Friday, March 5, 2010



“Cyberstalking”
- BY MR.SNEHAL VAKILNA ( ADVOCATE )

Stalking is a continuous process, consisting of a series of actions, each of which may be entirely legal in itself. In simple terms Cyberstalking is the use of the Internet or other electronic means to stalk someone. Cyber Stalking can be defined as the repeated acts harassment or threatening behavior of the cyber criminal towards the victim by using internet services. Cyber stalking is a relatively new phenomenon.
Cyber stalkers could opreats in following ways:
a. Collect all personal information about the victim such as name, family background, Telephone Numbers of residence and work place, daily routine of the victim, address of residence and place of work, date of birth etc. If the stalker is one of the acquaintances of the victim he can easily get this information. If stalker is a stranger to victim, he collects the information from the internet resources such as various profiles, the victim may have filled in while opening the chat or e-mail account or while signing an account with some website.
b. The stalker may post this information on any website related to sex-services or dating services, posing as if the victim is posting this information and invite the people to call the victim on her telephone numbers to have sexual services. Stalker even uses very filthy and obscene language to invite the interested persons.
c. People of all kind from nook and corner of the World, who come across this information, start calling the victim at her residence and/or work place, asking for sexual services or relationships.
d. Some stalkers subscribe the e-mail account of the victim to innumerable pornographic and sex sites, because of which victim starts receiving such kind of unsolicited e-mails.
e. Some stalkers keep on sending repeated e-mails asking for various kinds of favors or threaten the victim.
f. In online stalking the stalker can make third party to harass the victim.
g. Follow their victim from board to board. They “hangout” on the same BB’s as their victim, many times posting notes to the victim, making sure the victim is aware that he/she is being followed. Many times they will “flame” their victim (becoming argumentative, insulting) to get their attention.
h. Stalkers will almost always make contact with their victims through email. The letters may be loving, threatening, or sexually explicit. He will many times use multiple names when contacting the victim.
i. Contact victim via telephone. If the stalker is able to access the victims telephon, he will many times make calls to the victim to threaten, harass, or intimidate them.
j. Track the victim to his/her home.


Various countries have different laws relating to stalking and some states of the United States of America have cyber stalking legislation.
The Indian Information technology Act 2008 (amended) does not directly address stalking. But the problem is dealt more as an "intrusion on to the privacy of individual" than as regular cyber offences which are discussed in the IT Act 2008. Hence the most used provision for regulating cyber stalking in India is section 72 of the Indian information technology act ( Amended) , 2008 which runs as follows;
Section 72: Breach of confidentiality and privacy: Save as otherwise provided in this Act or any other law for the time being in force, any person who, in pursuant of any of the powers conferred under this Act, rules or regulations made there under, has secured access to any electronic record, book, register, correspondence, information, document or other material without the consent of the person concerned discloses such electronic record, book, register, correspondence, information, document or other material to any other person shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years, or with fine which may extend to one lakh rupees, or with both.
In practice, this provision is often read with section 441 of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with offences related to Criminal trespass and runs as follows: Whoever enters into or upon property in the possession of another with intent to commit an offence or to intimidate, insult or annoy any person in possession of such property , or having lawfully entered into or upon such property, unlawfully remains there with intent thereby to intimidate , insult or annoy any such person, or with an intent to commit an offence, is said to commit criminal trespass.
If the cyber stalking is done only to annoy the victim and is not resulted to serious offences like severe defamation, sexual crimes, identity theft or even grave crimes like terrorism, it is treated as a bailable offence.

Inspite of the current updation and amendments in The Indian Information technology Act 2008 (amended ) and comparing them with the severity associated with the said crime There is a need to create more awareness amongst the legislature and the law enforcing agencies regarding this new cybercrime in order to enable its early regulation .






by
MR. SNEHAL VAKILNA (ADVOCATE)
(MCOM LLB , WITH SPECILAISATION
IN CYBER LAWS AND CYBER CRIME
INVESTIGATION)


Major amendments in The Information Technology Act
- BY MR.SNEHAL VAKILNA ( ADVOCATE )


The Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008 has come into force on 27th October, 2009.
After Nine years of the birth of cyber laws in India, the new improved cyber law regime in India has become a reality. The Information Technology Act initially came into force on 17th October 2000. Major changes to this law have now come into force.
Most of these changes relate to cyber crimes. The last decade has seen a spurt in crimes like cyber stalking and voyeurism, cyber pornography, email frauds, phishing and crimes through social networking. All these and more are severely dealt with under the new laws.
Some of the major developments are:
1. Voyeurism is now specifically covered. Acts like hiding cameras in changing rooms, hotel rooms etc is punishable with jail upto 3 years. This would apply to cases like the infamous Pune spycam incident where a 58-year old man was arrested for installing spy cameras in his house to ‘snoop’ on his young lady tenants.
2. Publishing sexually explicit acts in the electronic form is punishable with jail upto 3 years. This would apply to cases like the Delhi MMS scandal where a video of a young couple having sex was spread through cell phones around the country.
3. Collecting, browsing, downloading etc of child pornography is punishable with jail upto 5 years for the first conviction. For a subsequent conviction, the jail term can extend to 7 years. A fine of upto Rs 10 lakh can also be levied.
4. The punishment for spreading obscene material by email, websites, sms has been reduced from 5 years jail to 3 years jail. This covers acts like sending ‘dirty’ jokes and pictures by email or sms.
5. Compensation on cyber crimes like spreading viruses, copying data, unauthorised access, denial of service etc is not restricted to Rs 1 crore anymore. The Adjudicating Officers will have jurisdiction for cases where the claim is upto Rs. 5 crore. Above that the case will need to be filed before the civil courts.
6. A special liability has been imposed on call centers, BPOs, banks and others who hold or handle sensitive personal data. If they are negligent in “implementing and maintaining reasonable security practices and procedures”, they will be liable to pay compensation. It may be recalled that India’s first major BPO related scam was the multi crore MphasiS-Citibank funds siphoning case in 2005. Under the new law, in such cases, the BPOs and call centers could also be made liable if they have not implemented proper security measures.
7. Refusing to hand over passwords to an authorized official could land a person in prison for upto 7 years.
8. The offence of cyber terrorism has been specially included in the law. A cyber terrorist can be punished with life imprisonment.
9. Sending threatening emails and sms are punishable with jail upto 3 years.
10. Hacking into a Government computer or website, or even trying to do so in punishable with imprisonment upto 10 years.
11. Cyber crime cases can now be investigated by Inspector rank police officers. Earlier such offences could not be investigated by an officer below the rank of a deputy superintendent of police.
The following have also come into force on 27 October, 2009:
1. Rules pertaining to section 52 (Salary, Allowances and Other Terms and Conditions of Service of Chairperson and Members),
2. Rules pertaining to section 54 (Procedure for Investigation of Misbehaviour or Incapacity of Chairperson and Members),
3. Rules pertaining to section 69 (Procedure and Safeguards for Interception, Monitoring and Decryption of Information),
4. Rules pertaining to section 69A (Procedure and Safeguards for Blocking for Access of Information by Public),
5. Rules pertaining to section 69B (Procedure and safeguard for Monitoring and Collecting Traffic Data or Information) and
6. Notification under section 70B for appointment of the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team.
As the techonology keep on advancing the updation in the said IT act should be in the same phase so asIt could encumbrate all different types of cyber crimes .
by
MR. SNEHAL VAKILNA (ADVOCATE)
(MCOM LLB , WITH SPECILAISATION
IN CYBER LAWS AND CYBER CRIME
INVESTIGATION)