CYBER VICTIMIZATION

Getting a SIM card for free? Check these risks

2016-04-03T04:36:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org by Dr.Debarati Halder

On women’s day, 2016, I was invited by Suriyan FM Tirunelveli to share my opinion about safety of women offline and online. It is indeed a sweet surprise for me each time I receive a call from the FM listeners who refer to the particular programmes they have listened and took keen interest to learn more about the risks involved in digital communication technology. This time I had this listener who made me to think about Free SIM cards.

Truly speaking, even though Facebook or WhatsApp may boast of its popularity in India, it has failed to penetrate the rural sectors in India, especially with women. This was seen in our latest survey titled “Harassment via Whatsapp in urban and rural India: A baseline survey report, 2015”(see http://www.cybervictims.org/CCVCresearchreport2015.pdf) . The main reason for this is obviously lack of awareness about safety tools and the well settled fear in the minds of women that using these platforms may necessarily land them in trouble. But does that mean that women and men including matured teens in these areas are reluctant to use digital technology communication as a whole? Perhaps NO. Mobile telecommunication companies are rapidly penetrating in the rural areas with offers on the services and this also includes distributing Free SIMs to potential customers. This however, attracts youngsters more than Facebook or WhatsApp because distribution of free SIM cards may not always need proper verification of documents, if distributed by local dealers including shops. Due to easy availability of mobile phones including camera phones at prices even below Rs. 2000 in Indian markets, people enjoy owning mobile phones, most of which may be armed with inbuilt cameras and double SIM facilities. Once one has a SIM card, it may become a matter of few more rupees to upgrade the status of handset to use it as a medium of smart phones whereby the subscriber can use the SIM for double purposes; i.e., for mobile phone calls as well as for mobile data facility to enable him to get connected with internet, no matter whether he/she knows about netiquettes or basic internet laws. Now, one must understand that SIM card is not an ordinary micro-level chip that enables one to communicate with others. The full form of SIM stands for Subscriber Identity Module, which carries information about the holder of the SIM Card. In general, when a person buys a SIM card from a dealer, he/she is asked to provide identity verification proofs that are sent directly to the service provider to enable them to activate the SIM card in the name of the buyer/subscriber. The data that is thus revealed to the service provider, stays with them permanently as a private document which is not supposed to be exposed to any third party unless the law and justice machinery, especially the police and the courts demand such information under S.69 of the Information Technology Act, 2000(amended in 2008) (Powers to issue direction for interception or monitoring or decryption of any information through any computer resource) primarily. Many a times when a distributor offers Free SIM cards, it is necessary that the distributor checks the existing ‘contracts’ with the interested subscriber. This is what happens when one wishes to get Free SIM cards from service providers like BSNL, which generally provides such Free SIM cards at Free SIM card distribution ‘Mela’ and to those who already own a landline from the same service provider.

In cases where free SIM cards are distributed by local dealers of mobile phones , talk time or data recharge services etc, there remains a risk of distributing used SIM cards for free. These may be SIMs which have been technically ‘discarded’ by their original owners, for various reasons including blocked numbers, stolen devices along with SIMs etc. Once an interested person opts for such free SIM, he may get to see several unknown contact options. There are cases where holders of FREE SIM may also receive calls from unknown numbers at odd hours; risks relating to data privacy for mails, social media accounts or even net banking may also be there. We need to understand that not every one may be aware of lodging complaint with the service providers regarding mobile phone (along with SIM) theft, leave the question of reporting the matter to the police. Similarly, there are numerous examples of how techno savvy criminals may re-fix the technically ‘destroyed’ SIMs to distribute it in the market only to loot innocent people or make illegal profit by secret data mining targeting women and young people. Added with it, one must not forget the cyber terrorism scenario where innocent civil citizens are ‘used’ by numerous tricks including such lucrative offers of Free SIM distribution to gain vital information. Keeping these in mind, young students, especially those who have finished their 10^th or 12^thboard exams, college freshers and women must be cautious enough to opt for availing SIMs just to be ‘SMART’.

Let us all unite to save our society.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2016), " Getting a SIM card for free? Check these risks” 3^rd April, 2016, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.in/

Render your support for child victims of cyber crimes

2015-11-13T23:54:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Bal diwas or children’s day is observed all over India on 14^thNovember, the birth date of Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the first prime minister of India. In the earlier days children’s days were celebrated especially to celebrate the child rights, spread awareness against child labour and about necessity of education and good values among children. But with the passing of the time, the need for using children’s day for addressing different child related issues was realised by child right activists, NGOs, schools and also the government. Considering that this is the age of internet and children are smarter than adults ( in many aspects) when it comes to use of internet and digital communication technology, it becomes very important to include a session to let the children express their own opinion as how they would like to see the internet –connected world around them. Any research on usage of smart phones may show that there is a difference in ratio of social media users and smart phone users (who may use sophisticated phones but not social media). CCVC conducted one research last year titled “”Harassment via WhatsApp in Urban and rural India (see http://www.cybervictims.org/CCVCresearchreport2015.pdf ) which showed such difference as well as the types of harassments one may receive through WhatsApp. Nonetheless, children from the age group of 5/6 are also using such technology and they have become experts in sending/receiving/sharing contents. What bothers me is when a minor user gets trapped in the tangled net, he/she feels extremely panicked because there is generally no adult with whom he /she may share the information who can guide him/her properly. This is mainly because the child may have used digital communication technology and shared contents without letting the parents or elders know about it. Often parents or elders tend to keep the children busy with tabs or smart phones and they may never know what sorts of dangerous habits they are introducing to children. The later not only start experimenting with the camera devices, they may also access unwanted staff not only on internet, but also those stored in the phone or tab itself. I have seen many children using parent’s Facebook or WhatsApp accounts to send unwanted contents to other ‘friends’ . Have we ever thought how children are growing their own network of friends through their parent’s profiles? It is ‘experience’ that makes them perfect to communicate with their known friends and then venture for unknown. Often children ask their classmates to log in through their parents’ profiles at particular times. Slowly they venture to a new world of surfing alone or even creating their own identities in social media alone. For this transition, it does not take much time. Consider the scene at local parks, busy market areas or shops.... you would get to see every second child trying to take a video or photo and invariably, he/she may circulate it via Whatsapp or any similar messaging platforms to his/her relatives or parents’ friends whom he /she tracks for updates.

This habit, if not properly guided, may turn dangerous for the photographer as well as the subjects. While stakeholders are concerned about effects of cyber bullying, one must understand that presently video graphing hitting, pushing, physical bullying and circulating the same to others ( which is also called happy slapping) is becoming a chosen trend for youngsters. Because of children’s curiosity to learn the new technology, perpetrators may misuse them as ‘agents’ of criminal activities and even use them as victims. There are many resources to know what sorts of victimisations are happening targeting children and matured teens. But how about motivating the victim child to come out of the trauma and not to turn into an offender him/herself? In my recent publication where I have explained our theory called “irrational coping theory” in relation to cyber crimes,(Halder, D., & Jaishankar, K. (2015). Irrational Coping Theory and Positive Criminology: A Frame Work to Protect Victims of Cyber Crime. In N. Ronel and D. Segev (Eds.), Positive Criminology (pp. 276 -291). Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-415-74856-8.) it was shown how victims may turn into offenders by taking up irrational coping mechanism and then turn into offenders themselves. This children’s day should be taken as a day to spread such awareness among all, especially to those children who had been victimised . In this connection, I must mention about a video I came across in Facebook. The video running for less than two minutes showed the changes in facial expression of a woman who had been targeted by curious people to answer several unwanted and hurting questions and comments. At the end of the video her face lit up when she started speaking about a few people who came up to her to support and share their own experiences. Her face no longer showed the pain, disgust, insult or anger. Any victim, including victims of cyber crimes, especially child victims, undergoes similar situations when they have to encounter the after effects of victimisation. When a child victim of cyber crime cannot share the details of victimisation to people near to him/her anticipating more harassment, scolding and even physical beating or hitting, he/she feels extremely pressurised to take measures which are extremely dangerous. There are umpteen numbers of examples of children trying to contact hackers, attempting to commit suicide or getting severe depression due to the cyber harassment: all such decisions may also be caused due to this particular issue of not being able to communicate with elders, especially parents and considerate teachers. If children are more open with their parents and teachers on such issues and the later reciprocates to their needs, the situation can be much different.

Considering this need, on behalf of Centre for Cyber victim Counselling, I have developed a model policy guideline for students, which every school should consider following. The policy guideline titled “Model policy guidelines for directing students for Positive use of internet including social networking sites and WhatsApp”( please cite it as Halder.D(2015), "Model policy guidelines for directing students for Positive use of internet including social networking sites and WhatsApp". URL: http://www.cybervictims.org/moderlpgccvc.pdf) was earlier published in my article titled “Children of internet era: A critical analysis of vulnerability of children in the darker sides of social media and WhatsApp”, (Published in the Conference proceedings of two days international conference on Accompanying social networking in teacher education, held on 26th and 27th March, 2015 by Loyola college of education, Chennai. Pg nos. 17-24.) This policy guideline can help children of internet era to use internet and digital communication technology in a positive way. Not only this; it can also help parents and teachers to get connected with children and build a unique learning experience.

Let us pledge on this children’s day to be positive supports for our children so that they don’t have to opt for irrational coping mechanism.

”, 14^thNovember, 2015 , published in http://debaraticyberspace.blogspot.com/

Circulating child abuse videos: consider how the distributor re-victimises the victim/s

2015-08-20T23:59:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org by Debarati Halder

Very recently in Facebook a friend of mine posted a video of a little child being violently beaten by an adult. It may be the child’s father or uncle or any other caregiver who wanted the child to score more marks. Some days later, another friend of mine showed me the same clipping in her WhatsApp account. The later being a person well versed in law, did not circulate the clipping. Instead, as per my suggestion, reported the video to WhatsApp. But by this time millions of users of Facebook and WhatsApp would have seen the clipping. But this is not the only incidence of child abuse that may have been documented and circulated in the social media. There are umpteen numbers of video clippings and still images of child abuse, sexual assault of children, rape videos etc that are being circulated every day in social media. The magic of internet network and social media make many such contents viral. Even if the receiver does not want to see such contents, he/she has to have a glance of such images when such images or clippings land up in his/her profile or account. Have you ever considered how these contents keep travelling time and places and what happens to those victims? One extremely important point every one must note that all contents are not for circulation always. Due to the smart use of smart phones, all of us have become ‘citizen journalists’ who document each and every noteworthy event in his/her daily life every day. These may include traffic violation cases, street children harassment cases, domestic violence cases and even terror strikes. In the last cases, the police and the army may continuously ask the civilians to switch off their mobile phones, especially not to use the mobile messaging services for circulating images as it may help the terrorists as well. For the cause of national security, the particular area may be blocked by intelligence department to receive any internet services. But in other cases, it depends much on individual perceptions as how we are taking the issues of harassment and why do we consider it worthy for circulating to our friends and then to millions of unknown strangers. People who are capturing such images, may never know that the images/clippings may not only be stored in their own devices, but may also be stored in other’s devices and that particular person/s may not take it as an issue of concern, but may take it as an issue of self gratification.

Consider the latest clipping where the child was being beaten by the adult: in many families, parents do slap or hit a growing child as an ultimate measure to discipline him/her. Slowly Indian society is recognising such behaviour of the adults with the children as risky behaviour, especially when intentionally the adults beat the child to an extent to cause grave injury to his/her body. In some families young mothers of young children are over burdened, constantly harassed by the husbands or in laws for various issues including bad cooking, messy house keeping and even for satisfying the demanding husbands. May be because such young mothers need more time to cope with the situation where they have to balance their time between their children and the family, they (the mothers) may direct their anger and frustration on the children. Nonetheless, such helpless situations of both the mother and child may be documented by other adults or even children and subsequently these clippings may be used for court cases if in case the husband or the in laws want to prove that the mother is not capable of handling the child. Such images may even travel in the internet and pile up comments which may prove extremely detrimental to the mother and children later. No one ever comes back to look into reason why the adult woman had to beat the child or how she would have managed the child later. Who cares? The distributor/s may simply enjoy the harsh comments targeting the poor woman and her child who may become a strong support to her later. But this is just an exceptional hypothesis which needs to be tested. In the same line, think of the child who is abused by elders including own family members: may be the recipients may shower sympathy to the child, but have you ever considered the mental state of the child when he/she gets to know that his/her clipping has been in that particular situation has been seen by hundreds of ‘watchers’ who can not help him in any way, but may feel satisfied’ by thinking that sharing the clipping or commenting on the clipping may make them marked as ‘concerned people’.

The same thing goes when one comes across any sexual abuse of children. Whether it is sexual harassment related to bad touch, or sexual molestation or even to graver offences like rape, one should prohibit oneself from circulating the images even for ‘accused finding’. This is especially true those who capture ragging scenes, sexual harassment scenes where matured teenagers are victimised who may be joining higher classes after finishing the secondary board exams. Remember that these young victims may get to see their own victimisation scenes in near future when they log into their Facebook pages or even open accounts with WhatsApp. It is not enough to hide the faces of the victims alone when the whole scene of victimisation is circulated. The victims themselves may feel extremely traumatised to get back these scenes. It is for this very understanding that the Protection of Children from sexual offences Act, 2012 was strengthened with S.23 which reads as follows:

“23. (1) No person shall make any report or present comments on any child from any form of media or studio or photographic facilities without having complete and authentic information, which may have the effect of lowering his reputation or infringing upon his privacy.

(2) No reports in any media shall disclose, the identity of a child including his name, address, photograph, family details, school, neighbourhood or any other particulars which may lead to disclosure of identity of the child: Provided that for reasons to be recorded in writing, the Special Court, competent to try the case under the Act, may permit such disclosure, if in its opinion such disclosure is in the interest of the child.

(3) The publisher or owner of the media or studio or photographic facilities shall be jointly and severally liable for the acts and omissions of his employee.

(4) Any person who contravenes the provisions of sub-section (1) or sub-section (2) shall be liable to be punished with imprisonment of either description for a period which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to one year or with fine or with both”

However, all laws come with an exception clause where by certain actions that are recognised as offence, would not be considered as an offence if done by the criminal justice machinery in particular ways laid down by the laws and for particular reasons which must pass the acid test of laws as well as the constitutional provisions and guarantees. POCSO Act stands as an exception especially in this regard when it comes to circulating the images for fact finding. After WhatsApp has been recognised as an extremely popular medium to communicate with the police, the government is constantly encouraging to create welfare Apps whereby individuals can upload or download information or share information with the police. We need to note that even while availing this technology, police must use the images of the accused which should be independent from the crime scene as a whole. Police has been given this special right because they are the recognised organisation to carry on the investigation for the benefit of the victim as well as the society. Civilians should not take the role of the police in circulating of the images.

However, I have noted that even while in such circumstances; such circulation by the police may also meet accidental violation of the laws and victim’s rights. But we need to note that for this again, there are proper reporting and investigating mechanisms. In my opinion, instead of taking up the responsibility of spreading the news about the accused by way spreading the victimisation clipping /image as a while( which actually spreads the victimisation of the child in question as well), people must consider immediately reporting the matter to the local police station or police head quarters with all evidence to show from where the images have travelled. This would definitely reduce the chances of re-victimising the victim and make the ‘reporter’ of the offensive clipping a saviour in a unique way.

Do consider.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2015), " Circulating child abuse videos: consider how the distributor re-victimises the victim/s”, 21^stAugust, 2015 , published in http://debaraticyberspace.blogspot.com/

Hate messages: do we really need to be concerned?

2015-04-07T04:51:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org by Dr.Debarati Halder

Recently I was delivering a plenary speech in the recently held international conference on accompanying social networking sites in teacher’s education arranged by the Loyola college of education, Chennai. Most of the participants were either university students or aspiring teachers and 90% of whom felt social networking sites were extremely harmful for children as well as women. My presentation was on the darker side of internet. But I made it lot brighter by presenting a model policy guideline as how schools can mould children in this regard. My article on children of internet era, which I have uploaded in a few web platforms including Academica.edu thus provides an understanding as how hate speech including cyber bullying and other cyber atrocities are picked up by children, or rather instilled in them, which may later make them hardcore bullies, trolls or agents of terror. Fortunate are we that our children who may be picking up these traits or are falling victims of such dangerous activities of other children, or their parents or the schools can look for help from us who are researching on the subjects and those of us who getting aware of the issue by such discussions. In our generation when we were growing up, not many of our parents or teachers or schools did not have such vast opportunities to learn about the trends and issues of deviant behaviours of children which would make them hardcore bullies or terror agents. Resultant, we have people who hurl hate speech, harassing speech, insulting remarks, offending comments thinking that this is the way to win over people even if their ultimate demands are devastating for the world. I say this because just a few days before my plenary session at Chennai blogger Avijit Roy was brutally assassinated in Bangladesh and some days after the same pattern followed for Washiqur Rahman, another secular blogger. Both were attacked for their revolutionary thoughts published through their blogs and other online publishing portals.

My concern is not particularly for what they wrote or how they wrote or what invited the terror organisations to kill them; my concern is how the threat was created to make them stronger on their views. As I get to know from numerous media reports, both of them had received warnings from the terror organisations that killed them. Avijit’s case especially attracts my attention as it can be seen that he would have received threat mails, hate mails, posts, messages etc against his views. How the world now should take such hate messages that are posted/sent/written targeting the potential victims? Since I received a copy of Professor Daniele Citron’s book Hate crimes in Cyber space for a book review, I read the chapters, the case studies and the legal interpretations of the writer as well as other judges, police officers, lawyers who may have dealt with such cases repeatedly. It is an unfortunate truth that the receivers of such hate messages may consider these as typical challenges which motivate them to proceed further in their aim. In cases like the bloggers’ murders, these threats messages could have been and should have been reported to the police and if reported, then the police should have taken enough precautions to save the lives. But in both the cases, terror groups won.

World mourned their death.

Consider what happens when some one receives threat messages, hate messages, insulting messages, and defamatory notes due to interpersonal problems. Most of the cases when such messages are received from known acquaintances or the potential interpersonal stalkers or ex partners, the victim is advised to shun off the harasser, avoid answering calls and ignore the messages. But it does not mean that the victim is encouraged to speak about such messages in public or speak derogatorily about the harasser in public. By saying ‘avoid’, the victim is advised to close doors to the perpetrator: it is like do not talk to him, do not entertain his messages and do not talk about him. In my recently published book chapter titled “Irrational coping theory and positive criminology: a framework toprotect victims of cyber crime” (co-authored with Dr.K.Jaishankar, published in the book “Positive Criminology”, edited by Natty Ronnel Dana Segav by Routledge), where I spoke about my theory on irrational coping mechanism in relation to online harassments, I discussed in detail about this sort of positive coping mechanism. The second step is obviously to report the matter to the police. The law and the legal interpretations in the US and also in India speak about reasonable threat test. Unfortunately, in 90% of the cases, police do not entertain such reports. Reasons are numerous in number. It is not only from my own personal experience in the Indian context; those who are researching or practically dealing with online harassment cases from across the globe would agree with me. But why does this situation stay? especially in India? In almost all of my scholarly articles and research reports I have emphasized the fact of reluctance of the victims in reporting crimes and reluctance in reporting such messages at the first instance is no exception. The bloggers’ death revealed to me the need of understanding offensive messages again and from a new light.

Do not keep quite when you receive such messages. Do not ignore the message. Take it as a challenge, but not the way to give the harasser more chances to stop you forever. Share the ‘fear’, not in the fashion that you would create a cycle of hate for hate, but through proper mechanism. Teach your children to be rational by being rational.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2015), Hate messages: do we really need to be concerned?

April 7,2015 published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/

Towards a wonderful informative network.............. but how safely?

2014-05-25T03:45:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

For the last full month while India was swept over by Modi vs Rahul vs Kejriwals for the general election, I was over swept by the joy of getting published in British Journal of Criminology. The article “Online Victimization of Andaman Jarawa Tribal Women: An Analysis of the ‘Human Safari’ YouTube Videos (2012) and Its Effects” (the online version can be found @ http://bjc.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2014/05/05/bjc.azu026.abstract?keytype=ref&ijkey=3XNPIViieFGse4G) has been published in one of the most coveted journals that any researcher can ask for. While researching for this I came to realise the new born habit of people: sharing controversial images and adding their thoughts to it. It can become extremely dangerous at times and the above article speaks on this.

There had been numbers of online propagandas on who is good, who has done the right things, who is bad and how he/she is bad in the course of election campaigns this year. Numerous cartoon images were made, animated short films were made and people were asked to share and comment. Some were noted by the respective political parties and the election commissionarate, majority of them went unnoticed. I found a new era in ‘free speech’ concept in India and I felt happy to note the liberal mindset of the people, especially the political campaigners to broaden the concept of free speech notion. But of course, there is other side of the coin as well. The recent arrest of the Goan resident for expressing some thoughts on Prime Minister elect Narendra Modi is an example (See http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/goan-youth-likely-to-face-arrest-for-anti-modi-facebook-comments/) . As the press release says, among the provisions brought in against the accused, S.153(A) of the IPC holds the key to make it a snow ball of problems. The Section prohibits causing enmity between groups on grounds of race, religion, place of birth, language etc. What was written by the youth that attracted such provisions is not known to us to still now. But it may be understood that while it was noticed by some as ‘offensive’, some have also pointed this arrest as wrong. It now depends upon the courts to decide whether the ‘post’ should be given the ‘protected speech’ status by overruling the lower courts who had denied anticipatory bail to the youth. In our article above one of my main focus was on showcasing how racial trolling took place in the YouTube videos and how the Jarawa women were made the centre points of these trolling. As far as my knowledge goes, no one was arrested for making comments some of which had every condition to attract the above provision. It was because the question of cross border jurisdiction was involved and the perceptions hugely differed. But nonetheless, I must say creating such comments in the cyber /digital space and spreading it through numerous people (who spread it because they liked the message/their friend, friend’s friend, or distant acquaintance has posted it ) had created riots in India; remember the recent exodus of north-eastern people from southern states? Or, the one image of a man kicking the Kargil memorial which became viral and caused violence? I am anxiously waiting for more news on the Goan case with my fingers crossed. Let us hope India’s notion about offensive speech is made more clear by the courts.

Keep peace

”, 25^th May,2014, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/

Beware examinees

2014-02-27T01:45:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org by Dr. Debarati Halder

Come the exam time, the children become more concerned about their studies... really? I have a different opinion this time. in one of my mid -seminar chats with the participants I got an opportunity to hear the experiences of Latika Saran, Ex Director general of Police, Tamil Nadu. She told me about incidences of disturbing fellow classmates through the social media profiles by young teenagers. Her observation said, this is a new trend picked up by students to distract the fellow classmates just before the examination starts. I completely agree with her observation especially when I myself got to see several of such cases. Many schools including sophisticated elite schools now have included direct teaching methods through internet. Science, social science, maths and even linguistic subjects are also made easy through several educational software. Gone are those days when children had to be taken to field trips to make them understand just a fragment of a portion of an entire science syllabus. Now field trips are additional ways to make a child understand the whole problem. Computer and internet are working as extremely beneficial windows letting the students visualise and realise everything . Students are encouraged to have their own emails and social media profiles to get connected to famous scientists, explorers, mathematicians etc through their own web pages or social media pages. This is extremely useful since these children are born in the internet era and they must learn to use the internet for good since early adolescent period. Home computers and internets may give wonderful opportunities to learn new things, solve problems together with the family. I have personally experienced this when my daughter wanted to know the meaning of a particular Hindi word; the whole family sat with her and learnt not only one word ( the meaning), but various ways to use the word constructively. But this is not ‘all is good’ scenario.

Young girls often become completely shocked to see their “fake avatars”(I have explained the meaning of FakeAvatars in the context of online harassment in my article http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2270061) ; the shock turns into nervous breakdown when they come to know that these were created by none other than their classmates to distract them from their studies. Parents often tell me that their children are increasingly becoming adamant to open new Facebook profile or get connected to their friends through Twitter or Google Plus particularly when they get study leave before the exams. Some students prefer to share class-photographs with their friends through emails/chats after they are reportedly ‘begged’ by their friends repeatedly. Further, I have also come across cases where students get into online bullying during their study leaves. Some students told me that to come out of boredom during study leaves they take to internet games and they did come across several games which were ‘adult types’ and they did not tell their parents about it. However, the appreciable part is, they immediately restricted themselves from further going deeper into those games as they said ‘we are aware of the dangers of these’. But not everyone is smart like these kids. There are children who had severe fights with their parents on the issue of using the internet ‘all by themselves’ without any parental guidance during holidays sending the parents to panic camps ; the real world parent vs child arguments did take off several days of the peaceful home atmosphere which hampered exam preparations for the child.

Ever thought why such incidences increase especially during study holidays? Mrs. Saran’s observation stands true with the testimony of a few parents who agreed that some children intentionally call up others to be online to distract them from their studies. How many of you readers remember the scene in 3 Idiots when “Chatur” circulates racy magazines to other hostel-mates during their exams to distract them? This silly prank-trend has an upliftment through Information/digital technology way. Apart from this, I must also say about one more incidence where medical students were caught red-handed with blue chips in the examination hall some years back and it was found that there was a big racket alluring the students to buy it; the intentional was not to empower the younger generation by availing them latest technology, but to sell answers to the right questions.

So students and parents, be aware of such trends. Internet is a way of learning now. But do not use it to destroy the positive powers.

Wish you all best of luck for your exams.

”, 27^th February,2014, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

The 377 and beyond

2013-12-15T20:58:00.001-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org Blog by Dr.Debarati Halder

With almost every free-thinking Indian getting shocked and surprised by the recent Supreme court decision to set aside the High court decision on the constitutionality of S.377 of the Indian penal Code, I can’t stop but share my thoughts on the issue. S. 377 is one of those penal laws created by the British rulers which has become obsolete in the eyes of the modern society, but sitting like an obstinate law due to the recent ruling of the Supreme Court of India. What does S.377 say? It actually criminalises unnatural sexual relationship and thereby touches the Lesbian ,Gay, Bisexual and Transgender community as well. I am one of those, who as a child were quite afraid of those ‘women’ who were not completely women. I grew up watching them in the trains, bus stops, roads, eateries and sometimes at weddings and family functions where (I was told) their presence was needed as a good omen. I continued to be ‘afraid’ of them till the day I met one who is one of them. That was way back in 1990’s when they used to socialise with people rarely. I knew how wonderful human being this person was and they as a group are more reliable friends than those who cheat and harass others in the name of friendship. I was particularly interested in their on-line presence. I did get to see lots of communities and groups in Orkut way back in 2008 and afterwards. When Orkut started losing its popularity, I searched them in other popular social media like the Facebook and found that they existed in several public, private as well closed groups. A fascinating fact that I would like to share is, while transgender, in many academic writings who are described as ‘cross dressers’, openly advertise about their sexual as well as physical appearance choices, many gay, lesbians and bisexuals take to internet often to secretly share their choices. Nonetheless, I did deal with online victimisation of such people who were violently bullied in public forums as well as private chat messages. The pain is no less than that of any normal men or women suffering from adult bullying or hate messages. Why stopping with this? it has become a trend to tease a man by calling him a ‘gay’ or a woman a ‘lesbian’ and go on-line bragging about it if a perpetrator wishes to bring huge embarrassment to his/her victim with immediate effect. I consider this as an insult to the LGBT community. It is a personal choice of sexual affiliation and no one should tag a person who has straight likings to be like one from the LGBT community may have. Similarly, LGBT community should have their own privacy and they deserve respect even if it is in an on-line presence. Constitutionality of S.377 has actually encouraged those who feel bullying LGBT community people is their right as such sorts of sexual preferences are seen as ‘wrong’ not only by a major sect of the society, but by the court itself.

Now, look at the practical scenario:

i. In Tamil Nadu, one transgender was provided government health worker’s job, another was given a home guard’s job as a ‘woman’ (See http://www.bbc.co.uk/hindi/india/2013/12/131215_transgender_home_gaurd_sr.shtml?ocid=socialflow_facebook_hindi). If S.377 is constitutional, then these ‘government appointments’ are bound to be affected.

ii. On-line groups and communities speaking about LGBT rights, often share information about each other. Many put up their profile status as bi-sexual, gay or lesbian in their Facebook profiles. Would this not be considered a ‘crime’ if the individual is an Indian national? If anyone feels this can be considered so, think of right to equality, freedom of speech and expression and of course right to personal preferences and right to life which has extended its scope to cover right to privacy.

iii.While I am an ardent supporter of S.66A of the Information Technology Act, which restricts some categories of speech in the internet, I also fear that this provision would lose its power if any one belonging to LGBT community wishes to avail it to prevent and punish those who would have hurled hate speech, death threats, sexual assaults to him/her just because his/her sexual preferences.

The practical scenario becomes graver as majority of Indian families deject adolescent children to attend sex education classes. But see the irony: many mothers love to dress up their young male children as baby girls with ‘girlie’ gowns, fairy wings complete with lipsticks. Many mothers also prefer to dress up their baby girls in boy’s dresses with half pants, shorts , shirts and encourage them to pick up toys exclusively tagged for ‘boys’ just for a ‘photo-sake’. Well, young parents love to show off their children ‘cross dressed’ but they forget that once floated, these pictures, images or videos can stay back for a long time in the web; it can actually make the child extremely embarrassed when he/she starts using the social media and his/her friends and peers take a look at their ‘babyhood’ pictures and how their parents wanted show them off to the world. Many adult ‘cross-dressers’ did confess in many forums that they took up liking for what they are now, due to their childhood experiences. But do note that these adults are ‘net immigrants’ who have taken the internet as a part of their lives not very long ago. If the young parents are showing off their babies (who would be true netizens) in such fashion, ask yourself on whom the liability lies to show the path? If this is the legal scenario, would the parents be able to counsel their children who may go through major psychological changes due to this? Probably not. Couple of weeks ago I heard this painful story of a co-passenger who was telling her friend how no one in her family supports her since she has become a ‘she’ from being a ‘he’ and how the possible employers ask them to leave right from the door step by seeing a ‘manly woman’. Yes, she has a boyfriend, but he meets her secretly because he does not have courage to accept a ‘former man’ as his legal partner. Online bullying of LGBT people is almost always based on these very facts which are painful realities.

There is one silver line in this dark cloud: the Supreme Court did observe that S.377 is constitutional. But at the same time, it also stated that it is open for the parliament to decide the final fate of it ( See http://barandbench.com/comment/44159#.Uq6CStIW3g0), even though this is neither an ‘unchallenged fact’, (See http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/the-wrongness-of-deference/article5463126.ece), Law makers, please consider. Law makers, please consider.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “The 377 and beyond”, 16^th December,2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

The value of good talk in the electronic communication devices

2013-10-31T06:14:00.002-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org by Dr. Debarati Halder

In a recent workshop on cyber crime I was delighted to hear how young people use the social media in unique ways which were not known before. Interacting with the participants made me understand that people are taking social media more casually than before. Remember the advertisement of a particular mobile phone company where a lift man asks a young professional “will you be my Facebook friend”? As many researchers have pointed out, cheap access to internet has made more and more people getting into it; but there is a huge lack understanding of the netiquettes. Be it social media, email communication or sending SMSs, it has become a norm to send ‘smilies’, slang words or even apparently vulgar words when the communication involves two or more friends who catch up each other for casual chat. This trend has proved dangerous time and again. Especially when the matured teens or young adults are involved and they do not hold a back ground of erudite families, the problem becomes bigger. India has a large sect of urban slum population which uses indecent language in everyday life. Be it wife abuse, elder abuse, child abuse in the slums or even drunken men making nuisance in public places, we do get to hear such sorts of words which prick minds of any educated individual; however, I do agree that usage of bad words in domestic violence are not limited to slums only. Many of us strictly believe that the language used by elders has a huge impact on the children at home. Truly, I have seen many instances where children at a very young age started picking up the not so decent language trend and it did reflect in their social communication skill. When in school, such usage of the language may turn them into huge bullies; not to forget that there are several restrictions in freedom of speech that is guaranteed by our constitution and these children and young adults like their peers, may even unknowingly fall in the other side of law when they communicate in such unconstitutional language.

In the workshop I had asked several teachers whether they are aware of any bullying incidences including cyber bullying. Not many could answer and this showed how bullying still remains unrecognised in our country. While real life bullying does not get due attention, what can we think about online bullying? Many youngsters including college students do not understand that with a technology that helps in communicating need for understanding the value of ‘good talks’ is increasing. In India, an easiest way to trigger violence is to hurt one with community sentiments. I could not stop myself from alerting a matured teenager school student who was then residing in a private Home for poor students run by an NGO adjacent to my home when I heard he was teasing somebody over phone by calling the recipient ‘neech jati’ ( people from lower cast). Probably the recipient also teased him in similar language, but what these children were unaware of was, they were slowly entering a big bad world unknowingly by constantly flouting the law which is meant to maintain decency of language. The boy probably had seen his peers or parents addressing others in similar fashion; but this proves how essential it has become to teach children the need to use good language while communicating over electronic devices. Nonetheless, with Diwali knocking at the door, many would be experimenting with their handsets and you readers be prepared to receive prank calls, obscene SMSs and drunken calls. Unless we as a society understand the value of good talks over bad talks, there would be more such communications which will destroy our piece of minds and may even instigate unknown dangers.

Stay safe.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “The value of good talk ”, 31^st October,,2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

The positive side of social media

2013-10-01T07:22:00.003-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

There have been lots of discussions on negativeness of social media. Children and women are considered as most vulnerable groups who can be targeted through social media and I completely agree with these views. But all is not always bad. Today completes exactly one month since I received my doctorate degree certificate from National Law School of India University, Bangalore on 1 st September, 2013. When my name was called by the Vice Chancellor and I marched towards the Hon’ble Chief justice of India who would be giving me the degree certificate, I realised that my time in the social media for past three years for almost 6 hours every day was not at all a wastage; for I built up my entire thesis on the social media and how it is being misused targeting women, how the laws are falling silent in front of the sharp abusive words that describe the victims in filthiest words and why all is not well in the social media. A few principles that I followed to protect my digital identity were learnt from earlier researches, hugely read blogs and from my own experiences and these include keeping those information private which I never wanted to share with the world. I had a very bad experience of being stalked. Social media had nothing to do with it though, but keeping this in mind, i wanted to explore the social media and what i got in them was nothing but gems.

Social media, as they promise, can bring old friends back. When I searched in Orkut, I got a whole lot of friends who were my best time buddies in the school. There were these two particular girls whom I never met since I was 12 years old. I got them back through Orkut and later got well connected through Facebook. We exchanged our phone numbers and talked for hours. They were not ‘fake avatars’( I coined this in my paper Halder, D. (2013). Examining the scope of Indecent representation of Women (Prevention) Act, 1986, in the light of Cyber Victimization. National Law School Journal, 11, 188-218) They were real and I understood this when both of them shared particular incidents in the school that only we know. I got to know my seniors from the law college where I did my law under graduation course and each of them gave moral boosting to become what I am today. I searched for my classmates from the law college in the ‘groups’ and found out the whole gang after nearly 13 years of leaving the college. We still have virtual hang outs. We grew up together for five years and we were fresh from the high schools. Orkut and Facebook took me back to those golden days of young adulthood when almost all of us were running to the same dream: to wear the black gown and fight for justice. However, Facebook found us more matured when we would discuss about legal points, share our advanced knowledge and also grow our professional network. During my leisure time, I love to watch the group behaviours in the social media. I actively participate in many group discussions and this has taught me the difference between ‘good talk’ and ‘bad talk’. I agree, if I had not experienced the ‘bad talks’, I would never had understood what are ‘good talks’. I still stay in many groups to learn many new ideologies of law. One such group proved to be extremely beneficial not only for my thesis, but also for my own understanding of practical aspects lawyering. I met some legal stalwarts and I was literally pampered by them when I wanted to clarify my doubts which arose while reading their works. Yes, Facebook brings you more close to your virtual professors and the ‘in- box’, if used properly can give you more than a ‘most sold’ book. Nonetheless, social media gave me opportunity to grow myself and read more current affairs. Believe me or not, i use Twitter to read the breaking news not only from one news channel, but from more than fifty domestic and international news channels, which are further shared by many Tweet- handles whom I religiously follow.

I am a Ph.d degree holder now and I may not apparently need to be glued to the social media anymore like before. But this addiction is for positive gain. This is especially so when one knows how and when to stop the virtual window and use the knowledge gained from it in real life.

Nonetheless, use social media for good and you may reap more than you sowed.

October 1, 2013, published in http://debaraticyberspace.blogspot.com"

5 (in)famous ways to become 'famous' in social media that one must avoid

2013-07-29T03:16:00.003-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

In the last couple of weeks almost the whole of England was in labour with Kate Middleton who gave birth to the baby prince just a couple of days ago. Social media like the Twitter and Facebook were flooded with comments on this ‘trend’. The language used in these comments was noteworthy. Many news channels picked up good, bad, humorous and rebellious comments and instantly the comment makers became famous or (in)famous. While internationally “royal baby” could make an impact among the online update feeders, nationally many sensitive issues have influenced the good or badness of the social media. Be it the devastating Himalayan Tsunami, or the ill-fated marriage of Divya and Ilavarasan of Tamil Nadu, or the poisonous midday meals which killed so many school students in different parts of India, or the political situation; users of social media have used all these issues to express their own concerns. But the styles that have been adopted by some of these users motivated me to do a small research to know how some of them have got instant highlight for good or bad reasons. I list here some of the infamous ways to become famous, which a good netizens should always avoid:

1. Using harsh words to target the personal shortcomings including physical challenges of activists or political leaders or celebrities; one must understand they are also human beings and they feel pain as much as we ordinary individuals feel.

2. Insulting the communal sentiments of others; no wonder, this may instantly trigger a riot.

3. Spreading false information and photo images; one can get huge numbers of ‘likes’ and followers. But think of the devastating consequences.

4. Trolling for unnecessary attention seeking; the troll may never understand that he/she may become a laughing stock very soon.

5. Posting awkward “selfie” pictures; while the contributor may attract huge attention either for him/herself, or for the background for which he/she put him/herself in the picture, this may finally be detrimental to the contributor if it involves breach of privacy or illegal activity especially when photography has been prohibited in that area.

It must be remembered that internet is a way of life today. But that does not mean that usage of it should be detrimental to the society at large. A responsible netizen may get lime light for correct reason in due time. Short way to fame may not always be a good journey.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “5 (in)famous ways to become famous in social media that one must avoid”, 29^th July, 2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

A devastating Himalayan tsunami and a potentially destructive cyber connection

2013-06-21T20:24:00.002-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

A week back Kedarnath temple and the surrounding area suffered a devastating natural disaster. While the ancient temple stood the test of nature’s fury, surrounding buildings, shafts and roads were washed away by the gushing water from River Mandakini. The news channels became busy to report the gravity of natural calamity, the human sufferings, the political blames and rescue operations. Some pointed out how the religious pilgrims described the scene as ‘Shiv-Tandav’, the destructing dance of the God. Being fed with stories from Shiv –mythology since my childhood, I was interested to see what has happened to the ancient temple. A search in the Google showed that while the ancient temple and sanctum sanatorium are intact, the calamity was really disastrous. Within days Facebook and YouTube got flooded with still and video images showing roads getting washed away, vehicles both heavy as well as light getting topsy-turvy in the flood water and building constructions moving away like storm wrecked boats. Some of these videos were from local and little known news channels, some were private videos. I was astonished to see the mindset of people who captured these moments. Nonetheless, many news channels were encouraging people to send them photos and videos of the flood situation and in one way I appreciate this people’s involvement as it is not only cost effective but also it spreads the feeling of remaining connected. But on the other hand, it can prove extremely dangerous and fatal. For instance, I got to see this video where two young men were taking pictures of themselves in the flooded footsteps leading to the ferociously flowing river somewhere near Rambara, the place which was most affected by the flood. The other images that I came across showed similar instances with men, women and children clicking the devastative flood water dangerously flowing in their background. Coincidentally I was reading a BBC report on selfie pictures (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/hindi/international/2013/06/130610_social_media_ra.shtml?ocid=socialflow_facebook_hindi) and I posted my own comments in the comment section too. Never imagined though that there would be a situation so soon which would motivate me to consider the issue.

Then there was this image of flood water almost submerging a tall statue of Lord Shiv in meditating posture, which was shown by almost all the news channels. One should note the comments posted under this very particular scene which was floated in the YouTube by numerous users including news channels themselves. Some of these have every potential to start a religious riot or vicious trolling. Not to end with this, there was this picture of human bridge made by soldiers helping stranded people to move to safer places, which has started getting viral in the Facebook. Undoubtedly the army is doing a momentous job in rescuing stranded people. But my doubt increased when I searched internet for this particular picture. It was not related to Uttarakhand flood, but with some other natural disaster somewhere else. By the time I came back to alert my friend who had got this picture in the Facebook timeline, I got to see many comments. Not to forget what happened last year with the Azad maidan riots in Mumbai and exodus of people of north eastern from South Indian cities including Bangalore and Chennai, which was directly linked to misinformation fed by YouTube videos, I put a small note to my friend regarding the authenticity of the information (related to the Uttarakhand flood) accompanying this amazing act of humanity that is depicted in that particular picture.

It must be noted that while social media can be extremely helpful in times of disasters such as this, it can be dangerously vicious especially when it is used to convey misinformation or when it sets dangerous examples of ‘selfie’ photos to the young users.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “A devastating Himalayan tsunami and potentially destructive cyber connection”, 22^nd June, 2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Social media: a child’s play ground?

2013-05-02T04:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Facebook and Twitter are the chosen grounds for many to express their thoughts, showcase their opinion and access the world around. YouTube stands as a favourite platform to showcase one’s activities or see others’ activities. All of these allure people belonging to different ages right from the age group of 13. Why 13? The High court of Delhi, India has raised a very valid question, which came up in the public interest litigation filed by former BJP leader K.N. Govindacharya.(see http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/illegal-for-minors-to-open-facebook-account-petition/article4654571.ece?homepage=true). Popular social media like the Facebook, Twitter etc are hosted in the US and the age limit has been set by the rules and regulations of the hosting nation. But in India the age of majority is restricted to 18. This is the valid age for voting, to get a proper driver license, to get married (for girls especially) and to form a contract. But in reality, all these norms are violated in different ways; for example, there are umpteen numbers of child marriages still happening in various interior parts of India; driving light vehicles to even heavy vehicles by children belonging to the age group of 13 to 18 are neither uncommon scene. The flaunting of disobeying the ‘age law’ is now more prominent after the 9 year old Ferrari driver was hugely exhibited in a private road in Kochi, Kerala through YouTube(see http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/NewDelhi/Kerala-father-arrested-for-letting-9-year-old-boy-drive-his-Ferrari/Article1-1052503.aspx . The YouTube exhibition drew attention of large number of people including the police and the father of the 9 year old is now being prosecuted. Regarding the contract by juveniles, S.11 of the Indian contract Act maintains that contracts made by minors are void especially when it relates to profit making by both or either of the party.

But when it comes to creating an account in the popular social media, the confusion of understanding demands better reading. Facebook, Twitter and Google have options for children to become users once they become 13. But in reality, children below 13 also find Facebook, Twitter and YouTube extremely alluring and I have personally seen many parents encouraging their children to communicate to their friends through parent’s profiles. This is also evident from the Base Line Survey report of cyber victimisation in India that we had conducted in 2010( seehttp://www.cybervictims.org/CCVCresearchreport2010.pdf) . Given this fact, when over 13, children actually become pretty much aware of the Facebook usages. But it may be noted that Facebook does not allow registering when the user is below 13. It is similar for Google and Twitter. However, , many under age children may have their profiles with fake age as these social media do not have real life age verification methods. But the concern lies in the fact as to what the children can access through these social media. There are many unclaimed images which often go viral in the social media. Greatest examples could be that of Delhi gang rape victim’s photo or that of children being raped. These are not only traumatising for children only, they create shock for adult viewers also. Similarly, older adolescent children are at higher risk for becoming cyber perpetrators like hacking. Many older children have also got into creating fake profiles of others, especially girls and adult women as well.

But not to ignore the advantages of social media also. Government as well as non-governmental educational portals, scientific bodies etc embrace Facebook and Twitter for showcasing latest news and developments. A matured handling of the social media can make a user gain more knowledge and experience. Undoubtedly, this depends upon the parents, teachers and peers to make the child use the social media for good. The Ferrari boy YouTube incidence stands a good example for the parents as well as children as how much parental control and guidance is necessary, what should not be allowed by parents and what should be done with internet era children and how it should be done. But at the same time, the video can actually make many under-age children take the same steps to do illegal activities if they are access the video without proper parental guidance. Perhaps here lies the concern of the Delhi High court. But the society has to accept the growing level of maturity and responsibility of children as well. Let us hope that the Delhi High court case brings out a good judgement which sets a path breaking example of welfare judgement in the light of modern internet era.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “Social media: a child’s play ground?”, 2^nd May, 2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Death penalty debates: a note to the supporters

2013-02-15T01:59:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Since the news of execution of death sentence of Afzal Guru, one of the prime accused of Indian Parliament attack case came out, India as well as the world seems to be divided into two groups: one who is saying no to death penalties, and the other who is saying yes to the death penalties. Unfortunately India is witnessing a killing spree which has become almost viral right from 16^th December,2012 when the Delhi gang rape victim was brutally raped. The 23 year old young woman was raped, stripped off and thrown out of the bus where she was raped. Huge numbers of protesters showed their protest against this cruel torture on the woman by saying yes to the death penalty. Internet was swept by such ‘demands’. One experienced woman journalist of a national news channel shared with me personally her fear that from now on all news papers/media channels will show case rape cases and their handling by the government agencies. She sadly told me that most media houses will go ahead with such news mainly to grow their TRP rates, but at the same time she feared that the result would be devastating. She was true! Anger of people kept on rising whenever there was any news of sexual assault and related death of the victim. The last was none other than the acid attack victim from Chennai who succumbed to death just a few days ago. Unfortunately there is an extremely dark history in our country which would show that many raped and subsequently dead women victims are extremely neglected by the criminal justice machinery. The Mathura rape case stands as the ugly evidence of abuse and misuse of power when it comes to providing justice to rape victims such as Mathura. The law has been amended time and again to test the strength of S.376 IPC which prescribes punishment for rape and its series which includes intercourse with a woman misusing the accused person’s designation (even that of a husband when he involves in intercourse with the wife during separation ) and its punishment. .While in some cases of brutal rape and then subsequent murder of the victim, the lawyers appearing for the victim (as well as the State) could actually convince the judges to award the death penalty (see Dhananjay Chatterjee Alias Dhana vs State Of W.B. on 11 January, 1994, 1994 (1) ALT Cri 388, 1994 (2) BLJR 1231), with the help of S.302 of the Indian Penal Code, S.376 originally did not prescribe death as the ultimate punishment for violent rape. As it can be seen, India does have death penalty and it is used for rarest of the rare cases. The language of Section 302 of the Indian penal Code prescribes death penalty as the first preference for punishment for murder. The second preference remains life imprisonment which is shown as a substitute to death penalty by adding an “or” in front of the words “life imprisonment”. The pecuniary punishment of fine comes as an added prescribed punishment with it. While this provision is a common punishment provision for ‘cold blooded’ murders (which actually excludes culpable homicides not amounting to murder, or cases of causing death by negligence etc), S.121 of the Indian Penal Code also prescribes death penalty as the first preference (again linguistically) and life imprisonment with fine as the second preference for (i) waging war against the government of India, or (ii) attempting to wage such war, or (iii) abetting the waging of such war. It was not till the recent Criminal law(amendment )ordinance, 2013 which mention awarding death penalty for brutal rape which would leave the victim dead or in a vegetative condition(see s.376A of the Indian penal code of the Criminal law (amendment ) ordinance,2013, published on 4^th February,2013 in the Press Information Bureau of India, available @http://pib.nic.in/newsite/erelease.aspx?relid=91979) that death penalty was accepted as the extreme punishment for rape of such nature. On a personal note, I actually support inclusion of this penalty as the last option especially for rarest of the rare cases if taken in its true meaning (the framers of the this ordinance has kept the option of ‘death’ as the last option in line, beginning with prison sentence for twenty years as the first option, which may extend for life). The ordinance made a sect of people happy as it carried out the retributive aspect of sentencing violent crimes against women. Apparently this section comprised of people who went for on-line petitions, debates and write-ups which actually wanted the prime accused of this rape case to be hanged or chemically castrated. The ordinance simultaneously made another sect of people disappointed as it upheld ‘constitutional murder’. Immediately after the publication of this ordinance, came the ‘shocking news’ of execution of Afzal Guru which was done without any prior publicity. Actually it was highly speculated in the internet especially after the hanging of Ajmal Kasab in 2012. I came across so many cartoon and images, short notes and write-ups in the Facebook itself and also in the Twitter which indicated that many people wanted to see the terrorists hanged. The on-line debates brewed up on the sentiments of people. Undoubtedly the demands of hanging of the brutal rapists and dangerous terrorists who have caused bloody death to many found their own ways of convincing ways. Such posts in the social media did not get removed, but it was seen as a plain case of freedom of speech and expression which expressed anger and frustration over the delayed process of law in seeing the result of the rape law amendment or parliament attack case or 26/11 case. These demands of death penalty especially for the gang rape accused got almost viral in the social media. I find the supporting grounds behind this ‘desperateness’ in some of the land mark death penalty verdicts which considered rarest of rare cases to award the penalty such as in Machchi Singh Vs. The state (1983)3SCC,470 etc.

I sadly observe that this turn of events actually made some people or groups of people obsessive with death penalties. Many are attacking activists who are against death penalty with harsh and extremely humiliating words in the web platforms such as Twitter. Such activists, especially women activists are targeted by trolls in very offensive words. It needs to be remembered that if supporters for death sentence can use their freedom of speech and expression in the social media, supporters against death penalty are no aliens who would be rejected this prime right. This pseudo anger over non supporters is carried out through peculiar ways ; some call these non supporters ‘traitors’, some openly throw challenges to breach the dignity of the person (this especially happens for women activists). While all of these sorts of speeches can actually be booked under S.66A of the Information Technology Act, I am yet to research on how many targeted non-supporters have actually taken this path. But at the same time, I would not be surprised if any of the non supporters is again dragged to the police station for expressing his/her views against death penalty as had happened for the Palghar girls’ case who was arrested for their Facebook remarks against the Mumbai shut down due to the death of veteran political leader BalSaheb Thackeray. Judicial investigation revealed how the law was misused by political goons who forced the police to book the false case.

But, one serious note for the supporters of death penalty: stop throwing threatening /humiliating words to the non supporters. If they are really “traitors” let the court( and not the police only) decide it. Instead of taking law in your own hands or throwing it aside for the sake of hailing the capital punishment , test the power of the law to judge whether their ways of protesting the death penalties really attracts the ‘protected speech’ category or not.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “Death penalty debates: a note to the supporters”, 16^thFebruary,2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Now India can boast of an anti-stalking law

2013-01-25T04:37:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

The December 2012 brutal Delhi rape had given birth to numerous issues. This included knee jerking awakening regarding the safety of women and a feeling of insecurity due to too many laws but too less execution of them. The incidence had also showcased the need of new sensible laws which can protect women not only in theory, but also in practice. The best result of this painful incidence is probably the Justice Verma committee report on proposal to amend the criminal law of India. The report did promise to fill in many gaps which were left for so long by numerous law amendment committees. Undoubtedly one of the notable moves by this committee was giving legal recognition to the offence of Stalking. In my blogs and many of my write-ups I had pointed out that we in India really needed a legal recognition for stalking. I had also pointed out in our 2010 report “Cyber victimization in India : A baseline survey report” that many individuals, including victims do not actually understand the nature of stalking, especially online stalking. In this report we had analysed online stalking as follows:

“In real life, stalking if we analyze the US laws on stalking, the nearest explanation of cyber stalking could be found in Violence Against Women and Department of Justice Reauthorization Act of 2005 which amended Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 223(h)(1)) through Section 113 to include the use of any device or software that can be used to originate telecommunications or other types of communications that are transmitted, in whole or in part, by the Internet for the purpose of ‘stalking’ , annoying and harassing others as penal offence. This US provision attempts to explain cyber stalking as follows;

Cyber stalking= following the victim’s internet activities + using digital device, software to create harassing, threatening , abusing mails/messages etc + transmitting the said mail to the victim’s inbox and / or victim’s friends or relative’s inboxes + successfully creating fear, annoyance, irritation harassed feeling in the victim.

We feel those who never understood how stalking may have happened or whether stalking has at all happened or not, perhaps feel confused with the whole component parts of the stalking. In one word, when ‘following’ is added by Mens rea to commit harm and it is successfully digitally carried out, we can say cyber stalking has happened.”[1]

I am extremely happy to note that the Verma committee report in January, 2013 has built up anti stalking law quite in the same tune. The report suggests introduction of S.354C(1) to the Indian Penal code which defines stalking in following lines[2]

“Whoever follows a person or contacts or attempts to contact such person to foster personal interaction repeatedly despite a clear indication of disinterest by such person or whoever monitors the use by a person of the internet, email or any other form of electronic communication or watches or spies a person in a manner that results in fear of violence or serious alarm or distress, in the mind of such person or interferes with the mental peace of such person, commits the offence of stalking.”

Note that the proposed law specifically mentions the behavioural pattern in the offence of stalking which we in 2010 report summed up by stating “when ‘following’ is added by Mens rea to commit harm and it is successfully digitally carried out, we can say cyber stalking has happened”. The proposed law has mixed up offline as well as online stalking giving much scope to experiment with S.66A of the Information Technology Act,2000(amended in 2008)(punishment for sending offending messages through communication services etc). The punishment that the proposed legal provision offers is however expanded from 1 year to 3 years and also with fine. This can actually bring the offence at par with S.66A of the IT Act.

It is expected that this proposed provision would finally prove beneficial to harassers who take up stalking specially through cyber space to victimise others. Even though the proposed law is expected to draw criticism for its proviso and also for its effectiveness in the long run, it is still a welcome move.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2013), “Now India can boast of an anti-stalking law”, 25^thJanuary,2013, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

[1] See pg.12, Halder, D., & Jaishankar, K. (2010). Cyber Victimization in India: A Baseline Survey Report. Tirunelveli, India: Centre for Cyber Victim Counselling. Accessed on 25-01-2013

[2] See pg 437 of the Report of the committee on amendments to criminal law accessed from @ http://ibnlive.in.com/news/full-text-justice-js-verma-committee-report-on-amendments-to-criminal-law/317383-53.htmlon 25.01.2013

Law to regulate cyber goons?

2012-12-20T05:37:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

One more strong amendment to the law meant for regulating cyber offences and this time I am little sceptical about it. The Tamil Nadu government has decided to incorporate the Goonda’s Act to curb cyber goons. Officially known as Tamil Nadu Prevention of Dangerous Activities of Bootleggers, Drug offenders, Goondas, Immoral traffic offenders, Sand offenders, Slum grabbers, and Video pirates Act, 1985, the law is extremely powerful and its arms reach seven categories offenders: bootleggers, drug offenders, goondas, immoral traffic offenders, sand offenders, slum grabbers, and video pirates. Those who research in the area of social sciences including criminology, law and victimology, and those who practise criminal law, may note that in general, the typical offenders in such cases who are first nabbed by the investigating officers are often hired individuals or groups of individuals who work for organised crimes sector. The law definitely is extremely powerful to punish the big heads also. This law, if extended to include offences committed in the cyber space which reports suggest “has the propensity to disturb public order”,(see http://www.thehindu.com/news/states/tamil-nadu/tn-will-use-goondas-act-to-curb-cyber-crime/article4218006.ece?homepage=true) would actually acknowledge the devastating damaging effect of cyber crimes. As I get from The Hindu, the law would be used to curb “ any repeated cyber crime that involves harassment, intimidation or cheating of innocent people in large scale”. But the rest of the news report gave an idea that these definitions may be largely meant for economic crimes and money laundering activities through identity related crimes in the internet. True; phishing, lottery scams, card scams, whatever you call them, people behind these crimes are becoming cyber goons who are no less than those which are already under the scope of the Goonda’s Act. In real life, the hired goondas may often be less educated and become habituated for need of money. Cyber goons who act as key players for phishing scams are well matured than these sects of people. But their ultimate motives remain the same: to earn money by illegal ways. In the Information Technology Act, 2000(amended in 2008), the offences chapter in Chapter XI already have bunch of provisions like sections 65 and 66, which prescribe punishment for unauthorised access to computer and data and modifying the contents and computer related offences, the controversial 66A which prohibits sending offensive messages etc, 66 C which prohibits identity theft and 66D which prohibits impersonation by cheating etc. All most all of them can be used in cases of phishing activities (off course depending upon the nature of the operation) and they prescribe jail terms which may extend to three years, besides monetary fines. To make the crime more severe, several Sections from the Indian penal Code like Sections 417, 419, 420 are also used in some cases. All of these sing in the same tune (with different tones): cheating and illegal monetary benefit.

Apart from these, is the Goonda’s Act needed ?

I endorse Ratna Kapur’s one statement in her very recent article Rape and the crisis of Indian masculinity (http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/rape-and-the-crisis-of-indian-masculinity/article4214267.ece). She says More law — or calls for the death sentence — are not the answer to what is a deeply ingrained societal problem. True, one more law may not be the answer for ending the problem, but I feel happy to note that the problem which remained “cyber” for so long is gradually becoming “real”. The true scope of the law is yet to be determined. But I expect that it should not be misused by police personnel just for the sake of executing the law. We already have a devastating example of misuse of section 66A and the after effects must be taken as a lesson for all. However, I am still waiting to see whether the law extends its hand to nab cyber eve teasers too.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Law to regulate cyber goons”, 20^thDecember,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/

To speak or not to speak while driving:A confused law ?

2012-12-13T05:20:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Survived Bangalore traffic last evening, I thought of revisiting certain feedbacks from the police regarding the side effects of certain laws. Talking and driving have been proved fatal many times on Indian roads. Gone are the days when vehicle owners could be punished for driving while listening to car radios only. Introduction of mobile phones, smart phones, blue tooth etc have ushered in a new era when the lawmakers had to think of prohibiting the driver from focussing his attention to other things like talking while driving. True, talking while driving can be extremely fatal. Particularly when I see drivers of public vehicles like the buses, trucks or even auto rickshaws, I feel extremely uncomfortable. The typical position of placing the mobile phone on his ear and clipping it with a hiked shoulder proposes every possibility of faulty driving and even losing mobile phone from the ‘grip’ if the driver has to cross bumpy roads with equal speed as an F1 driver. Each time I am in the hands of such drivers, I keep on shutting my eyes off and on to avoid viewing any nasty accident (fortunately my fear has still now remained a fear only). But can the law really check this habit of talking while driving?

The recent Motor Vehicle Amendment Bill imposes a hefty punishment for repeated use for cell phones, hand held or hand free device or any gadget which actually aides in communicating while driving. Cell phones, i pods, GPs devices .....all are included in the red book now. The feedback from the police in this regard was particularly noteworthy. They stated that it would be difficult to prove driver’s guilt under this law. Cudos to the police understanding. How can an officer on duty catch a driver who may be armed with a blue tooth on his ear and asking the passenger for the direction? Why would GPS system be at all installed in the cars? Above all, it needs to be understood that in many cities, and even semi rural places (which are blessed with good transport systems), auto rickshaw drivers are often seen to build up personal network among the residents by exchanging their mobile numbers. Their services are available almost 24/7 and this is possible because drivers receive calls while ‘on job’ and if they are driving other passengers, they instantly contact other fellow drivers to provide service to the ‘customers’. Say it a boon of digital telecommunication era, but this is the hard truth. These drivers may not be financially strong enough to buy hand free sets like the upper middle class or upper class car owners. But their business network remains alive for whatever device they have. Majority of urban and rural population of India is still not properly introduced to GPS system; “call a cab” is still a spreading concept for many non metro cities and in this situation, the easiest way to call for a transport is relying on the mobile phone number given by the good old auto driver.

Added to this, the law even though can prove extremely good to regulate for safe driving, poses another question: the driver should not concentrate on communication through electronic devices; what if the passenger does the same? Human beings cannot keep their attention focussed on one thing for long if he/she is surrounded by various communicating elements. Indulging in communication with the passenger or through the communication device of the passenger which is held by the passenger can also be equally dangerous. Many often wise passengers advise others to keep on communicating with the driver while on a long drive. This is a common method adopted by many to keep the driver awake and to avoid any fatal accident which may be caused due to silent, boring and even strenuous drive hours. The driver’s guilt again becomes a question of burden of proof. As the law suggests, the driver needs to stop driving while attending his phone calls. But what would be the situation when the passengers are equally “disturbing” ? It needs to be remembered that while physical safety like wearing seat belts, using helmets etc are extremely necessary for a safe driving and the law must be punitive if the driver faults in these aspects, at the same time, checking on the driver’s communication activities during driving needs a very high legal and psychological understanding.

But I cannot stop praising the police officials who pointed out this folly. Keep it up officers. If this is the attitude, misuse of law can be prevented in a far better fashion.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012),” To speak or not to speak while driving:A confused law?”, 13^th December,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/

Showing death to the world

2012-10-13T20:04:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Off late there are too many disturbing reports about suicides in India. Well, if a researcher checks the graph, it can be seen that suicide rate probably goes higher immediately after the school leaving exams are finished or the exam results are out. Our young generation is stressed and many of them cannot take the pressure of being humiliated by peers and rejected by colleges they dreamt for. Yet another type of people who take this extreme step that attract my attention is those who commit suicide with web-cams on. Now this is really disturbing. The latest of this ‘brigade’ is a Chennai boy who took his own life with his web cam on. Before him, there were several others who did this and found their names in the news reports. While this boy in question finished his life for poor studies, others include those who committed suicide due to fight with girl friends, due to work pressure etc. In the first case, I feel that the deceased probably had taken this extreme step to actually threaten the girlfriend on the other side of the screen. My claim can become a ‘truth’ only when the person witnessing it is properly investigated and the online communication is thoroughly investigated. The second case and cases like this boy in question may need more in-depth research, as whether they were persuaded by someone online at the time of death etc. But thinking from the other side, it is disturbing for the viewer to see a real suicide taking place infront of his/her eyes (through his camera). Ironically in India attempt to suicide is considered a penal offence and once the death has happened, the witnesses may face stringent police prosecution on several legal questions including persuading to even negligence in stopping the act. This is the case for many other countries too. But imagine a witness’s plight if he/she is a minor, or he/she never expected to witness such ghastly acts till he actually saw it. The prolonged process of investigating the evidences through checking the communications conveyed between the deceased or the one who tried to commit suicide and the witness on the other side should also obviously include cyber forensic test to ensure whether there were any third party activity involved in it or not. All these may leave the ‘witness’ even more traumatised.

Probably this is one of the worst examples of misuse of webcams by users. In one way, people must understand that attempting or committing suicide and showing death to the world is no big act of heroism. It creates bad example for others. On the other hand, it must also be understood that now time has come to take up interdisciplinary research to highlight this problem which may actually create new brands of cyber offences and cyber criminals.

”, 14^th October,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

A message to my fellow netizens of internet era

2012-08-19T01:15:00.002-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

It is disturbing to see how India is getting divided due to the pranksters and mischief mongers who took full (mis)use of social networking sites and digital communication medium, especially SMSs. Too many news reports, blogs, media high lights and I am distraught to see how the fear wave touched my own dreamy university town Tirunelveli. Yes, the fear has spread like a fire and people belonging to north east, who used to work in various industries including hotels, brick kilns, ports, every one is running back to their home land (See http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/article3794140.ece) . All for a dreadful SMS which instigated the violence in Bangalore and then it did not take much long to push out others from other southern cities of South India. I know this will die down. It will either have a natural death, or the phenomena would be killed in the rightful way by the authorities. But the fact remains fact. We are never encouraged to be INDIANS first. I married a Tamil and got settled in Tamil Nadu for past thirteen years. I speak the language of the place which has given me motherly comfort and which actually blessed me to become what I am today. But I am still tagged as a “north Indian” (I am not from northern part, I am from the eastern part of India), some of the oldies in my in laws are scared of me because of my non Tamil lineage ( a peculiar sociological behaviour which actually bars people from different regions from accepting others due to some age old cultural beliefs), some blame me for bringing in the Calcutta culture in my own home consisting me, my husband and my multi lingual and multi cultural child. In my virtual life, I often get to see ‘groups’ of Bengalis, Tamils, Hindus, Muslims, Christians, ................... the list is endless. Yes, all of us are practising our precious rights to speech, expression, religion, and life. But where is the red line? Who bars us? The answer is known to none. We are now a generation of internet era. Probably we are the first generation. How would our children who are born of multi-linguistic, multi religious, multi- cultural parents tag themselves? What about those who have migrated to other parts of the country for good? They are neither south Indian nor north Indian, neither Tamils, nor Kannadas, nor Bengalis, nor Assameese. They are INDIANS of the internet era. But still then, the division stays; some over smart opportunists try to create the separatist movement through the digital technology and we are unnecessarily feeding them to grow like poisonous trees by taking them extremely seriously. Isn’t it an irony? When scholars, researchers, cyber psychologists bravely announce that every human being in the NET must learn how to detach oneself from the NET, the NET is gripping us more by sheer technological ‘magic’ to forget about the human side of the users?

In spite of the fact that I had my ups and downs in this place due to cultural differences, I would still say people of Tamil Nadu have hearts that are tied with the heart of India. From my part, I am not giving any opportunist any opportunity to break my country and my family. What about you?

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012),A message to my fellow netizens of internet era”, 19th August,2012, published in http://debaraticyberspace.blogspot.com"

Tackle the bullied in you: an example set by a nine year old

2012-08-12T00:01:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

As a young student I was also subjected to bullying by my schoolmates. Unfortunately twenty –twenty five years back in India the word “bullying” was pretty unfamiliar with the students, parents, teachers and also behavioural scientists. When I joined this school in Kolkata in the late parts of 1980’s as an 8^th standard student, at first, my new classmates could not happily accommodate me in their groups. They took time. In between I regularly got to hear teasing and humiliating words targeting my body structure, my previous location and even my family back ground. Teachers were of no help either as they were busy bringing out the best of the lot for the forthcoming public exams. My only comfort cushions were my parents and my sister. We felt that these were extremely humiliating and teasing words; but never knew that this particular behavior is known as bullying and it is that particular girl/s who loved hurling those remarks, who needed more attention from the teachers and counsellors than me, because she/they probably had terrible personality disorders. My mother probably understood this and she constantly petted me, comforted me telling me that I need to be strong enough to deal with such people not only in the school, but in future also. I grew up being a person strongly advocating positive thinking. I finally understood what my former classmates were actually going through when I got this golden opportunity to work in the project on cyber bullying. Huge amount of literature made me aware of various patterns of school bullying; added with this, my mentor Jayne Hitchcock, President, Working to Halt Online Abuse (WHOA), gifted me a unique training on how to withstand cyber bullying. No wonder, physical bullying and cyber bullying are different in nature and the effects of both may not be the same. But the core effect of bullying, either in case of physical bullying, or in case of cyber bullying remains the same; it hurts, it destroys the self confidence of the victim and it successfully wastes huge lot of study and activity times for the young victims.

No sooner, I saw a growing little princess in my own home, my daughter, who I felt would be more vulnerable to bullying as she comes from a mixed cultural background and has a very uncommon name for the school. Some of her early behavioural symptoms regarding her day to day interactions with her classmates made me aware that bullying is back in this generation with the same old flavour. I started experimenting with her the tricks that my mother taught me and that were further nurtured by Jayne. I made her understand that whatever some people say her, she will always remain my darling princess, I will encourage her for better performances on each of her failures and I would love to see her as whatever she aims to be. Well, a pinch of sour; I warned her that I will not be her well-wisher if she crosses her lines for bad and she has to learn from her own mistakes then, which might be extremely painful. Over the times, she accepted me as her best friend. She shares her own thoughts with me and she teaches me as how to laugh away worries and win over the situation.

And then came the biggest surprise for me as a mom . she came back from the school last week and showed me her note ; someone has left a message for her in her note telling “You’re Loose”... the particular ‘adjective’ is a very common one in this place to describe one as a fool, idiot and stupid. No sooner I understood that some one has become a bully and found a (wrong) target in my daughter. I looked at my daughter and asked “are you hurt?” she twisted her lips in an attempt to smile and answered “well, not really. But I want to know who is this ‘friend’?”. I told her ‘what is the use in finding that out? Better ignore and enjoy life.’ She answered “I want to show him/her something”. I was literally taken aback when she returned from her desk after a few minutes; she had written this message as you can see above in the picture to the bully. she wrote " yes, loose persons win" and she carefully closed the message by adding her own 'signature' "from Rai".

She started giggling heavily.......... the sweetest thing every parent would love to hear from his/her child; she told me she can see a baby with a back pack, a ripe fat tomato, a drum stick and two unequal shaped potatoes... her favourite vegetables. I felt a peculiar joy.. She successfully tackled the ‘bullied’ in her. She refused to let herself be bogged down by the message. She gave me the greatest message “the writer would feel good if I feel bad....... I am feeling happy to get so many amusing things in the note.... thank you who ever you are”.

Didn’t she just reveal a CORE feeling? Don’t let yourself feel bullied. The more you FEEL the more you are HURT.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Tackle the bullied in you: an example set by a nine year old”, 12th August,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/

Cut-copy –paste....who cares?

2012-07-29T07:19:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Recently I met some young fresh college students who were preparing for their assignments. When they showed me the topics, I could not hold back my surprise and also appreciation. The topic was about new findings on astro-physics and they had to contribute from their own understandings. When I asked them what do they think about it, almost all of them answered that ‘internet will think for us’. Apparently they were planning to spend some days in the net- searching and then put the results of the same in the assignments. But the question is how far these contributions would be original? A faculty in a local college told me ‘no wonder, none of them write from their own’. It is no surprise to me too. Last year, I got to see one of my own write-ups on cyber crime against women, neatly cut and pasted in a scholarly article which came for submission to a noted journal. The editor somehow sensed something wrong and alerted me.

But I am not alone in this “stolen and victimised” group. There are many noted as well as upcoming scholars whose works are being used without proper citation or acknowledgements by others. Either such people do not know about copy right violations, or they care a hang about these. But what no one understands is, more than violation of certain legal terms, it victimises the original creator. A simple blog full of genuine creativeness may take minimum two days time to materialise; whereas a full length scholarly paper may take minimum three months to maximum five months time to be written to the expectations of a standard journal. Indeed, the cost of heavy weight books may not be afforded by many, and these open access informative write ups not only help people (especially students) to fill up the vacuum, but also they help them to finish off their works in record times. Just “search” and you would get the answers even at the odd hours of midnight. But it no way means that one can use these sources as mugging up knowledge to pour over in the assignments or projects. It is unfortunate that in India among the high school and undergraduate students, awareness regarding copy right violation in relation to such ‘references’ is hopelessly low. A striking reason for this could be that the law meant for copyright protection in India, has given much weightage to literary, dramatic, musical works, architecture, computer programmes, films, photographs etc. Scholarly works, which include short write-ups also, fall much in the kitty of the publisher/s who choose to publish them. Authors of such works therefore in many cases become secondary copyright holder, or may not have the copyright at all, but confers the right to their publisher/s. However, the same may not be the case when the write up is published in the world wide net. While independent bloggers using Google services, or independent writers using other web-pages hosted in the US, are hugely protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act or DMCA irrespective of their nationality, in India, the law is little tricky in this regard. Section 3 of the Copyright Act, 1957 makes it clear that ‘publication’ means “making a work available to the public by issue of copies or communicating the work to the public”. This very definition apparently gives an indication that once a write-up is “floated” for public viewing, it is published. But the very next section, i.e, section 4 warns people that when such ‘publication’ is made without the author’s proper ‘license of the owner of the copyright’, it would be considered not published in the eyes of law. The conjugated inner meaning of these two sections lies in the fact that even if the work is ‘published’, no individual is allowed to use the same as his/her own work unless the original owner properly authorises the other person to use it. In practise, this authorisation can be implied when one uses a write-up from an open access source after properly citing the author’s name, the title of the write-up, the place where it is published and the date when it was published. However, when the write-up is published with the note from the author that it can be reused only with the written permission from the author, the way of obtaining permission extends by personally approaching the author for his/her permission.

In India hardly any undergraduate student is actually aware or is told about this. I observed that this awareness of respecting other’s hard work slowly arises in some students by regular reading of other available reading materials; some learn this when their works are rejected by editors on the ground of plagiarism. But unfortunately the number of these awakened individuals is very less. Largely, the education system is liable for this. In our schools we ask the students to produce exactly what is written in the text books; hardly any parent or teacher can spend time to make their wards understand what those scriptures actually mean. Many parents are never happy when they learn that their children are not taking up professional courses but prefer to be “thinkers”, or ‘researchers’; even when some land up in their dream courses, they are pressurised to produce some contributions towards the subject without being told how to do it on their own without ‘stealing’ other’s ideas. This gives rise to the vicious circle of infringement of copyrights and victimising the original authors.

Solution? Unless the ‘predecessors’/teachers/guides/parents show the way to be ‘innovative’, cut-copy-paste culture would happily exist in the land of unique thinkers and writers. Young students .......don’t victimise authors; respect their work, learn from them and show the world who inspired your work.

”, 29^th July,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Misuse of information technology, digital devices and rise of cyber crimes

2012-06-20T22:03:00.000-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

In India consumption of information technology and electronic mediums for the same has seen steep high since the new millennium. I remember a Tamil movie in the late 1990s which showed how the computers would be used in future; it showed people are literally throwing off their desk tops to the dustbins since they were “over used”, people belonging to average income group have the power to buy laptops and grass root level workers are using mobile phones. Nonetheless, I am talking about an era when a desk top computer would have costed not less than twenty thousand rupees ( nearly $400) and an ordinary mobile phone with no device other than device for speaking and hearing would have costed not less than two thousand rupees (nearly $40). Cost of internet and pre paid sim cards for mobile phones were not generally accessible by people belonging to lower to middle income group. As such, computers and mobile phones were considered to be prized possessions for the creamy layers. India was slowly getting introduced to cyber crimes like hacking. Crimes like child pornography, phishing etc were still considered as “not our problem still now”. Things have changed since then.

Back in 2012, couple of days ago I was sitting at the railway station waiting for my train which will connect us to the international flight to Sweden. I was online through my husband’s IPad, searching for some last moment details about the conference we were about to attend in couple of hours. Suddenly a woman shouted at me telling “ you will not spare the computer even at the railway station? be careful.. somebody might steal it.” Stunned, I looked at her: the woman must be in her late twenties, in a dirty sari, neatly pinned up here and there. She was a schizophrenic; must have been abandoned by her family and she remembers clearly how the computer screen looks like when one is online. She sat on the floor near me and from her distracted communication with her imaginary child, I could clearly understand that she was persuading the child to not to sit with “mobile phones”. Within an hour or so, I saw another man, a daily wage earner who commutes from nearby place, speaking loudly over his prize possession, a cell phone with camera. I remember another incidence: on my way to Kolkata couple of years back, I got a few co passengers who were contract labourers from north Indian states. A couple of stations later, a young woman boarded the same compartment. She was accompanied by a man who could be her colleague, or even her boyfriend. Both of them looked well educated and professionals. One of the earlier co passengers made good use of his mobile phone; he started clicking the camera device randomly. When the woman noticed it, she instantly demanded not to click her and the owner of the device politely told her that he is getting accustomed to the device and doesn’t know how to handle it......lame excuse indeed. The lady’s companion snatched the phone and found a few pictures of the woman in different poses. He patiently deleted all of them and warned the owner that if he again does it, he will take stern action. The woman was probably spared because the owner of the device got down in the next halt without making any more attempt to ruin the peace.

What did I learn from all these incidences? Digital technology if put in wrong hands, can be devastating. We can divide the cyber miscreants in two different sects: one who do it for fun; one who don’t do it for fun. There are numerous examples of sexting cases, phone bullying cases involving children where you can see the first sect of miscreants. In many such US court cases, defence had established ignorance of the accused. But what about miscreants who are not minors and who intentionally mishandle it for the purpose of experimenting the devices? Basically we can do nothing. There is no law in any country which prohibits ignorant persons from possessing a digital device with information and communication technology, be it a computer, or a mobile phone. But off course, experience can turn an ignorant into a mighty individual. I sadly note that when laymen such as the above gather experience in handling the devices, the results may not be good. My assumption may not testify all, but surely would testify some. The devices have inbuilt mechanism and the internet always opens it doors with both good and bad shades, which allures new users to experiment. This can lead to devastating effect including hacking and sexual offences of cyber space. What these people lack actually is the knowledge of cyber etiquette. Remember the old tradition of attaching license for possessing radio? Perhaps it is time now for the companies making computers and electronic gadgets like the cell phones to think of attaching a module of user manual including etiquettes with their products. May be this could bring down purposeful mishandling of the devices which gives rise to various sorts of cyber crimes.

Or you need to believe..... no gain no pain...

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Misuse of information technology, digital devices and rise of cyber crimes”, 21^stJune,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Stop people: spare the disputed Mamata Banerjee cartoon

2012-05-19T04:27:00.001-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

The cartoon controversy of West Bengal Chief minister has created a new focus point for cyber law researchers like me. Why wouldn’t an individual express his political ideologies through cartoons? Why would the government gag this right? Most supporters of liberal free speech guarantee protested the Chief Minister’s angry protests when a professor of a reputed university had reportedly spread the cartoon through someone else’s email id. When the lady noted the issue and the man behind this was indicted by the police, he apologetically accepted his first mistake, sending message from someone else’s email id. But he failed to understand the mistake which created such a big controversy, i.e spreading a supposedly offensive cartoon about Mamata Banerjee’s administrative skill and human resource managerial skill. The cartoon was made after the then minister Trivedi was dropped by Banerjee because of some internal tip offs between the two. It apparently depicts parts of a conversation between the two characters of a famous detective series film made by the legendary film maker Satyajit Ray for children. The cartoon picture which was widely circulated in the Facebook, showed Mamata’s face cut and pasted along with other two ministers, where one of the individuals tells “ei sei dustu lok”, meaning this is the bad man, and mamata says “dustu lok vanish”, meaning bad man vanish. She apparently speaks similar words like the villain in the noted children’s film where the person pushes another one to death and clarifies to the child protagonist that he has made him ‘vanished’(see Professor arrested for poking fun at Mamata. HT Correspondent, Hindustan Times

Kolkata, April 13, 2012. http://www.hindustantimes.com/India-news/WestBengal/Professor-arrested-for-poking-fun-at-Mamata/Article1-839847.aspx) .

What irked mamata were using her picture for conveying this ‘bad’ image, and also using the speech which according to her, conveyed the same meaning to the audience as the film characters did.... murdering the man in question and removing him from her path. According to the reports that posted her feelings for the issue, she had felt it was a cyber crime because it involved morphing of the pictures and it was insulting and injurious to her as well as her political party’s image(See Cartoon row: Mamata loses cool, storms out of live TV session, May 18, 2012. published in http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/cartoon-row-mamata-loses-cool-storms-out-of-live-tv-session-212905). Both of these crimes are recognised by the Indian Information Technology Act; the first under section 66 of the Act, which states that “If any person, dishonestly, or fraudulently, does any act referred to in section 43, he shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two three years or with fine which may extend to five lakh rupees or with both,”( To be more detailed about this, section 43 also includes unauthorised access to computer documents and altering the document for misuse of the same, among some other types of typical computer related crimes); the second under section 66A which prescribes punishment for sending grossly offensive messages or which have menacing character, or which is false, injurious, insulting etc. Well, that is her defence, and when she expressed her defence, a battery of intellectuals and common people burst out in protest saying this is nothing but gagging the freedom of speech and expression which is, according to me, is the most coveted right enshrined in the Indian constitution. Well, that is the people’s defence. People of India have not forgotten the emergency period that was created by erstwhile prime minister Indira Gandhi in the 1970’s, when extremely strict regulations were brought in regarding journalism and also regular right to speech. This time, the protest was stronger because Mamata herself belongs to that generation which grew up learning what should not be done with this almost sacred right.

But still then, I stand on the opposite platform. I feel there should be a limit line in activities which keep the soul of democracy alive, namely criticising the ruling party’s decision. However, there is one ‘myth’ that anti cartoon row people believed and I would like to break. My defence line may look very thin, but I stand strong on that.The incidence may not have involved “morphing” of the pictures of the individuals in the true meaning of morphing. The pictures were used as it is, however, they were accompanied by set of conversations which were framed and with visual indication lines as to from whom they are originating. Well, ask me what is morphing and how affected people feel for it, for in my capacity as a cyber victim counseller, I get to see hundreds of such pictures of women especially, and I know their pain.

But my defence stands on the main ground: usage of the logo of a government department,i.e the Indian railways for the purpose of such cartoons, which may derogate the actual purpose of putting up the logo in the original government website. It must be understood that the cartoons were not meant to derogate a government establishment, but criticising people in it. Unauthorised usage of government emblems for trade, business, calling and professional practices is prohibited under section 3 of The Emblems And Names (Prevention Of Improper Use) Act, 1950. If the wordings of this section are pulled broadly, probably this very cartoon row would establish another milestone in Indian legal research field; for not to forget a small observation by a wise parliamentarian Sharifuddin Shariq, who pointed out that cartoonists are given this chance to paint the politicians “wrong”(see “We ourselves have given the chance to cartoonists”, published in The Hindu on May, 14,2012, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article3419130.ece), which turns my attention to another question...can cartoonists fall under this law ?

People, it is wise to be a part of the largest democracy wisely. But do remember, you cannot wrongly ride over the law of the land to insult the core values of democracy.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Stop people: spare the disputed Mamata Banerjee cartoon”, 19^hMay,2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

CYBER VICTIMIZATION: The lawyer says: what are the Indian laws to prevent cyber stalking?

2012-03-26T21:16:00.001-07:00

CYBER VICTIMIZATION: The lawyer says: what are the Indian laws to prevent cyber stalking?

http://www.cybervictims.org

When women pose as men in the virtual world

2012-03-17T22:13:00.001-07:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

Couple of years back when Laurie Drew posed as a man to befool teenager Megan, who would subsequently commit suicide, women posing as men to date with women was a very underreported and unfocussed issue. When I picked up this very issue of women posing as men to harass women earlier in my book “Cyber crime and the Victimization of Women: Laws, Rights, and Regulations”. Hershey, PA, USA: IGI Global. ISBN: 978-1-60960-830-9 , I noticed that one of the main causes behind such behaviour for women was a burning desire to take revenge on her victim.... jealousy.....thy green eyes.... The perpetrator woman generally feels extremely satisfied when she realises that she is driving the victim woman for nothing else but utter emotional disaster. Drew posed as a boy to give Megan a feeling how unworthy she is in the eyes of a boy.....a would be man, who would subsequently approve the worthiness of a woman. Most feminist scholars have argued since long against this very apparently (un)disputed truth. But this remains a fact for a majority of women and men alike. The reason behind such a nasty game by Drew was nothing but the anger, frustration and jealousy which arose due to her own daughter’s not so friendly and comfortable relationship with Megan.

But note that I have used “one of the main cause” to describe my reasoning behind the issue. Apart from jealousy, there is something else which also drives women to play this nasty game. Imagine when a woman poses as a man just to have fun at the cost of the emotional distress of another woman! Don’t think that such behaviours are abnormal for women; but in reality, such trend is growing. I do get to see couple of reported cases where women, mostly younger women play this fun game. Putting on the shoes of the opposite sex and playing with other women as charming prince in dating sites and also social networking sites is no more uncommon now. I refuse to believe that this could be the result of “penis envy” only, a Freudian psychoanalysis term. Probably this might call for deep research on cyber psychology; but something in me tells that this could also be the result of acute loneliness in the wrongdoer as well as the victim. The ‘man’ woman unknowingly falls in the self created trap when the victim woman senses something wrong with the camouflaged identity. Not to forget the trail of private investigations, police complaints and even the risk of being banned by the website itself..... the perpetrator ‘man’ woman may become a victim herself as she may invite open threats regarding her sexuality, sexual orientation and following gradual out casting by the virtual society on which she would have depended heavily to change her monotonous life.

It is high time ‘man’-woman that you go ahead with some other positive productive leisure activity, for the painful crash of your imaginary ‘flight’ to the reality-ground may become extremely hard to cope with.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “When women pose as men in the virtual world”, 18^th March, 2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”

Did the court do justice to Orkut posts that reportedly called Adnan to see his end?

2012-02-01T01:36:00.000-08:00

http://www.cybervictims.org

In the time when web censorship is getting lime light due to the recent on going tussle between the courts and the Google and other websites, the news of acquittal of four murder accused of Adnan Patrawala pulls out mixed response from me. In 2007, this teenager was found dead some where in Navi Mumbai. He was the son of an affluent businessman; he loved life and social networking through Orkut. He reportedly became friendly with his alleged murderers through Orkut (see Did Orkut friends kidnap and kill Adnan?(August 20, 2007), published in http://www.rediff.com/news/2007/aug/20adnan1.htm) and was allured by one “Angel” to go out where he met his bloody end (See Adnan murder trial opens on Orkut;Published on Friday, Aug 24, 2007, By Arun Ram; availbale @ http://www.dnaindia.com/india/report_adnan-murder-trial-opens-on-orkut_1117311). No body knows whether he really met “angel” of Orkut or not, but the police depended heavily on the indirect evidences including the Orkut exchanges which vouched that he went out to meet some one. His family later received two calls asking for a lump sum for Adnan, who was reportedly in their custody when the calls were made. The news was leaked in the media and it created a huge wave of sympathy among Adnan’s friends who started discussing the issue in many communities. Some believe that the alleged kidnappers got panicked with the out break of the news. The media highlighted how Adnaan’s friends in Orkut have started a virtual investigation. Resultant the wrong doers killed the teenager. In 2012, when the alleged murderers were acquitted, the court justified its sentencing by stating that both forensic and circumstantial evidences were “assembled so loosely that it ended up cutting down each other rather than forming a cohesive thread against the accused” (Court acquits murder accused in Mumbai teenager Adnan case, pg 20, The Hindu on January 31, 2012). The Orkut messages between the four accused men and Adnan were considered as the “key evidences” by the police; further the police reportedly drew the conclusion that Adnan was murdered by these guys on the notion that he was last seen with one of them. The police picked up the accused on the testimony of a garment dealer who saw one of the accused lifting apparently unconscious Adnan; later on the day, when he read about the whole issue, he informed the police. The defence lawyer emphasised that “there were no eye witnesses and an identification parade did not inspire the court’s confidence”.

The question of acceptability of the exchange of messages through Orkut really presents thin chances to target the four men. This is especially so since the identity of “Angel” remained a mystery and no one could prove that the profile was operated by any of the accused or either their aide. The case presents a tangled web in every sense. Many suspected that all the profiles may have been fake and they were made to trap the poor little rich boy. But nonetheless, the boy did fall in the trap and the whole issue, as reported in the media, created an example as how virtual friends can allure one to come out of the net and face real life danger. But the court gave more weight on the production of solid evidences rather than depending on evidences such as these. True, the court stuck to the principles of rule of law, where flimsy evidences do not find any space. Perhaps the court did the right thing on not depending too much on the Orkut messages especially when the police themselves did not go for a stringent thorough search. The news reports suggested that the police relied mainly on the person who saw the boy was being lifted in the car. He didn’t see the act of strangling; neither could he hear what Adnan had to say about this. The other way round, many may shift the blame on the victim as why did he trust Angel, who was probably a fake identity; and this is probably the reason that the court didn’t want to reply upon the circumstantial evidences that came up from the Orkut message exchanges. What did the profile owners do? They made the victim to believe them, especially Angel and come out of his home. But for what? Every individual has right to express and simultaneously every individual has his/her own right to reciprocate or not to reciprocate to the subjects expressed by the other. But that can not be the point to draw up the conclusion and shift the burden as heavy as planning a murder and finally executing the same, to the creator of the message unless the proper nexus is proved. Perhaps the court felt not to do injustice with these accused on the grounds of this principle................. perhaps not..

I really wish that further investigation takes place when the family goes for appeal , and this question is answered. If the prosecution can really prove that there lies strong nexus between the Orkut friend’s messages and his murder (may be by someone who was/were operating the profiles), probably a new history would be created in Indian evidence law which is shifting very much towards cyber space happenings.

Please Note: Do not violate copyright of this blog. If you would like to use informations provided in this blog for your own assignment/writeup/project/blog/article, please cite it as “Halder D. (2012), “Did the court do justice to Orkut posts that reportedly called Adnan to see his end?”, 1^st February, 2012, published in http://cybervictims.blogspot.com/”