NEW DELHI: Your email or the personal contents of your computer could soon be under the government’s scrutiny without your knowledge.
With Parliament on Tuesday passing a bill which stipulates life imprisonment for those indulging in cyber terrorism and giving the government endless power to “intercept or monitor any information through any computer resource,” experts fear that “unauthorised interceptions could soon become common”.
Calling for setting up of an independent authority to review complaints of unauthorised interceptions, cyber law expert Pavan Duggal told TOI that the bill was bound to infringe on civil liberties like right to privacy or right to anonymous communication with legitimate purposes, because no safeguards had been put in place to prevent such abuse.
Calling the bill "a hurried reaction", Duggal said, "The potential for misuse of these powers stipulated by the bill for political gains can’t be ruled out."
There also appears to be no effective remedy or mechanism to appeal against unauthorised interception, Duggal said. "Once it becomes law, the government will have sovereign and blanket power to intercept or peep into any electronic communication of even legitimate citizens. Because the bill states that safeguards would be stipulated at a later date, it would clamp down on civil liberties right away. While we are concerned about national security, we don’t want these interception mechanisms to become a handle for misuse," he added.
"There has to be a proper balance between contradictory subjects of interception and privacy. So safeguards are critical," the expert said. The Information Technology (Amendment) Bill 2008 also empowers the government with absolute power to block websites in national interest.
The government’s move to bring in new provisions to tackle cyber terrorism comes after repeated instances of terrorists using the web to propagate mayhem and claim responsibility after every act.
For those indulging in cyber terrorism, the new legislation provides for stiff penalty of life imprisonment. The bill also says that dishonestly receiving stolen computer resource, identity theft, cheating by personation by using computer resource and violation of privacy will result in imprisonment upto three years apart from fine between Rs 1 lakh to Rs 10 lakh.
Transmitting material containing sexually explicit acts in electronic form would be punishable by imprisonment of upto five years along with a fine of upto Rs 10 lakh.
Emphasising on the overriding power given to government, a senior IT official pointed out that Section 69 of the original Act had given the central government the power to intercept and monitor any information through computer systems in national interest, permitting it to monitor any potentially cognisable offence.
Looks like the aftermath of 26/11 is also being reflected in the Tech world.
giving the government endless power to “intercept or monitor any information through any computer resource,”
So now we gonna be monitored by our very own desi Big Brother....
1.) terrorist arent fools to let them in the hands of cyber police ...
2.) as was shown in Wednesday film ... ( i think the title is correct ) our computer , technology are way back or say backwards....
3.) even if its the case , normal people dont have to worry. coz wht are we to hide ?? but if some idiot in the gov tries to look into to gain some p.s files and other stuff.. then it will get dirty.... very dirty... !!!
4.) but if 3 is to be true... at present there are so many idiotic/noobish net users who dont know basic stuffs and get carried awaya with , stupid offer , porn sites , and give out passwords , CC , etc...etc... and dont forget the orkut is place where many loose theirs ids.. privacy etc...
so actually it doesnt matter....
5.) and to gov... terrorist may NEVER or usually not use the common y! , Gmail or other things... and wht if they give thier plan on RAR file with password protected ??
do u have powerful computers to scan , decrypt those files to view inside them ???
or wht if they use tor network ???
6.) and does gov knows about hacking coz innocent people may be mistaken for terrorist or cyber crime individuals.. since there are so many things called mac address spoofers , ip spoofers ... etc...
i dont know how well this law can be effective...
instead of these waste laws .. why cant they increase army strength , invest in R&D for weapons etc
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Last edited by naveen_reloaded; 31-12-2008 at 08:52 PM.
i think 95-99% will be against this law. it is just like that some one enters in your house (To see how much u eat daily seconds, minutes,hrs , days , years )
If u read the below par. what means violation of privacy. Gov. it self violation violation of privacy by this law
For those indulging in cyber terrorism, the new legislation provides for stiff penalty of life imprisonment. The bill also says that dishonestly receiving stolen computer resource, identity theft, cheating by personation by using computer resource and violation of privacy will result in imprisonment upto three years apart from fine between Rs 1 lakh to Rs 10 lakh.
this is another article which has made it to slashdot
and the controversial part are viewing P0R N is now illegal and police can come anytime to check ur pc activites
ds more like provisions currently being proposed in Australia. the blogger writes, "Around 45 amendments have been made to the original Act, which now treats both publishers of online pornography and its consumers on equal footing. A law so sweeping in its powers that it allows a police officer in the rank of a sub-inspector to walk in or break in to the privacy of your home and see if you were surfing porn or not."
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this is another article which has made it to slashdot
and the controversial part are viewing P0R N is now illegal and police can come anytime to check ur pc activites
ds more like provisions currently being proposed in Australia. the blogger writes, "Around 45 amendments have been made to the original Act, which now treats both publishers of online pornography and its consumers on equal footing. A law so sweeping in its powers that it allows a police officer in the rank of a sub-inspector to walk in or break in to the privacy of your home and see if you were surfing porn or not."
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i think it time we start some uproar/// wht say guys????
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I would accept this. Yes, to make my country secure, I do have to lose something. If they can snoop my pc for terror related info, I am willing to put my pc in govt. line of sight. No second thought.
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^^lol so that means yeah you can snoop into my home too at any time
PC is just not abt pr0ns, there can be any sensitive data which you dont like anyone to access. Remember that someone can blackmail you for other contents. Or even someone can hack into your username and password details.
When you are keeping your PC open to others then ther is inexorable certainty of getting exploited for malicious uses.
Details logged by ISP is another thing, and it surely will make internet a restrictive medium.
I oppose this law anyday, anytime. I dont want someone to barge in like an idiot getting all other extraneous details except for what the law is meant for
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New law will let govt snoop on your PC
Re: New law will let govt snoop on your PC
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People,head to the courts!!
Re: New law will let govt snoop on your PC
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