Cyber Crimes – A definite challenge

What is Cyberspace?

William Gibson in the Science fiction („Neuromancer”) coined the word cyberspace 1984. Basically it denotes the virtual location within which electronic activities takes place.

Cyberspace-Is it a world of fantasy or crime?

Cyberspace is a fascinating world where you can roam at your fingertips. It is a power trip; you can do whatever you want at your will. There are no boundaries or restrictions. For youngsters if it is dream world then for businessmen it is the fastest medium to deal their contract, on the same pedestals now this space is becoming safest place for criminals due to less accountability.

Crimes that are most likely in this world

Hacking, cracking, sending obscene mails, tampering of source codes, e-mail abuse, e-mail spoofing, e-mail threat, sending obscene messages over SMS, post defamatory profile on net, mishandling copy right acts and cyber stalking, Identity theft.

Cracking-A person can delete files or put a virus up or sell information or steal some source codes and could use it for his own benefit. He can also perform a denial of service attack and cause the computers to stop working.

E-mail Spoofing-A spoofed e-mail is one that appears to originate from one source but actually has been sent from another source. E-mail spoofing can also cause monetary damage.

Cyber Stalking-It involves repeated threat and harassment of a victim through e-mail, chat messages or web pages.

An overview over Karnataka’s Statistics of Cyber Crime from October 2001 to March 2003

Source (Cyber Police Record)

Mentioned above is the number of cases, which came into limelight of Karnataka Cyber Cops. So far ninety-two cases have been recorded in which only twenty-four cases come under IT ACT says K.Sri kanta,Deputy Superintendent of police(Cyber Police Station Kannataka)and in 8 cases they have filed charge sheets in the court.

What was the need for cyber law?

Srikanta says,there was not any defined act in IPC,which could cover cyber crimes so it was necessity of separate law. India is the first country that has legislated the misconduct done in cyber world as a crime. And the first cyber police station established on August 20, 2001 but it started functioning since October 22, 2001.

On this issue of delayed judgments M.R.Devappa, director of prosecution and government litigation in Karnataka says that „accused are on scooter but we are still riding bicycle”.

Karnataka cyber police claims that they have traced those people and filed chargesheet. On question of whether it might be possible for a person to alter the information, Srikanta, says that it’s not so easy. An accused can be traced out on the basis of minimum information that comes along with a particular mail, which gives the whole detail of timing and ISP number of the computer. But he does not deny ” it’s somehow difficult in case of cyber cafes where people come to surf randomly.”

Karnataka government has issued a notice to all cyberwallahs to keep track of visiters.

Srikanta states that „steganography”(sending messages behind a picture) is the new challenge in front of cyber authorities. Hi-fi sophisticated terrorists use this method. Without the source code it’s very difficult to decode the message behind the picture and moreover we don’t have that kind of software to help us.

Smiti Bharti