Cyber Laws and IT Act Of India

Cyber law is significant because it touches almost all aspects of transactions and activities on and involving the internet, World Wide Web and cyberspace. Every action and reaction in cyberspace has some legal and cyber legal perspectives. Cyber law encompasses laws relating to 1. Cyber crimes 2. Electronic and digital signatures 3. Intellectual property 4. Data protection and privacy In India, cyber laws are contained in the Information Technology Act, 2000 (IT Act) which came into force on October 17, 2000. The main purpose of the Act is to provide legal recognition to electronic commerce and to facilitate filing of electronic records with the Government.

What is cyber crimes?

Dr. Debarati Halder and Dr. K. Jaishankar (2011) define Cybercrimes as: "Offences that are committed against individuals or groups of individuals with a criminal motive to intentionally harm the reputation of the victim or cause physical or mental harm to the victim directly or indirectly, using modern telecommunication networks such as Internet (Chat rooms, emails, notice boards and groups) and mobile phones (SMS/MMS)" Computer crime encompasses a broad range of activities like

• Hacking
• Child Pornography
• Cyber Stalking
• Denial of service Attack
• Virus Dissemination
• Software Piracy
• IRC Crime
• Credit Card Fraud
• Net Extortion
• Phishing

Electronic and digital signatures under the IT Act, 2000

Digital signature means authentication of any electronic record by a subscriber by means of an electronic method. Electronic signature has also been dealt with under Section 3A of the IT Act, 2000. A subscriber can authenticate any electronic record by such electronic signature or electronic authentication technique which is considered reliable.

Intellectual property

According to Wikipedia, “Intellectual property (IP) rights are the legally recognized exclusive rights to creations of the mind.[1] Under intellectual property law, owners are granted certain exclusive rights to a variety of intangible assets, such as musical, literary, and artistic works; discoveries and inventions; and words, phrases, symbols, and designs. Common types of intellectual property rights include copyright, trademarks, patents, industrial design rights, trade dress, and in some jurisdictions trade secrets”.

Data protection and privacy

The Section 43-A, dealing with compensation for failure to protect data was introduced in the ITAA -2008. As per this Section, where a body corporate is negligent in implementing reasonable security practices and thereby causes wrongful loss or gain to any person, such body corporate shall be liable to pay damages by way of compensation to the person so affected. Sensitive personal data or information consists of information relating to;-

• password;
• financial information such as Bank account or credit card or debit card or other payment instrument details ;
• physical, physiological and mental health condition;
• sexual orientation;
• any detail relating to the above clauses as provided to body corporate for providing service
• medical records and history;
• any of the information received under above clauses by body corporate for processing, stored or processed under lawful contract
• Biometric information;