SUBMITTED BY

NEETHU NANDAKUMAR
LEGAL ISSUES PERTAINING TO INTERNET

1. Cyber Crime
2. Free speech and internet
3. Online harassment and Hate
speech
4. Children and Internet
 1. CYBER CRIMES
• CYBER CRIME is any offence where electronic communications or
information systems, including any device or the internet or both of them
are involved.

• CYBER LAW can be defined as the legal system which deals with the
internet, cyberspace and their respective legal issues.

CYBER CRIME CLASSIFICATIONS

1. Cyber crime against individuals

2. Cyber crime against property
3. Cyber crime against organization
4. Cyber crime against society
Cyber crime against individual

• Email Spoofing – forgery of email header

• Spamming – junk mail ; sending unsought mass messages
• Cyber defamation – harm on reputation of individual through internet
• Internet Relay Chat (IRC)- Offences through chats
• Phishing – gains personal information like log in id or account info pretending
genuine

other types of cyber crimes against individual ;

Hacking, indecent exposure, trafficking etc.
Cyber crime against property

Intellectual property Crimes ( copyright, patented, trademark)

• Software piracy – copying software unauthorizedly
•Copyright infringement - unauthorized use of copyright materials
•Trademark infringement – unauthorized use of trademarks

Cyber crime against organization

• DOS attack- flooding the servers with traffic to make it difficult to use
• Email bombing- same as spamming (huge no. Of messages sent to an email
to flood the mailbox)
•Salami attack- seizing the customer’s information through online database
Cyber crime against society

•Forgery - making false document, signature, currency etc.

•Web jacking – fake website is made by the attacker to get access to the
victim’s webpage

2. Free Speech and Internet

Every constitution guarantees freedom of speech, but there are instances
Where it can provoke a lawsuit. The main causes of action against free
Speech on the internet is;

DEFAMATION ;- “A published intentional false communication that injures

a person or company’s reputation”
BREACH OF CONTRACT; If an employee signs a confidentiality agreement and
then posts information about products, sales, management, other employees,
or rumors, then he may have breached his confidence and trust to the company and
be held in Breach of Contract.

BLOGS ; blogs are considered as personal journal, but one must keep in mind that
it cannot be used to ruined the reputation of others.

3.Online Harassment and Hate Speech

• When a harasser uses the internet to cause substantial emotional
distress to his or her victim, this is considered Online Harassment.

• It can take the form of email, chat rooms, instant messaging,

newsgroup posts, or message board posts.
HATE SPEECH

• Hate speech is speech that offends, threatens, or insults groups, based on race, color,
religion, national origin, sexual orientation, disability, or other traits.

• Examples of hate speech can include racist cartoons, anti-Semitic symbols,

ethnic slurs or other derogatory labels for a group, burning a cross,
politically incorrect jokes, sexist statements, anti-gay protests...etc.

4 Children and Internet

Any communication for commercial purposes that includes sexual material that is
harmful to minors, without restricting access to such material by minors is considered
crime.

OBSCENITY AND PORNOGRAPHY – The bad effects of obscenity and pornography on the
vulnerable children especially adolescents
CYBER CRIME RELATED CASES

The bank NSP case

In this case a management trainee of a bank got engaged to marriage and used the
company’s computers to exchange e-mails. After they got divorced, the young lady
created some fake email ids such as “Indian bar associations” and sent emails to the
ex-husband’s foreign clients. The employee’s company lost a huge number of clients
and took the bank to the court. The bank was held liable for the emails sent using
the bank’s systems.

Cyber terrorism case ; India and Pakistan Conflict As tensions between the
neighbouring regions of India and Pakistan over Kashmir grew over time, Pro-
Pakistan cyber-terrorists and recruited hackers began to target India’s Internet
Community. Just prior to and after the September 11th attacks, it is believed that the
sympathizers of Pakistan began their spread of propaganda and attacks against
Indian Internet based communities. Groups such as G-Force and Doctor Nuker have
defaced or disrupted service to several major entities in India such as the Zee TV
Network, The India Institute of Science and the Bhabha Atomic Research Center
which all have political ties. The Group, Pakistani Hackerz Club also went as far as to
target the United States Air Force Computing Environment and the Department of
Energy’s Website
Regional case related to internet issue;

Jayesh.S.Thakkar vs. State of Maharashtra –related to pornographic content

National level case

Ritu Kohli’s case – related to cyberstalking

Other legal issues related to internet;

•cyber stalking
• cyber terrorism
• virus and contaminants
• phishing and vishing
•Data Theft
The Information Technology Act of India, 2000

•According to Wikipedia “The Information Technology Act, 2000 (also known as

ITA-2000, or the IT Act) is an act of the Indian Parliament (no 21 of 2000), it was
notified on 17th October 2000.
• It is the most important law in India that deals with the digital crimes or cyber
crimes and electronic commerce. It is based on the United Nations Model Law on
Electronic Commerce 1996 (UNCITRAL Model) recommended by the General
Assembly of United Nations by a resolution dated 30 January 1997” [14].
Some key points of the Information Technology (IT) Act 2000 are as follows:
E-mail is now considered as a valid and legal form of communication. Digital
signatures are given legal validity within the Act. Act has given birth to new
business to companies to issue digital certificates by becoming the Certifying
Authorities. This Act allows the government to issue notices on internet through
e-governance. The communication between the companies or between the
company and the government can be done through internet. Addressing the issue
of security is the most important feature of this Act. It introduced the construct of
digital signatures that verifies the identity of an individual on internet. In case of
any harm or loss done to the company by criminals, the Act provides a remedy in
the form of money to the company [15].
Cyber Law in India

Following are the sections under IT Act,2000