To combat sexual crime videos getting circulated on Internet, the Centre has decided to fix responsibility on internet service providers (ISPs) to report such crimes to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). This move comes on a recommendation made by a high-level committee formed by Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) that submitted a report on “Roadmap for Effectively Tackling Cyber Crimes in the Country.”
Although the report was submitted in September this year, the Ministry considered the recommendations and has now given in-principle approval to some of the suggestions.
Providing a gist of the acceptable recommendations to the Supreme Court dealing with a PIl filed by NGO Prajwala on the scourge of sexual videos circulating on Internet, an affidavit by MHA Joint Secretary Vedantam Giri said, “The MHA supports the submission regarding directing service providers to mandatorily report any sex crime posted (on internet) to the special cell of CBI.”
This is the first time, the service providers will be under a mandatory duty to report posting or circulation of sex videos, the lapse of which can even attract penal consequences. The finer details of how to implement it is yet to be finalised by the Centre.
The Expert Committee in its report noted several “gaps” in tackling cyber crime. These were lack of an online body for collecting complaints of cyber crimes, inadequate infrastructure and expertise to tackle with cyber crimes, lack of monitoring and investigation tools, and legal reforms besides generating awareness of such crimes.
The Committee constituted in December 2014 was headed by Gulshan Rai, who heads the National Cyber Coordination Centre (NCCC), which is the apex cyber security body in the country. It also comprised experts drawn from academia and leading information technology departments working in the country.
The panel recommended an urgent need to set up a national cybercrime coordination centre for cyber crimes, with special focus on Cyber Crime Prevention against Women and Children (CCPWC). Both these proposals have got the nod from MHA. The CCPWC would be set up using Nirbhaya fund maintained by Centre at an estimated cost of Rs 244.32 crore.
The Committee was of the view that since cyber crime is a “borderless” crime, the jurisdiction of investigating agency is a challenge. Besides, victims are not aware whom to approach as there is lack of clarity among police and law enforcement agencies to handle such complaints.
Cyber crimes are on the rise and this is what is worrying the Centre. Figures available with National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) show that in 2011 cases registered under Information Technology (IT) Act stood at 1,719 while cyber crimes under IPC were only 422. In just three years, cases under IT Act have risen to 7201 while cases under IPC showed a substantial increase to 2,421.
While CBI will remain the nodal agency to tackle cyber crimes in collaboration with Interpol, the Committee opined the national coordination centre to provide technical assistance to CBI and State police in dealing with cybercrimes in their respective jurisdictions.