Lab to help cops crack cyber crimes

KOLHAPUR: District guardian minister Chandrakant Patil inaugurated the cyber lab for Kolhapur district on the occasion of Independence Day on Monday.

The lab on which the state government spent Rs 66 lakh is located at the district headquarters of the police. As many as 10 officials have been deployed in the lab to provide assistance in cases and complaints lodged under the cyber law and IT Act.

The rise in the number of cyber crimes, almost 1,000 in the past three years, prompted the state home department to come up with a special laboratory that would be the backbone of investigations. The police are also not aware of cyber crimes and the widespread impact because of which nabbing the fraudsters has become a challenge. The lab is expected to ease up the procedure to some extent.

Inspector general of Kolhapur range Vishwas Nangare-Patil, district superintendent of police Pradeep Deshpande, municipal commissioner P Siva Sankar, district collector Saini and CEO of Kolhapur zilla parishad Kunal Khemnar were present on the occasion.

Chandrakant Patil said, "The state government is working on two fronts - increasing the number of officials in its force as well as improving technology. This will enable easier detection of crime as well as reduce the burden on the police force. I also urge the police officials to spread awareness about the cyber law and IT Act so that the number of violations is curbed automatically."

As per the CID's latest bulletin, there has been a rise of 207% in cyber crimes between 2015 and 2016 calendar years. Because of the growing use of smart phones and various banking services through computer as well smart phones, credit card users are potentially vulnerable to such crimes. The complaints of circulating private or morphed images and eve-teasing through social media are also on the rise in semi-urban and rural areas.

While the police are currently being trained to deal with cyber crimes, the setting up of the laboratory will be handy for them.

Nangre-Patil said, "Kolhapur range has five districts and the total expenditure on the cyber labs has been Rs 3 crore so far. We will educate and sensitise people about these laws so that more cases will come up and the overall complaints will go down. It will work as a deterrent."

Cyber crimes in the state are registered under two different acts - the Information Technology Act and the Indian Penal Code.

The IT Act mostly deals with hacking, breach of confidentiality, obtaining digital signature by misrepresentation, publishing false digital signature certificate and publication of obscene content.