Chinese ICT Equipments And National Security Issues In India

India is to investigate whether its use of Chinese-made telecom equipment in sensitive border and insurgency-hit areas could jeopardise national security, a minister said Friday. "It is a security issue. The government is looking into the matter," junior telecom minister Sachin Pilot said in New Delhi, according to the Press Trust of India news agency. "Whatever prudent decision is jointly recommended by the ministries of home affairs and communication and information technology, the government will not hesitate to take it," Pilot added. A report this week in the Hindustan Times newspaper said India's intelligence agencies had warned that Chinese products could have embedded elements enabling China to launch a cyber attack or shut down the equipment. China and India share uneasy relations thanks to an unresolved border dispute dating back to a brief but bitter war in 1962. China's close ties with India's arch rival Pakistan are also a cause of tension. But bilateral trade between the economic rivals has zoomed to exceed 40 billion dollars, according to industry and government estimates. India is battling myriad insurgencies, ranging from an Islamist rebellion in its Himalayan region of Kashmir to Maoist unrest in a vast swathe of eastern and central India and tribal separatism in its northeast.


SOURCE: ECONOMIC TIMES

Compensation Ordered For Corporate Negligence In Cyber Crime Cases In India

Human rights violation in cyberspace may take many shapes. One of them is the negligence committed by the Internet service providers (ISPs). The infamous case of Lakshamana Kailash's arrest by police for the negligence of Bharti Airtel is a classical example of the same. In a welcome step the Maharashtra State Human Rights Commission (MSHRC) has directed Bharti Airtel to pay Rs 2 lakh as compensation to the Bangalore-based techie for providing wrong information to the police that led to his arrest in 2007. Although the compensation awarded is meager as compared to the claimed compensation of 20 crores yet the gesture of suo motu action on the part of MSHRC is really praise worthy.

The story of Lakshamana Kailash's arrest smacks of all that can go wrong with an investigation. Kailash spent 50 horrifying days in a Pune jail after he was arrested by the police on the basis of information provided by Bharti Airtel regarding the Internet protocol (IP) address used to create a profile on Orkut defaming Shivaji. The Commission, which took up the case suo motu after reading newspaper reports, found that Bharti Airtel provided wrong information to the police on the IP address as they made a mistake in the time for which the information was sought. The 12-hour time difference for information provided led to the arrest of the wrong person.

"In our opinion, the company officials misled the police by providing wrong information. They did not care to check whether the requested time was AM or PM and gave details of the victim who used the IP address in the morning instead of night," The Commission noted in its June order.

On the basis of information provided by Bharti Airtel, Kailash was arrested on September 1, 2007. Subsequently, when yahoo provided its independent information, the three real culprits were arrested on October 3, 2007. Despite arresting the real culprits, it was only on October 20, 2007 that the police filed an application to release Kailash.

It seems the issues of human rights protection in cyberspace in India are going to be frequent in the future.

Cyber Regulations Appellate Tribunal Of India: A Dream Or Reality

Over two years after the Cyber Regulations Appellate Tribunal (CRAT) — the maiden forum in the country to exclusively try cyber cases — became functional, it recently got a new address and a well-equipped courtroom. However, the red tape policy of Indian government has not allowed it to be an effective cyber crimes redressal forum.

Firstly, there is a general lack of awareness among not only the public but the law enforcement as well. This has resulted a lower rate of cyber crime reporting in India till now. Secondly, even the judicial officers are not aware about the basics of cyber law and cyber crimes. This has resulted in lower conviction rates in India.

The CRAT cannot effectively serve its purpose till we make it functional in every aspect. The manpower need training, the government needs to be serious, law enforcement must be aware about cyber crimes, etc.

The Stalled Judicial Reforms In India And The Decisive Bold Step

It is now clear that the declaration of the law minister Mr. Molly regarding judicial reforms in India proved to be just a wish alone. With no hopes for the judicial and legal reforms in India left, we are now witnessing a silver lining in the dark clouds of mammoth backlogs of cases and archaic and redundant laws. With a welcome step that shows the fairness and boldness of the judicial officials like Justice DV Shylendra Kumar, a new debate has once again cropped up.

The Government had to withdraw the Bill on Judges' Assets in the last session of Parliament after a chorus of protest from the Opposition against the provision that a judge's assets would be beyond the purview of the Right to Information Act. Justice Kumar argued that it was the Supreme Court itself that pushed RTI and said that he was than willing to declare his assets in public.

MORE: IBN LIVE

Critical ICT Infrastructure Protection In India Is Urgently Required

The Infrastructure security trends in India are not very encouraging and to make the situation worst we have weak cyber law in India (IT Act, 2000). We have to develop technologies and capabilities to protect Indian citizens in areas such as power, transport, civil aviation, etc. Additionally, we have to increase the security of infrastructure and utilities supporting arms such as ICT, transport, and services in the financial and administrative domain.

Critical ICT infrastructure protection in India must be taken seriously in the larger interest of Indian citizens. Crisis management by improving security systems integration is the need of the hour and a dedicate effort is required in this direction.

Agrees Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and the Leading Techno-Legal Specialist of India*. He maintains that presently critical ICT infrastructure protection in India has not got the attention of national policy makers and there is a long gap to cover before we can protect our critical infrastructures. He opined that India does not have a good ICT Policy and this is resulting in weak cyber security, inadequate cyber forensics capabilities and poor cyber laws.

It is clear that India has to play a pro-active role in this direction to avoid serious damage to Indian infrastructure. The first step seems to be to make stringent and good cyber law in this regard as soon as possible. Thankfully, the terrible Information Technology Amendment Act, 2008 (IT Act 2008) has been rightly rejected by the Indian government and the same has “not been notified” to prevent further degradation of the already weak cyber law of India.

*Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law, is the Leading Techno-Legal Specialist of India and is an Internationally renowned Expert in the fields of Cyber Forensics, Cyber Security, Cyber Law, etc. Both him and Perry4Law are “authorities” on techno-legal issues like critical infrastructure protection and are internationally renowned in this regard.

SOURCE: ITVOIR

India Is Heading Towards The Cyber Crime Nation Of The World

Thanks to the weakest cyber law of the world, India is heading towards becoming the cyber crime nation of the world. This is not the first time that similar concerns have been raised. Previously, Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law, the leading techno-legal ICT law firm of India has cautioned that India is not only suffering from malware attacks but is also emerging as the focal point for cyber crime activities.

India is fast emerging as a major hub of cybercrime as recession is driving computer-literate criminals to electronic scams, claimed a study by researchers at the University of Brighton.

Titled 'Crime Online: Cybercrime and Illegal Innovation', the study states that cybercrime in India, China, Russia and Brazil is a cause of "particular concern" and that there has been a "leap in cybercrime" in India in recent years, partly fuelled by the large number of call centres.

"One recent report ranked India in 2008 as the fourteenth country in the world hosting phishing websites. Additionally, the booming of call centres in India has generated a niche for cybercriminal activity in harvesting data", the report maintained.

It is sad that India is doing nothing to improve this position. There is an emergent need to reformulate Indian cyber laws like IT act, 2000 and make them more stringent and effective.

Google Revealed The Blogger Identity

In January, the 37-year-old Ms. Cohen sued Google after the search engine giant declined to provide her with the identity of the blogger who made five posts on the "Skanks of NYC" blog in August of 2008.

Although Ms. Cohen's lawsuit received widespread global attention because of its connection to Google, such cases are not uncommon online, where users will often push the boundaries of free speech behind a perceived curtain of anonymity.

"Requiring an intermediary, whether it's an ISP [Internet service provider] or a search engine, to disclose the information they have off of an IP address or an email address is pretty common," said Michael Geist, a University of Ottawa professor who holds the Canada Research Chair in Internet and e-commerce law.

"But I think it happens a bit behind the scenes ... and sometimes it takes these higher-profile cases for people to better understand that, where required, intermediaries will disclose whatever information they have and that veil of anonymity that some people think they have isn't quite as strong as they think."

Google declined to comment directly on the lawsuit, opting instead to issue a brief statement saying the company sympathizes with anyone who winds up the victim of cyber bullying. "We also take great care to respect privacy concerns and will only provide information about a user in response to a subpoena or other court order," the company said. "If content is found by a court to be defamatory, we will of course remove it immediately."

SOURCE: NATIONAL POST

Use Of Technology In India To Remove Chronic Backlog Of Cases

E-Courts in India have tremendous potential to reduce the backlog of cases in India. However, establishment and implementation of e-courts requires techno-legal expertise that is presently missing in India. As a result e-courts projects in India always failed from time to time.

Ironically India has very few e-courts experts who can really give Indian e-courts project a shape. However, till now neither the Indian government nor the Supreme Court e-court committee has seriously though about taking help of the experts in this regard.

Mr. Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and the Leading Techno-Legal Specialist of India* is of the opinion that we nee pro-active role on the part of government as well as e-court project management team to successfully implement the same. He maintains that the backlog of cases would ultimate crush the legal and judicial system of India if a timely action is not taken immediately. Establishment of timely e-courts is a good option in this regard according to him.

Even on the legislative side as well India is lacking far behind. India has the sole cyber law in the form of information technology act, 2000. The same is inadequate on many counts and cannot accommodate the requisites of e-courts in India. Further issues of cyber forensics and cyber security would also impede the e-courts projects in India. The national e-governance plan must also be suitably reformulated in his regard. The government must act immediately to get the desired results.

* Mr. Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law, is the Leading Techno-Legal Specialist of India and is an Internationally renowned Expert in the fields of Cyber Forensics, Cyber Security, Cyber Law, etc. Both him and Perry4Law are “authorities” on e-courts and are internationally renowned in this regard.

AUTHOR: V.K.SINGH

SOURCE: MYNEWS

Technological Harrasment Is Increasing In India

A real estate agent based in Bangalore was arrested in Chennai on Sunday for allegedly harassing Tamil film heroine Sneha by sending frequent text messages on her mobile phone urging her to marry him.

Sneha had on Saturday submitted a complaint to the city police commissioner T Rajendran claiming that she was receiving text messages bordering on sexual harassment on her phone from an unindentified person. The sender was pestering the heroine to marry him.

The police commissioner forwarded the complaint to the cyber crime wing. An investigation team headed by assistant commissioner of police (cyber crime) M Sudhakar traced the mobile number to N Raghavendra of Bangalore. He was tracked down and arrested from T Nagar in Chennai.

This is the second instance of a film star being harassed by a love-struck fan in the recent past in Tamil Nadu. Earlier, a Malaysia-based diehard female fan of top actor Suriya had come under police scrutiny when she repeatedly called him at odd hours urging him to marry her. That incident happened two years ago.

In the present case, police have registered a case under various sections and arrested Ragavendra. He was remanded in judicial custody after being produced before the XI metropolitan magistrate court in Saidapet on Sunday. Police recovered his mobile phone and sent it to the cyber lab for verifying whether he had sent the text messages to Sneha using this mobile phone.

"Based on information provided by the service provider, we located the address of Raghavendra and questioned family members in Bangalore about his whereabouts. Raghavendra had actually come down to Chennai to meet some of his business associates. Subsequently, we traced his whereabouts city using his mobile phone tower location. On an indication that he was somewhere in T Nagar area, we accosted one of his friends and asked him to talk to Raghavendra to trace his exact location. Based on this information, a police team nabbed Raghavendra in front of a hotel in T Nagar and took him into custody," deputy commissioner of police (central crime branch) C Sridhar told The Times Of India.

Initially, Raghavendra denied the allegation but later conceded to having sent the text messages to Sneha. Raghavendra, a B Com graduate, had trained in an auditor's office in Bangalore and is now engaged in the real estate business. He was acquainted with realtors in Chennai and used their contacts to tap potential buyers of properties here; he often travelled to the city.

"He claimed to have got Sneha's mobile number from a contact in Chennai last year and from then on he had been sending love text messages to her. Initially Sneha ignored these messages, but she took it seriously when she received messages with an intimidating tone," a police officer said.

SOURCE: TOI

Electronic Voting Machines Can Be Manipulated In India: Says Experts

Recently there has been lot of controversies regarding electronic voting machines (EVMs) in India. In this “guest column”, Mr. Praveen Dalal is providing his views and opinion in this regard.

Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) have revolutionised the Indian election process. EVMs have many advantages over the traditional paper based voting system. However, all the advantages are futile if they can be abused and the election results can be manipulated.

The ECI-EVMs in India are claimed to carry many security safeguards. The machine code of the source programme code known as hex-code (not the source code itself) is given to the micro controller manufacturer for fusing in the micro controllers. From this machine code, the source code cannot be read. Source code is never handed over to anyone outside the software group.

This makes the comparisons between ECI-EVM and EVMs used by foreign countries irrelevant. Most of the systems used in other countries are PC based and running on operating Systems. Hence, these could be vulnerable to hacking. The EVM in India on the other hand is a fully standalone machine without being part of any network and with no provision for any input. The software in the EVM chip is one time programmable and is burnt into the chip at the time of manufacture. Nothing can be written on the chip after manufacture. Thus the ECI-EVMs are fundamentally different from the voting machines and processes adopted in various foreign countries.

The source code is so designed that it allows a voter to cast the vote only once. The next vote can be recorded only after the Presiding Officer enables the ballot on the Control Unit. In between the machine becomes dead to any signal from outside (except from the Control Unit). The control units do not electronically transmit their results back the Election Commission, even though a simple and unconditionally secure protocol for doing this exist. The EVMs are purposely designed in this manner to prevent any intrusion during electronic transmission of results. Instead, the EVMs are collected in counting booths and tallied on the assigned counting days.

Despite all these safeguards, the chances of abuses and manipulations cannot be ruled out. These abuses may be man made and effectuated or technological glitches and manipulations.

Some of the objections in this regard point that the machines only display an electronic number but there is no paper trail to cross check against as physical proof of who people actually voted for. Similarly, concerns have been raised that no EVM is safe from hacking or rigging. The EVMs are manufactured by a state owned organisation, Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL). BEL and ECI consider obscurity and obfuscation as security, however this is really not security. The human element is weakest in the security chain and in the absence of an external authentication and corroboration, the results may be manipulated.

If we go through a good cyber forensics phase, these manipulations can be traced and taken care of. For instance, all the data is recorded on non-volatile dual redundant memory chips and can be retained for over 6 months even when the power pack is removed. Even when the battery is removed the memory in the microchip remains intact. If the Court orders a recount, the Control Unit can be reactivated by fixing the battery and it will display the result stored in the memory. Now if any political party, person or institution is not satisfied with the election results and smells some foul play, he/she/it must act within these 6 months otherwise the data may be lost forever. Of course, if there is a backup of the data the same may be kept for a longer period.

Now the crucial question arises is what if voting is proved to be tainted subsequently after cyber forensics appraisal and a Government has been formed on the basis of that voting? Will the Election Commission declare such elections null and void? Will the President of India declare a re-election? Will the Supreme Court of India take cognisance of this fact?

There is no sense if this crucial matter is taken lightly by the Election Commission, President of India, Supreme Court of India, etc. The ghost of EVM is still haunting these authorities and it would be better if the matter is resolved once for all as soon as possible.

Mr. Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law, is the Leading Techno-Legal Specialist of India and is an Internationally renowned Expert in the fields of Cyber Forensics, Cyber Security, Cyber Law, etc. These are his personal views and opinion.

LPO Industry In India Is Calling

In an informative piece of work, Dhiraj Phukan, Associate Leader-Consulting with KPO Consultants, has elaborated on this aspect. According to him these turbulent times have opened doors of opportunities for prospective entrepreneurs, lawyers, and present companies to enter, consolidate, and grow their business in the LPO sector.

Well renowned company expert, Mr. Praveen Dalal of Perry4Law said that his company has seen an increase in requests on LPO assignments at the moment as compared time before recession.

It seems the LPO opportunities are increasing in India and India being the hub of LPO assignments has lot to offer.

WI-FI Banned In Many Indian Offices

The Home Ministry has banned the use of wireless fidelity (WiFi) internet or WiFi-enabled computers in sensitive ministries and has issued dos and don’ts for departments and Indian missions abroad which use such service.

“In view of the vulnerabilities associated with the usage of WiFi and their exploitation by terrorists/criminals and unscrupulous hackers, sensitive ministries and departments are advised not to install or use any WiFi network in the offices,” says a July Ministry of Home Affairs circular.

The ministries will have to install “best available” WiFi intrusion detection systems and carry out regular audit of their airspace to detect hot spots, rogue access points etc. The move follows terror emails sent by militants of the Indian Mujahideen by hacking open WiFi services to send emails around the time of blasts in Jaipur, Ahmedabad and Delhi.

The MHA said that a survey of WiFi networks in the National Capital Region had shown that over 73% of the detected networks, including those in key central and Delhi government offices and prominent financial institutions, had “either no or very weak security.”

Ministries and Indian missions which install WiFi networks will have to ensure that these are robust enough to “protect confidentiality, integrity and availability of the information data” as well as implement secured authentication, authorization and encryption.

Officials traveling abroad have been told to desist using open-access points available free at international airports. And, in case they do, they should enable the firewall in their computer, run random checks to see if anyone else was using their computer, encrypt wireless traffic using virtual private network (VPN) etc, the guidelines say.

SOURCE: INDIAN EXPRESS

Google Personnel Booked Under Indian Cyber Law

According to the Hindu Temple of Georgia, thirteen of Google, Inc. and Google India Pvt. Ltd. owners, board members, and top executives are being prosecuted in Criminal Court in India for violations of the Indian Penal Code and the Information Technology Act of 2000. The potential criminal penalties faced range from two to five years imprisonment with fines as high as one Lakh Rupees (approximately US $2,250.00).

Earlier this year, a similar civil suit has been filed against the same individuals by the Hindu Temple of Georgia. The civil suit is asking the highest dollar amount in damages ever from Google in India - "50 Crores of Indian Rupees," (approximately US $10 Million!).

According to a July 16th 2009, letter from A.P. Jayachandran, the temple's legal advocate in India, "if the accused do not appear in the Judicial Magistrate No. III of Coimbatore, (Tamil Nadu, India on August 28th, 2009) arrest warrants will be issued."

The US temple's Chief Pundit, Viswanathan Lakshmanan, explained that the case stems from Google's alleged refusal to edit, or delete, content on Blogspot.com and Youtube.com, two websites owned by Google. The content is considered to be offensive and defamatory to the Atharva Vedic religion practiced by the Hindu Temple of Georgia located near Atlanta, which has temple operations in India.

The Criminal Case No. 36 of 2009 on file at the Judicial Magistrate No. III of Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India, contends that Google profits monetarily from the irresponsible and hasty electronic publishing of unverified facts and figures, and defamatory slanders, that are part of a criminal conspiracy against the temple, and as such it "amounts to Cyber Terrorism." The case asserts that due to the International Law on Cyber Space and Google maintaining a legal business entity in India, the American Google owners also fall under Indian jurisdiction.

The leader of the Hindu Temple, Dr. Commander Selvam Siddhar, said in an interview today in his temple that there had been an ongoing concerted effort to defame him and his temple by two Tamil speaking Indian-American co-conspirators residing in Georgia, Valmiki Raghunathan and Chandramohan Loganathan. In a 2006 Gwinnett County Police Incident Report Supplemental Investigation, Mr. Raghunathan admitted, "...that he was very upset...with Selvam." He also told an Atlanta Fox 5 television reporter that Dr. Commander "had just picked on the wrong person."

The Hindu Temple suspects that the two have spent countless hours creating a fictitious website for sending inflammatory emails, impersonating temple employees on blogsites, and posting thousands of scandalous, defamatory, and sometimes filthy, blogs which were hurtful and denigrating to the Temple and its founder.

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED CONTENTS

Mass Surveillance Under The IT Act 2008: Some Curious Development

Hi all,This post would be about the recent amendments done in Information Technology Act (Amendment) 2008, India and some other curious stuff I have seen on the wikipedia entry of the same the last few days.

There was an Information Technology Amendment Bill 2008 which was passed by Govt. of India on 22nd of December 2008 . There was virtually no debate on the matter as it was passed within a group of 8 bills which were passed in a record 17 minutes. Now that the law has been passed it would take years or even decades to get it overturned. The mainstream press turned a blind eye to all the things. Not a single newspaper talked of this either before or after the event.

What also has been curiouser though is something I saw on Wikipedia. I have to confess that in my free time I edit or go through the articles of Wikipedia to enrich myself. The IT Act 2008 has been covered adequately in wikipedia with the Amendment as well. While going through the links, a specific link made by Praveen Dalal stood out as it was the sole voice at the time I was going through. Curiously though, the links have been removed. The only single post is by somebody named Shristi Sharma and the comment says it belongs to somebody else. The whole thing stinks. Whatever perspective that person had bought is now dead to us as the link no longer exists. Even google cache throws up empty.

If somebody has some more info. on the blog site, what happened at the blogspot site would be interested to know. For the other thing, just have to hang my head my shame. In hope of better times

SOURCE: ISSUES AROUND ME

WHAT HAPPENED BEHIND THE SCENE

Simple. Google platforms have been abused by the competitors of Praveen Dalal and Perry4Law. Since Google failed to remedy the abuses, as a protest all the blogs have been taken away from public domain. No further updates would be available. The entire history is available at http://www.inforum.in/legal-issues-dispute/3178-delhi-cyber-law-advocate.html#post12191

See the following also:

(1) http://lnav.wordpress.com/2009/05/05/abuses-of-google-are-jeopardising-its-reputation-and-trust/

(2) http://cyberlawsinindia.blogspot.com/2009/05/public-notice-for-users-of-lnav-blog.html

(3) http://cyberlawsinindia.blogspot.com/2009/05/abuses-of-google-are-jeopardising-its.html

Even cyber squatters are enjoying the hard earned fruits of others (Reclaiming India Blog) due to Google’s indifference.

Fake Website Creator Arrested

For MCA student Shubh Prakash Singh, it was a scheme that would rake in the moolah with every click of the mouse. The 25-year-old Delhi resident simply replicated the website of the Kolkata office of the Railway Recruitment Board and promised jobs to candidates. It was computer applications' at its most cunning, but the youth was found out. He was arrested and brought to Kolkata on Thursday.

Singh had launched the website www.railwayrecruitmentboardkolkata.com some months back and used an alias to cover his tracks. When the chairman of the Railway Recruitment Board (RRB) in Kolkata, D K Srivastava, spotted it, he immediately smelt something fishy, as the original website of the board is www.rrbkol.org. On February 20, he lodged a complaint with Ultadanga police.

SOURCE: TOI

Royal Australian Air Force Website Defaced

An (alleged) Indian hacker broke into the Royal Australian Air Force website and defaced it with a threatening message aimed at the Australian Government. A spate of recent attacks on Indian students has attracted widespread news coverage and public condemnation in India. Many blame the Australian Government, despite Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's assurances that the incidents were being thoroughly investigated.

The Department of Defence confirmed that the hack took place between Monday and Tuesday, forcing it to pull the entire RAAF website offline and replace it with a page explaining that there had been "technical difficulties". The site has now been restored.

Defence would not say who it believed perpetrated the attack, how the hack took place or what the message said, but national Indian news service Timesnow.tv reported the message warned the Government to stop attacks on Indian students or else face further cyber attacks.

The message read: "This site has been hacked by Atul Dwivedi. This is a warning message to the Australian government. Immediately take all measures to stop racist attacks against Indian students in Australia or else I will pawn all your cyber properties like this one."

SOURCE: SMH.COM.AU

RFID Enabled Identity Cards Are Not Safe

I don’t buy into a lot of cyber-scares, but having my vital statistics accessible to anybody who feels like snatching it out of the air is definitely something I’d like to avoid. It’s not a new threat, but it seems that RFID-enhanced IDs are fast becoming the standard instead of a high-tech option. And since the security surrounding them is laughable to any serious hacker, it’s dangerous proposition to mandate them.

This AP story is a good summary of what’s been going on in the chipped ID world over the last couple years. If you’ve gotten a passport recently, or a driver’s license in certain states, chances are you’ve got RFID in there just waiting to beam its information to anyone who’s got $100 in easily-obtainable electronics.

Oh God, what can we do?! Well, it’s against the law to disable the RFID in any government-issued ID, so don’t you go off and put it in a microwave or something. But passports get a lot of use and sometimes accidents happen, like maybe you dropped your luggage on it? Or maybe you dropped a hammer on it, over and over?

SOURCE: CRUNCHGEAR

Who Is behind The DDOS Attack?

The cyber-attacks that took down prominent US and South Korean Web sites in the last week have apparently ended, but the search for those responsible is only just beginning. North Korea has emerged as a likely culprit, especially among politicians, but was it really behind the attacks?

The country makes a convenient target for blame. After the six-nation talks broke down, the country reneged on its pledge to halt nuclear development and has been rattling the cages of the US and South Korea with a nuclear test and several short and medium-range missile launches. The latest launches, of seven missiles, were taking place as the cyber-attacks began on prominent US Web sites on July 4 - the country’s Independence Day holiday.

SOURCE: COMPUTINGSA

The Civil Services Bill, 2009 And Discriminatory Protection

TO beat the Prime Minister’s 100-day governance agenda, the mandarins in his office are working overtime to evolve an efficient and effective public service to serve the UPA mascot ~ aam aadmi. As part of this new initiative, these reformers have placed on the fast track the enactment of a public service code that will lay down a strict performance evaluation regime for promotions and postings of senior civil servants. But even before the process has been initiated, one breed of civil servants ~ those who hail from ‘God’s Own Country’ ~ seem to be exempt from this code. The Civil Services Bill, 2009, a draft of which is being fine-tuned, will enunciate this code. It will provide for parliamentary scrutiny on all bureaucratic appointments, transfers and postings. It is believed to be an improved version of the Public Service Bill, 2007 which did not materialise during the UPA’s previous dispensation. These provisions will first be applicable to IAS and IPS officers and may later be extended to all services that come under the all-India service category, including the Indian Forest Service.

The Bill, which incorporates various suggestions of the second Administrative Reforms Commission, envisages the setting up of a new Central Public Service Authority (CPSA). It will not only manage the civil services in a professional manner, but also serve the interests of civil servants and citizens through checks and balances.

Fixed tenure

IF the Civil Services Bill becomes an Act in its present form, all bureaucrats will get a minimum fixed tenure of three years. If any bureaucrat is transferred before three years, he or she will have to be compensated for the inconvenience and harassment caused due to such a move. This is a vague provision. What sort of ‘inconvenience and harassment’ can an official claim if he is transferred ten times in three years within the same building and retains the same residence?

As regards the top-level appointments in states, the Chief Secretary and Director-General of Police will be selected out of a panel of suitable candidates by a committee comprising the Chief Minister, the leader of the Opposition and the home minister. Currently, the Chief Minister alone decides on such appointments.

Similarly, the leader of the Opposition will also have a say in the appointment of the Cabinet Secretary who will be selected from a panel by a committee comprising the Prime Minister, the leader of the Opposition and the home minister. If the government deviates from these norms while appointing bureaucrats, it will have to inform Parliament about the reasons for doing so.

The new Bill will put in place a different kind of performance evaluation system. Unlike the current practice of Annual Confidential Reports which take a panoramic and often prejudiced view of a civil servant’s work, the new performance management system will evaluate officials on their job-specific achievements and the number of tasks that they perform as a team leader in a particular department.

The system will be managed by the CPSA which will work under a chairman whose rank will be equivalent to that of the Chief Election Commissioner. The CPSA, comprising three to five members, will have the power to recommend action against the public servants who do not adhere to the codes and values of public service. The Authority will assist and advise the Centre in all matters concerning the organisation, control, operation and management of public services and public servants.

The CPSA will also be the custodian of the public service code for civil servants. It will be framed to facilitate civil servants ‘in discharging official duties with competence and accountability; care and diligence; responsibility, honesty, objectivity and impartiality; without discrimination and in accordance with the law’. The incubating Public Service Bill, 2007 contained certain Values of Public Services: (a) patriotism and upholding national pride; (b) allegiance to the Constitution and the law of the nation; (c) objectivity, impartiality, honesty, diligence, courtesy and transparency; (d) absolute integrity. It is a travesty that after six decades, a law has to be enacted to inculcate values in our elite civil servants, indeed values that are expected of any ordinary citizen.

The reforms to develop the public services as ‘a professional, neutral, merit based and accountable instrument for promoting good governance and better delivery of services to the citizens’ is a bold and assertive step by the Prime Minister and his team and, therefore, deserves to be welcomed.

Quite the contrary

BUT what is actually happening, presumably with the knowledge of the Prime Minister, is quite the contrary. Of late, a mini-replica of ‘God’s Own Country’ has been created in New Delhi’s corridors of power, originating from the Prime Minister’s Office itself. Almost every conceivable top civil service post has been captured either by those who belong to ‘God’s Own Country’ or speak the language of that ‘land of lagoons’. The list looks endless and impressive ~ National Security Advisor; Secretary to the President of India; Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister; Cabinet Secretary; Home Secretary; Foreign Secretary and the Secretaries to the Government of India in the Departments of Civil Aviation, Coal, Mines, Labour and Employment, Legal Affairs, Overseas Indian Affairs, Urban Development, Space, Textiles and Heavy Industries. It looks as if those who were involved in this process of selection and placement ran out of candidates. Otherwise, the list would have been much longer. These ‘selectors’ are forever alert. In anticipation of the retirement of the incumbent Foreign Secretary at the end of July they have already announced his replacement ~ another lady from ‘God’s Own Country’!

No public service code or reform initiative will have any meaning or credibility if this debilitating parochial inbreeding doesn’t stop. The least that the Prime Minister can do is to submit this ‘parochial’ agenda to parliamentary scrutiny as envisaged in the proposed Civil Services Bill. The question is: will he or can he?


AUTHOR: MG DEVASAHAYAM

SOURCE: STATESMAN

Indian National ICT Crisis Management Plan

The government of India (GOI) has accepted one more suggestion of Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and the Leading Techno-Legal Expert of India. It has recently finalised a “National Crisis Management Plan”, in a bid to protect IT infrastructure in critical sectors such as petroleum, aviation, banking, power and telecom.

This plan is in conformity with the suggestions of Praveen Dalal regarding protecting critical ICT infrastructure of India as well as formulating good crisis management plan for India. The details of the plan are still awaited but it would require tremendous expertise to meet the challenging requirements of an ambitious plan like this.

However, issues of human rights in cyberspace, strong cyber law, secure e-governance base, adequate cyber security, effective cyber forensics capabilities, etc have still not been resolved by GOI. In the absence of strong cyber law and cyber security as well as inadequate e-governance infrastructure, the crisis management plan of GOI is bound to fail. Further, this ambitious plan requires domain specific techno-legal expertise that is presently missing in India.

However, at least a beginning has been made in the right direction. But only time will tell whether this would be useful initiative of just another wishful claim by the GOI.

SOURCE: ITVOIR

E-Governance In India: Interview Of Praveen Dalal

E-Governance in India has failed by and large. Despite spending many thousand crores of money, the e-governance projects of India failed to make any significant impact. Of course, in exceptional cases, very few e-governance projects were successful in India. What failed the e-governance projects of India? Why these projects are not taking a concrete shape? What steps must be taken by Indian government to implement successful e-governance projects in India?

SOURCE: ITVOIR

Failure Of 100 Days Workplan Of Indian Government: What Would Be The Next Carrot?

President of India has recently revealed the “Priorities” of Indian Government in the next five years/100 days. However as per experts within a week of time span (100 days starting from 5th June, 2009 and ending on 12th September, 2009) some of the “Promises” of the Indian government seems to be just “political jargon” alone.

Now even a larger community has shown its concerns regarding the feasibility and possible failure of the 100 days plan of Indian government. Even oppositions are coming from the government’s partners and ruling States themselves. For instance, human resource development minister Kapil Sibal had to clarify his stand on his reformative ideas when many States showed their concerns about the proposed reforms.

With the end result of 100 days agenda very apparent, various ministries are now trying to fool Indians by prolonging the “starting point” of the 100 days plan. The government is in no serious mood to actually implement the promises made by it on 4th June 2009. The actual period of 100 days started from 5th June 2009 and the government is just fooling Indians by now claiming that its ministries would release its 100 days plan very soon.

The 100 days period must expire on 12th September 2009. However, the ministries of UPA government have still not wakened to this reality. Rather they are in a mood to give another carrot to Indian citizens to chew by claiming that 100 days plan would be revealed very soon.

With the Parliament session in the corner, the true faces of many ministries would be revealed. The embarrassing moments for the Congress led government are definitely going to haunt the government till the next session of the Parliament. Further if the government is still not serious and honest than perhaps for the rest of its 5 years tenure. As far as carrots are concerned, the government must stop giving them to Indian citizens lest they complaint of perpetual indigestion.

AUTHOR: GUNJAN SINGH

SOURCE: MYNEWS

US Grappling With Privacy And Cyber Security Balancing Act

The Obama administration is moving cautiously on a new pilot program that would both detect and stop cyber attacks against government computers, while trying to ensure citizen privacy protections.

The pilot program, known as Einstein 3, was supposed to launch in February. But the Department of Homeland Security is still pulling the plan together, according to senior administration officials.

Einstein 3 has triggered debate and privacy concerns because the program will use National Security Agency technology, which is already being employed on military networks.

Any involvement of the NSA — the agency oversees electronic intelligence-gathering — in protecting domestic computer networks worries privacy and civil liberties groups who oppose giving such control to U.S. spy agencies.

SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS

E-Commerce Law Of India Needs Urgent Amendment

E-commerce law in India is primitive says Praveen Dalal, India’s leading techno-legal expert. He has also suggested for enacting suitable cyber law, e-commerce law, e-governance law, etc to Union Minister for Law M Veerappa Moily.

E-commerce is in its preliminary stage in India. It has lots of potential but a weak and inadequate technology law regime is not allowing it to reap maximum benefits. If the government of India makes suitable laws, e-commerce can mature into a profitable industry in India.

SOURCE: ITVOIR

Information Technology Amendment Act 2009 Of India

Cyber law of India requires rejuvenation. In this interview with Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and the Leading Techno-Legal Expert of India he suggested that the Government of India (GOI) must come up with the Information Technology Amendment Act, 2009. In fact he has been suggesting that there is a need to “reformulate” the Information Technology Amendment Act, 2008 (IT Act, 2008) as it is going to create lot of problems for India in future. Already “wrong prosecutions” have brought bad name for India in general and Indian law enforcement in particular.

Human Rights violations in cyberspace are bound to happen in India in the absence of good . It seems the GOI has finally woken up from its sleep and is plannlegal enablement of ICT systems in Indiaing to bring further amendments in the existing Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act, 2000). Union Minister for Law M Veerappa Moily said the Government will amend the existing laws, including the IT Act, 2000 to combat cyber crimes in the country. There was a misconception that the IT Act, 2008 which was passed last year, was for dealing with cyber crimes. It was mainly for legalising e-commerce, he added.

It is clear that GOI would come up with Information Technology Amendment Act, 2009 (IT Act, 2009) very soon. It has finally accepted the suggestions and recommendations of Praveen Dalal in the larger interest of India. It has accepted that India needs a strong and stringent legal regime to fight growing menace of cyber crimes in India. Perry4Law has welcomed this step of GOI and assured that it would provide all necessary expertise and assistance for the enactment of IT Act, 2009 so that the same may be introduced in the Parliament this year.