Centre takes steps to check increasing incidents of cyber crimes

New Delhi, Apr 16 (UNI) The government is taking a number of steps to check the rising incidence of cyber crimes including economic frauds through phishing, e-mail scams, piracy and data theft.

Minister of State for Home Shakeel Ahmad told the Rajya Sabha in a written reply that the Home Ministry has envisaged to widen the scope of the Common Integrated Police Application (CIPA) project being implemented in all the states in a phased manner, under the Modernization of State Police Forces (MPF) Scheme. The project would now be extended in terms of the applications and by extending it from the police stations to the other higher-level formations in the police hierarchy, and provide network connectivity.

The government has also set up Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) to provide reactive and proactive support to the cyber incidents in India, he said. Besides, a bill to amend the Information Technology Act, 2000, was introduced in the Lok Sabha in December 2006 to provide for insertion of legal provisions to address various computer crimes.

He said these steps have been taken in view of reports of criminals committing economic frauds through phishing, e-mail scams, piracy, data theft and launching of denial of service attacks onto targeted organisations, network infrastructures and countries, using internet services.

Police being a state subject, it is primarily the concern of the state governments to modernise their forces and to establish cyber police stations for cyber crime investigation, but the Centre has also taken a number of steps to check them.

UNI AJ BDP BD2005