Let’s go the tech way, Mr Speaker

BANGALORE: Union Information Technology Minister, Pramod Mahajan, who is also
the Parliamentary Affairs Minister, last week, speaking at a seminar, brought up
some of the archaic laws of the land that are proving to be an impediment in
India’s transition to the Net era. He explained the audience how the Lok Sabha
speaker recently refused his application for tabling a report in the Parliament
by way of CDs instead of papers. "It was difficult for us to make more than
1,000 copies of the report in a matter of days. It would have been easier to put
them in a CD and replicate it. But, the speaker rejected the request and asked
the report to be tabled in paper format," he said amidst laughter from the
audience. The reason for refusal? The law does not allow CDs and other
electronic equipments to be brought into the Parliament!

Mr Mahajan brought out this incidence to announce in the same forum that the
much awaited IT Bill-99 was expected to be passed by the Parliament before June.
Popularly called Cyber Laws, IT Bill-99 is expected to be the launch pad for
e-commerce in the country. Naturally, the proposed bill, soon to be made an Act
of Parliament (provided, of course, there is consensus between the political
parties), was the topic of the week.

India being a technologically advanced country, should have had the Cyber
Laws framed much earlier, but it is sad to say that things are not done at the
required pace in our country. The Indian legal system today, does not recognize
electronic records or documents at par with written documents. Consequently,
these would not be accepted as evidence in the court of law. When records are on
papers, it can be authenticated, but when records are in electronic form, issues
like evidence of transactions, enforceability and authenticity of these
transactions arise. Now that all software companies in India are moving towards
e-commerce, there is need for a new law to cover the new form of records,
transactions, signatures, storage, carriage and the disputes that can arise. Of
course, the security of something, which we cannot see, is intangible and can be
faked, does cause serious concern.

The security of electronic records and signatures is of great concern to the
people as there are crackers and hackers, who can tamper with the records,
signatures, destroy or distort them. If this is not checked then the e-commerce
segment will perish in its infancy itself. No buyer would be prepared to use his
credit card for purchases on the Internet if he fears that the card data can be
stolen and misused. For instance, in a study conducted by Ernst & Young, 97
per cent of the consumers participating in the study, did not purchase anything
on-line and said that the main reason was fear about disclosing their credit
card information. Although financial organizations, banks, ISPs and e-commerce
service providers are ensuring a secure system, users will make use of these
services comfortably only when Cyber Laws are in place. Even in the case of
Internet-based stock trading that recently commenced in India, the promoters'
believe that if cyber laws are implemented, the system would further be
strengthened.

The absence of cyber laws is actually being felt in the Indian IT industry
and it has also left a negative impact on the industry. India is said to have
not signed a MoU digitally with Ireland because of the absence of Cyber Laws and
sometime back Nasscom president Dewang Mehta had also pointed out that
e-commerce transactions had not gained importance in India due to lack of cyber
laws. According to a Nasscom study, e-commerce transactions in the country would
grow phenomenally to Rs 2,500 crore in 2000-01 and to Rs 10,000 crore in 2001-02
after the Cyber Laws Bill is passed. The growth of e-commerce transactions would
have been even greater if the laws were passed earlier.

Once this Bill is passed, electronic documents, i.e., whatever is recorded in
computer memories as well as electronic signatures will be legal and will have
to be accepted by all offices equipped for the purpose. The Bill proposes
creation of a one-man Cyber Regulation Appellate Tribunal where the computer
criminals could appeal. Computer criminals who conceal, destroy or distort any
computer source document for a programme, system or source-code can be fined
upto Rs 2 lakh and imprisoned up to three years. Those who electronically
publish or circulate information, which is disagreeable can be fined upto Rs
25,000 and also imprisoned for two years. Persons unauthorized or persons
illegally disclosing the contents of electronic records can be fined up to Rs 1
lakh and imprisoned for two years. The Bill has provisions concerning electronic
fraud and crimes are defined and punishment for such crimes is prescribed for
the offenders. Besides, they will have to pay compensation to the aggrieved to
an extent of Rs 10 lakh. The criminals can also be sent to jail.

Once this is clearly defined, the Internet users can use the Net for any kind
of transaction without any apprehensions. With the passing of the IT Bill, both
service providers and the users will be content. Cyber Laws will not be just in
favor of Internet users or service providers, but also for lawyers who will
fight cyber cases. These lawyers can earn a good livelihood, command a
prosperous future and also be a part of the e-commerce cynosure. The dream of
India being an IT super power on which the future of the Indian IT industry and
IT professionals depend, now rests on the availability of the legal support
system for e-commerce. Without Cyber Law there will be no e-commerce and with
Cyber Laws the Internet or e-commerce use will increase manifold. So keeping
this in mind, the leaders of the nation should give priority to the cyber legal
system and implement it soon. Now the only worry is - what if it gets postponed
again?