How is Digital Evidence Used in the International Criminal Court? An Exploratory Analysis

Yann Lecorps (), Khaoula Naili (), Marie Obidzinski (), Yves Oytana () and Téa Toutounji ()
Additional contact information
Yann Lecorps: Université Paris Panthéon Assas, CRED UR 7321, F-75005 Paris, France
Khaoula Naili: Université Marie et Louis Pasteur, CRESE UR3190, F-25000 Besançon, France
Marie Obidzinski: Université Paris Panthéon Assas, CRED UR 7321, F-75005 Paris, France
Yves Oytana: Université Marie et Louis Pasteur, CRESE UR3190, F-25000 Besançon, France
Téa Toutounji: Université Paris Panthéon Assas, CRED UR 7321, F-75005 Paris, France

No 2026-04, Working Papers from CRESE

Abstract: We examine the use of digital versus classical evidence in cases handled by the International Criminal Court (ICC). We study and exploit variations in the use of evidence (i) between stages of proceedings, namely pre-trial and trial, and (ii) between parties in ICC trials. Since the standard of proof varies between stages of the proceedings, we frame the situation using a simple model and discuss the results we can empirically expect. The model predicts that the prosecution’s reliance on both types of evidence should increase from the pre-trial to the trial stage, although the relative magnitude of the increase remains ambiguous. Our empirical results confirm that references to both categories of evidence are more frequent at trial and show that the rise is proportionally larger for classical evidence than for digital evidence. For variations in the use of evidence between the parties involved in the trial, our approach is purely empirical. We find that the relative intensity of references to digital evidence by parties varies across cases and across trial sub-phases.

Keywords: International Criminal Court; digital evidence; standard of proof; social media; textual analysis; sentiment analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: K4 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 36 pages
Date: 2026-06
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://crese.univ-fcomte.fr/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/WP-2026-04.pdf First version, 2026 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:crb:wpaper:2026-04

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from CRESE Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Laurent Kondratuk ().