Cyber Crime: The Dark Corner of Internet (PART-1)

One evening, while thinking about, what our country is going to be in near future, with crimes increasing day-by-day, a thought of writing and sharing my views on Cyber Crime struck me. They say the start is always the toughest, in my case the start was with a pen in my hand and lights turning off! Funny right? Quarantine is making me go mad! Yet, it didn’t stop me from penning down my views about it.

Since the start of civilization, man has always been a social being. They constantly interact with each other in the society. With change in time and progress in technology, many more ways of socialization came into existence. Hence with progress in the society, there came progress in internet allowing us to interact with our friends and family through social media websites and mails etc. As it is rightly said, “Every coin has two sides”, Internet has its own drawbacks. Though it helped making socialization easier, people came up with new ways of committing crime, commonly known as Cyber Crime.

Is Internet a Curse or Boon? An interesting subject to debates, with difference of opinions. I often come up with the question to ask myself- What exactly is Cyber Crime? Is it really an issue to be addressed in this society? This question needs to be answered. Many of you might wonder, What Exactly is Cyber-crime? Is there a need to be worried of our personal data stored online? Let’s be honest here, all of us are paranoid when it comes to storing data online or sharing personal details on websites. But what are we scared of? That exact fear is called Cyber Crime.

Cyber Crime is a crime in which the person who intends to commit crime uses computer or similar technology to commit it. Basically they hack into your personal system, laptops, mobiles and steal personal information or trying to blackmail you to give money or trick you to transfer money and then woof!! They just disappear as if they never existed. I am sure some of you might be wondering, does this ever happen in reality. While discussing this topic with some of my friends, they said that its all a part of happening in films and serials, it and not in real life. If this is what you think, let me share a small personal incident experienced by my family itself. One of my family member got a call from an unknown number who was pretending that he was someone calling from bank and was asking for some routine enquiry which was going on in bank and in which they needed their card details for record purposes. My family member believed him and gave him all the details he asked for. Within an hour amount of Rs. 50,000 /- was debited from their account and then we understood it was a fake call and they had been robbed of Rs. 50,000/-. You see not only this there are many such examples of Cyber frauds, extortion and theft which we do not even come across. Cyber Criminals are smart in hacking into your personal records and steal data or money from you through computer, mobile or any such digital device. It’s no longer an individual problem or problem faced by any particular country but, it’s an global issue now, which needs to be addressed, as it growing with progress in technology.

One of the most famous case which happened in India, in 2013, that gathered attention for being first known case on cyber crime in which conviction took place famously called as, “Sony Sambandh.com case”. In this case, Sony opened an online website sony-sambandh.com which enabled NRIs to gift Sony products to people in India after paying online. In 2002, a person ordered Sony product to be delivered to Arif Azim living in Noida. After the product was delivered, the person ordering the product denied the purchase and refused to pay for it. Case was filed by Sony under Section 418(Cheating with knowledge that wrongful loss may ensue to person whose interest offender is bound to protect), 419(Punishment for cheating by personation) and 420(Cheating and dishonestly including delivery of property) of the Indian Penal Code. Investigation was carried out and Arif Azim, who confessed dishonestly that he took products using someone else’s credit card, was arrested. He was convicted under section 418, 419 and 420 of Indian Penal Code, making it first case of Cyber Crime resulting in conviction. He was eventually released on Probation for one year.

Cases like this, have been on rise in India. Some National statics reveal in India alone in 2017, Indian consumers lost over 18 billion US dollars. These numbers shot up by 121% in 2018. And if you all think that it’s only limited to Private sector, You have gravely mistaken! In 2018, Indian had faced its biggest cyber attacks, on Aadhar portal, which was hacked making personal details of Aadhar holders misused. Also the RBI scam, in which fake RBI website was created by the criminals and mails where sent to users asking them to share their personal information for winning cash price of Rs. 10,00,000/-. Ask yourself, how many safety precautions we need in order to restrain these types of Cyber Crimes.

Moving further, Cyber Crime is not limited to any particular type, instead it is divided into various types which I shall discuss in next part of Blog, and as the concept is very vast, I don’t want it turn into an Essay!

If you liked this blog, Do like and Share it with all your friends and family, as only by bringing awareness about it, we can curb this crime. Also leave a comment on how you felt about it and do share your opinions.