of crimes in cyberspace and forms the basis for further development of the semiotic information paradigm of criminal law science