Karti tweet arrest: Five online crimes you might be committing

A small scale industrialist from Tamil Nadu was arrested on Tuesday for allegedly posting ‘offensive’ messages on Twitter. The reports say he was targeting Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram’s son Karti Chidambaram. What will happen to this person, only time will tell. But, there could be a good possibility, that we, “common people” could commit online crimes unknowingly. Keeping this in mind, we bring you the small print.

The government is considering lighter punishments for cyber crimes by teens and first-timers on the grounds that many commit the mistake without knowing the gravity, a Times of India report said on 17 September.

Given the complex and tricky nature of the Web, it is unlikely that the non-tech savvy can learn the ways of technology that easily. And chances of committing further cyber offences are high.

In this context, experts feel it is important for Net users to know about the Information Technology Act 2000.

“It is important that the public is made aware of these things, since there could be severe consequence for these actions,” said Pavan Duggal, Advocate, Supreme Court of India. The punishments range from a few years of imprisonment to penalty of a few lakh rupees. Here’s a list of a few things one must take care of in order to not get caught in the web of crime.

Others’ details: Consider the following scenario: you visit a website; it asks for your mobile number before you proceed; since you don’t want to get bugged by pesky calls you give a random mobile number. But, hold! You may be committing a crime by doing this. “To avoid sharing their own numbers, there are people who simply punch in random mobile number. But this mobile number can actually be an active number and belong to someone,” says Mayur Joshi, CEO, Indiaforensic, and Cyber expert. “They may not have any intention to cause damage to that person, but unknowingly they are actually committing a crime,” he said. What you should do in such cases is simply exit the website.

Impersonation: Impersonation is when you pretend to be somebody else online. “This is very common with young adults, where they create email IDs or even fake profiles on social network sites,” says Joshi. This is an offence even though it is done to simply pull off a prank. In fact, as per Twitter website: Impersonation is a violation of Twitter rules. Read more about it here.

Forex trades: A number of websites for trading in foreign exchange have sprung up of late. Many hook up on to such sites in order make a quick buck. But there are lurking dangers. “The RBI allows you to trade, provided the rupee is involved (pair of rupee and another currency). You are not permitted to trade in the pair of two foreign currencies,” says Joshi. So, while dollar-rupee, euro-rupee and GBP-rupee are allowed, dollar-euro and euro-GBP are not permitted. “Making money is easy on these sites. Just register, give your credit card details and the gains you earn are directly put on the card itself. Since, you are not aware of foreign exchange rules, you break the law unknowingly.” So, beware the next time you trade in forex online.

Pornography: As per a Mumbai high court judgement passed in 2010, watching pornography in the privacy of your home is not an offence. However, publishing or transmitting or causing to be published obscene content in electronic form is, says Chapter 10 of the Information Technology Act 2000.

Amendments were made to the law in 2008 to make child pornography a crime. “Section 67B: This provision makes creating any text or digital image, browsing, downloading and collecting child pornography an offence even if the person doing this act does not have any intention to publish or transmit the obscene object,” author Brijesh Rajtak says in his book Pornography Law. The danger is that one may accidentally hit a child porno site by mistake, because of pop-ups. To protect yourself, install internet pornography filter software on the computer. This will ensure that you do not browse or download such content, even by mistake.

Downloading: Downloading of copyrighted or pirated material-literature, film, music or software-is a common offence. “Downloading of pirated versions of software is an offence under sections 43 and 66 of Information Technology Act, and you could be sentenced with three years of imprisonment,” says Duggal. In fact, even using someone else’s user ID and password, or sending confidential material from your employer to your personal ID without authorisation is also an offence.

Keep these things in mind whenever you are online. Happy surfing!