GOVERNMENT OF INDIA

MINISTRY OF ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

LOK SABHA

UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 127

TO BE ANSWERED ON: 16.11.2016

CYBER CRIME

Will the Minister of ELECTRONICS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY be pleased to state:

(a) whether the Government has taken note of cybercrime especially on social media increasing all over the country;

(b) if so, the details thereof along with percentage increase in cyber crimes in the last three years;

(c) the action taken by the Government in this regard along with the steps taken to protect women from increasing harassment on social sites?

ANSWER

MINISTER OF STATE FOR MINISTRY OF ELECTRONICS AND INFORMRATION TECHNOLOGY

(SHRI P.P. CHAUDHARY)

(a) and (b): With the proliferation of Information Technology and related services there is a rise in instances of cyber crimes including that on social media in the country like elsewhere in the world. As per the data maintained by NCRB, A total of 5693, 9622 and 11592 cyber crime cases were registered during the years 2013, 2014 and 2015 respectively, showing a rise of 69% during 2013 to 2014 and 20% during 2014 to 2015. Further, CBI has registered 11, 20 and 25 cases in the year 2013, 2014 and 2015 respectively related to cyber crimes.

(c): Government has taken various steps in the form of legal framework, emergency response, awareness, training, legal framework and implementation of best practices to prevent occurrence of cyber breaches and cyber crime threats. Such steps include: 

i) The Information Technology Act, 2000 provides a comprehensive legal framework to address the issues connected with cyber crime, cyber attacks and security breaches of information technology infrastructure.

ii) Government is implementing a Framework for Enhancing Cyber Security, with a multi-layered approach for ensuring defence-in-depth and clear demarcation of responsibilities among the stakeholder organizations in the country.

iii) Government has established National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIIPC) as per the provisions of Section 70A of the Information Technology Act, 2000 for protection of Critical Information Infrastructure in the country.

iv) The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) issues alerts and advisories regarding latest cyber threats and countermeasures on regular basis. CERT-In has published guidelines for securing IT infrastructure, which are available on its website (www.certin.org.in). In order to detect variety of threats and imminent cyber attacks from outside the country, periodic scanning of cyber space is carried out.

v) Government has formulated Crisis Management Plan for countering cyber attacks and cyber terrorism for implementation by all Ministries/ Departments of Central Government, State Governments and their organizations and critical sectors.

vi) Cyber security mock drills are being conducted regularly to enable assessment of cyber security posture and preparedness of organizations in Government and critical sectors. vii) Government has initiated setting up of National Cyber Coordination Centre (NCCC) to generate necessary situational awareness of existing and potential cyber security threats and enable timely information sharing for proactive, preventive and protective actions by individual entities. viii)CERT-In, Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology is setting up a Botnet Cleaning and Malware Analysis centre for detection of computer systems infected by malware and to notify, enable cleaning and securing systems of end users to prevent further malware infections. ix) Cyber Crime Cells have been set up in all States and Union Territories for reporting and investigation of Cyber Crime cases.