Cyber Law

OVERVIEW

Cyber law is a new phenomenon having emerged much after the onset of Internet. Internet grew in a completely unplanned and unregulated manner. The growth of the cyberspace has been enormous. Internet is growing at the rapid pace and cyberspace is becoming the new preferred environment of the world. This growth of the cyberspace lead to coming up of the new and the ticklish issues related to various legal aspects of the cyberspace cropping up. In response to the complex and newly emerging legal issues related to cyberspace, CYBERLAW or the law of Internet came into being. The growth of the Cyberspace has resulted in the development of a new and highly specialized branch of law called CYBERLAW. There is no exhaustive definition of the Cyber law, in simple word it is a term which refer to all the legal and regulatory aspect of Internet and the World Wide Web. Anything concerned with or related to or emanating form, any legal aspect or issues concerning any activity of netitizens and others, in cyberspace comes within the ambit of Cyber law.

RATIONALE

Main reason for the need for the cyber law is the growth of the electronic commerce which makes it necessary to have an effective regulatory mechanism in the form of the legal infrastructure for the success of it. All the regulatory mechanism and the legal infrastructure come under the domain of the cyber law. Also the arrival of the internet and the related technologies has made irreversible changes in the today's world which is steadily moving towards the information society and the knowledge economy so it becomes essential to have law that must contribute its input to promote e-commerce.

Cyber law is important because it touches almost all aspects of transactions and activities concerning the Internet, the World Wide Web and cyberspace. Every activity in cyberspace will have a cyber legal perspective. Moment a person registers a domain name, sets up and promotes his or her web site, and then conducts electronic commerce and has transactions on the site; various cyber law issues are involved. Systems across the globe have many different rules to govern the behavior of users who are completely free to join/ leave any system whose rules they find comfortable/ not comfortable to them. This flexibility may lead to improper user conduct. It would become difficult for the System Administrators to have a check on Frauds, Vandalism or Abuses in the absence of any legal framework. Any element of distrust for Internet may lead to people avoiding doing transactions with online sites thereby directly affecting e-Commerce growth. Misuse of Internet as an excellent medium of communication may in some situations lead to direct damage to l societies. Non-imposition of taxes on online transactions may have the destructive effect on the physical businesses and also government revenues.

Complex legal issues coming up in the internet world lead to the coming up and development of the cyber law. Also need for the recognition of the e- format as well as electronic contract in order to give them legal validity and enforcement i.e. law should be able to recognize the practical existence of an electronic offer, acceptance and the resultant contract. Cyber law is needed in order to deal with the cyber crime as well with cyber security.

CYBER CRIME:

Computer or Cyber crimes are considered as illegal, unethical or unauthorized behavior of people relating to the automatic processing and transmission of the data, use of computer systems and networks.

Common types of Cyber Crimes may be broadly classified in the following groups:-

1. Individuals: - (Against Person): -

i. Harassment through e-mails.

ii. Cyber-stalking.

iii. Dissemination of obscene material on the Internet.

iv. Defamation.

v. Hacking.

vi. Indecent exposure.

(Against property of an individual): -

i. Computer vandalism.

ii. Transmitting virus.

iii. Internet intrusion.

iv. Unauthorized control over computer system.

v. Hacking.

2. Organizations: -

a. Against Government, Private Firm, Company : -

i. Hacking & Cracking.

ii. Possession of unauthorized information.

iii. Cyber terrorism against the government organization.

iv. Distribution of pirated software etc.

3. Society at large: -

i. Pornography (especially child pornography).

ii. Polluting the youth through indecent exposure.

iii. Trafficking.

CYBER LAW WORLDWIDE

In order to meet the challenge posed by crime made possible by computer technology including telecommunication, many countries has reviewed their respective domestic criminal laws so as to prevent computer related crimes. Some of the countries who had review their law under such context are USA, Austria, Denmark, France Germany, Greece, Finland, Italy, Turkey, Sweden, Switzerland, Australia, Canada, India, Japan, Spain, Portugal, UK, Malaysia and Singapore. The diagram presents state of the cyber law in various nations around the world.

Some of the major type of the cyber law which most of the countries has enacted across the globe is as follows:

1. Unlawful access to the data information in computers.

2. Damaging data in the computers.

3. Data spying

4. Computer frauds.

5. Committing mischief with the data.

6. Unauthorized access to the computer and computer materials.

7. Alteration of the data.

8. Sabotage of the computers.

9. Forgery of the prohibited data.

10. destruction