You can hide the hen but can’t
stop the Sunrise, is old saying and it can be seen in 2017 report of NCRB about
Cyber Crimes.
Government maintains that cyber crimes are quite
satisfactorily contained by existing law enforcement officers with available
legal framework and judicial set-up. It has been only handful of people who
make more clamours about growing pace of cyber crimes but actually situation is
in control. Rate of cyber crimes is only 1.7 per lac of the total Indian
population meaning that in a country of 12885 lac's population total cyber
crimes registered in 2017 are meager 21796, as per recently published National
Crimes Record Bureau report.
But the fact is that in 2017, total cyber crimes registered
in India are 21,796 as compared to 12317 registered in 2016 shows surge of
@75%. So it’s difference of perception about the way you look towards cyber
crimes statistics. If you go by growth in terms of percentage its 75% growth as
compared to previous year but report puts it at 1.7 per lac of the population
and finds no significance in growth of crime.
A country where almost 70% population enjoys benefits of digitization
(?) the argument that 1.7 per lac of the population is affected by cyber crimes
genuinely holds no meaning.
Karnataka and Jharkhand witnessed @200% growth followed by
Chattisgarh, Telangana, Uttarakhand which witnessed @ 100% growth; Uttar
Pradesh witnessed 80% growth followed by Maharashtra which witnessed 50%
growth. Out of 29 states and 7 Union territories Arunachal Pradesh, Goa,
Nagaland and Tripura witnessed negative growth in cyber crimes.
As regards to share of states in total
number of cyber crimes registered in entire India, UP witnessed maximum crimes
i.e. 4971(22.1%) followed by 3604(16.5%) in Maharashtra, 3174 in Karnataka (14.6%),
1304(6%) in Rajasthan , 1204(5.5%) in Telangana and 1120(5.1%) in Assam. These
six states collectively witnessed 15377 crimes i.e. almost 70% of the total
crimes registered in India and suggests that there needs more focus on these
states if we want to contain/curtail cyber crimes.
The cyber crimes
registered under various sections of Information Technology Act are as below;
A-S 65 Tampering Computer source code – 233, B-S 66 Computer
related offenses (a-e) – 10108, C-S 66f Cyber Terrorism-13 ,D-S 67 Publishing
obscene info in electronic form -948, E-S 67A Continuity of Act – 401, F-S 67B-
Child pornography – 46, G-S 67 c – Related to intermediaries – 11, H-S 67 Other
sections – 362
The cyber crimes
registered/covered under IPC are as below;
I-IPC SECTIONS BUT UNDER CYBER CRIMES (Total 7976),J-354 D
Cyber Stalking 542, K-379-381Data Theft – 307, L-420 r/w 465,468-471 Fraud –
3466, M-Credit card fraud- 395, N- ATM Fraud-1543,O- Online BANKING Fraud-804
and P- OTP Fraud-334
This break up is really strange and surprising. Sections of
IPC are applied in about 8000 cases i.e. about in 30% cases registered by
police in India. This shows that either police are not sure about the applicability
of I T Act or are not properly trained to apply provisions of I T Act which is
special act passed by parliament to deal with cyber crimes. There are various
judgements of the court wherein courts have held that if provisions of I T Act
are not maintainable then provisions of IPC can’t be applied in the crime owing
to principle of dual jeopardy. This applicability of IPC sections also
establishes that police are not comfortable with I T Act even after 19 years of
its enactment.
The motive as per NCRB for
crimes is analyzed as below
For personal revenge total 628
crimes were committed and Assam tops with 246 followed by Kerala 62 and
Maharashtra 47. Fraud was motive in 12213 crimes wherein UP Tops with 3450
followed by Karnataka 2764 and Maharashtra 2171. Extortion was the motive in 906
crimes in which UP Again tops with 419 followed by Telangana 95 and Assam and
AP with 65 each. Causing disrepute to someone was the motive in 1002 crimes and
again UP tops with 366 followed by Maharashtra 135 and Karnataka 94. Motive of
Sexual extortion was witnessed in 1460 crimes and Maharashtra topping with 462
followed by Assam 217 and UP with 117. Terrorist activities through cyber space
was witnessed in 110 cases and Assam 44 followed by Rajasthan 20 and TN 13 were
top three states. Hate against country was registered in 206 cases where Maharashtra
tops with 57 followed by UP 51 and Karnataka with 21. Software Piracy was
registered in 90 cases in which Odisha contributes almost 50% with 43 cases.
Motive in category others was reported in 3756 cases in which Rajasthan has 819
cases followed by Maharashtra 619 cases , Haryana 382 cases, West Bengal 379
cases, Assam 322 cases and Telangana 304 cases.
The details state that Fraud is
the most prominent motive in cyber crimes as in 12213 cases it was observed.
Terrorist activities was the motive in 110 cases and Hate against country was
motive in 206 cases but surprisingly cases registered under section 66F relating
to cyber terrorism are only 13 indicating that something is missing in
understanding the basics of cyber crimes and motives behind them.
Many times these crimes are
committed by faceless criminals who are totally unknown to victims and located
at different territorial locations even outside INDIA also and in the present
policing system which is handicapped by jurisdictional issues in its
investigation it is practically impossible to nab these criminals and hence we
find very poor and pathetic report of police disposal in cyber crimes which is
elaborated below.
Police disposal report
As per report 8877 cases were
pending for investigation in previous year (2016) and 13635 new cases were
added to investigations in the year 2017. Out of these cases 5457 cases were in
the category Cases true but insufficient evidence or untraced or No clue. Total
730 cases were reported in category cases ended as Mistakes of Fact or of law
or Civil dispute.
Total 3169 charge sheets were
filed by the police in 2017. Total 9750 cases were disposed off by the police
out of 22513 cases and most surprisingly in @ 6500 cases or 70% cases which were disposed, investigation was never carried
out meaning police investigated only 3250 cases successfully in the entire year
2017. At end of 2017 pending cases for investigation are 12750 with 32.5%
charge sheeting rate and 56% pendency rate.
Judicial set-up for cyber crimes trials
is also in equally pitiable condition.5712 cases were pending in courts under
head Cyber crimes at start of 2017 and 3169 cases were added in 2017 making
total 8881 cases before Courts in India. Out of which 44 cases were disposed
off without actual trial. In 84 cases of previous year conviction was
pronounced along with 31 cases of 2017. With 19 discharges and 323 acquittals
conviction rate in cases of cyber crimes is merely 25%. Pendency rate is 94%
and this situation is very alarming.
NCRB also published reports about
19 Metropolitan cities in India, where population is more than 2 Million. The
interesting facts are as below.
Bengaluru with 2743 crimes tops
the list followed by 1362 in Mumbai and 685 in Jaipur. Nagpur witnessed only 82
crimes as compared to 97 in 2016 and 102 in 2015 meaning actually there is
decline in cyber crimes in Nagpur and ranks at 12’Th position.
Nagpur tops in pendency of cyber
crimes are concerned with 91.9% followed by Patna with 87.7% and Delhi with
85.5%.
The overall pendency rate of 64.1%
in all 19 major metropolitan cities suggest that our police machinery is
inadequately trained and equipped to carry out cyber crime investigation. The
crimes which are committed with use of technology can certainly be more
effectively investigated by use of same technology but there seems to be lack
of investigative skills on behalf of police personnel which needs to be
sharpened.
Advocate Mahendra Limaye’s
additional take----Whether to believe on the current report is million dollar
question because it is observed that cyber crime is happening on every passing
second but not reported to police or report is not taken by the police if
victim goes to police station.
If our own assessment of cyber
crime helpline is to be believed then we receive almost 60-70 calls per day and
about 20-30 complaints through our FB page. Receiving about 100 complaints per
day by an ordinary cyber crime helpline managed by CYBER AWARENESS ORGANISATION,
without any SEO or promotion for past few years shows that more than 21796
CYBER CRIMES are committed in India. If premier agencies wish to undermine the supremacy
of Cyber criminals and unwilling to accept the reality in cyberspace then it is
misfortune of the citizen who are compelled to carry our most of the activities
through online medium.
