Kochi: As part of efforts to check cyber crimes, Chief Justice of India KG Balakrishnan on Saturday said a Cyber Appellate Tribunal and other courts will be coming up in due course in different parts of the country.
A Cyber tribunal has already been set up in New Delhi as per section 40 of the IT Act, the CJI said addressing a Public awareness meeting on `Cyber Crimes Against Women` here.
Balakrishnan said there are practical difficulties in dealing with Cyber crime cases since the locality is not defined and hence it is difficult to identify perpetrators of such crimes.
Many website with obscene contents are registered abroad. Government can ban such websites, but it would not be right to clamp a blanket ban on all websites, he said.
He said many job and matrimonial websites are misused. There are multifarious ways in which cyber crimes are being committed, he added stressing the need for creating awareness about it.
Also present at the function, Kerala Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan said judges and law makers should formulate action plans to deal with cyber crimes and related issues.
"There is need to create more awareness among women about cyber crimes as it is the fairer sex who mostly become its victims, he said.
Earlier at the inaugural function, Speakers stressed the need to amend laws appropriately to address the challenges thrown up by newer technologies.
Justice Kurian Joseph said 81 percent of children become victims of cyber crimes. In Ernakulam alone, 22-25 cyber crimes are reported every month. He also urged government to sanction more funds for setting up subordinate courts as there are 11 lakh cases pending in the state.
Justice PR Raman said with the advent of technology, cyber crime and victimisation of women are on the rise and it poses a major threat to the security of a person as a whole.
India is one of the very few countries to enact IT Act, 2000 to combat cyber crimes but issues regarding women still remain untouched in the act.
Certain offences like hacking, publishing of obscene material in the net and tampering of data are termed as punishable offences. But the grave threat to the security of women in general is not covered fully by this Act, he said.
Speaking at a session on `Cyber Crime and Cyber Laws`, Justice R Basant said a `missed call` is the starting point of a relationship which is maliciously cultivated. Social welfare department should undertake awareness classes for adolescent students in schools and colleges, he said.
The function was jointly organised by the Department of Social welfare, Government of Kerala, C-Dit (Centre for Development of Imaging Technology), Kerala state Legal
Services Authority (KELSA) and Kerala Social Security Mission.
Later speaking at another function, Justice Balakrishnan said recently there has been a sustained focus on the role of judiciary on measures to be taken for pollution control, conservation of forests and wild life.
As a result of the Supreme court intervention, forest depletion had decreased, he said after inaugurating the Kerala chapter of the Asia Pacific Jurist Association here.
Kerala high court judge Thothathil B Radhakrishan, Former chief justice YK Sabharwal, Former chief justice of Punjab and Haryana Virender Jain, Advocate General CP Sudhakara Prasad, were among those who spoke.
Bureau Report
