State to open e-police station

Maharashtra is finally getting its own full-fledged, cyber crime
police station. City police sources said the rising number of cyber
crimes as well as the need to protect the growing Business Process
Outsourcing (BPO) industry has made it imperative for the state to
get its own committed cyber crime-fighting unit with access to state-
of-the-art technology.

The police station has been sanctioned by the home department and is
expected to be functioning within three months. It will be the third
such police station in the country after the ones in India's IT
meccas of Bangalore and Hyderabad. The cyber police will also tackle
financial terrorism, which involves money-laundering and hawala, and
the online flesh trade.

The police station, with state-wide jurisdiction, will get money from
the budget set aside for modernisation plans approved by the central
and state governments. The present 18-member Cyber Crime
Investigation Cell (CCIC) in the Mumbai police force will be absorbed
by the 61-strong cyber crime police station.

Joint commissioner of police (administration), Hemant Karkare,
said, "The cyber crime police station will have the authority to
register FIRs and investigate cases, unlike the present CCIC."

"All cases under the Information Technology Act will be dealt with by
the cyber police station, which will also make arrests. However, the
2,000-square-foot police station may not have a lock-up, so suspects
may be kept at other lock-ups," added Karkare.

A senior police officer said the creation of such a police station
could also attract more IT companies to the region. IT companies are
attracted to Bangalore and Hyderabad because the cities afford
protection from cyber crime, he said. "Once the police station is
started, MNCs may prefer to make Mumbai their base," he said.
Bangalore's cyber crime cell, in existence from 1999, was converted
into a police station in September 2001.

Recently, the CCIC detected a huge case of e-crime in which an
airline had to suffer losses of Rs 13.47 crore after 15,255 tickets
were booked online. In another case, the CCIC arrested a Bhopal
teenager, Mohammed Sharique, after he sent threatening emails posing
as a member of an unknown terror outfit in the wake of the 7/11
bombings.

The CCIC also helped arrest a man who sent an email threatening to
bomb the World Trade Centre, Cuffe Parade.

Former IPS officer and e-security expert, Sanjay Pandey, said there
was also need to define cyber crime in central and local laws.

"It's good that the government is making an effort to tackle cyber
crime, but it's also necessary to define cyber crime in laws," said
Pandey. "The Information Technology Act is an IT act and not an IT
crime act."

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