sue of Jurisdiction in Combating Cyber Crimes: Issues and Challenges Pornography and

Indian Jurisdiction
Constantly developing science and technology has endless benefits for the citizens of the
growing global village. Although it has many advantages, the dark side of it cannot be avoided.
The misuse of Information technology for the criminal activities is increasing day by day. Cyber
Offences are Offences that are committed against individuals or groups of individuals with a
criminal motive to intentionally harm the reputation of the victim or cause physical or mental
harm to the victim directly or indirectly, using modem telecommunications network such as
Internet (Chat rooms, emails, notice boards and groups) and mobile phones (SMS/MMS). There
are numerous types of cyber-crime involving a long list like Hacking, Identity theft, Denial of
Service attack, Virus, IPR violations, Cyber Terrorism, Frauds, Pornography, Spam, Drug
Trafficking, etc. One such Offence, i.e., Cyber Pornography, which includes also includes child
pornography, is not defined but, in general interpretation, it refers to the depiction of erotic
behaviour (as in picture or writing) intended to cause sexual excitement. Globalization has led
the Pornography to emerge as one of the largest and biggest business threat for society. This not
only covers the adults one but is very popular among childrens of all age. In India, Indian Penal
code under Section 293, prohibits the Sale of obscene objects to young person and in Information
Technology (Amendment) Act, Section 67, 67A and 67B covers the substances relating to
pornography. It is generally carried for Illegal financial gains and to take undue advantages over
others, i.e., by blackmailing other. Cyber Criminals operate through different electronic devices
which may in the same of varied country. The problem of jurisdiction arises when they are
committed outside India, effecting Indian citizen or Indian property. This is because of disparities
between the rules and regulations of different nations (what one nations considered as crime,
may not be considered by the other nation). In pornography suspects may/may not host a website
on the network located outside India and in countries where pornography is allowed.
As Cited by Pawan Duggal (Cyber Law Expert) in a Newspaper Clipping Evolving
technology is the reason porn sites are difficult to track down. It acts as a shield against the
authorities trying to figure out ways to put ban in India. Moreover, due to globalization and
restrictive internet jurisdiction, combating the issue of pornography is no longer solely under the
control of the Government of India..
Statement of Problem
There is an ongoing debate over the jurisdiction of Indian Courts in combating cyber-crimes,
committed by outsider effecting Indian cyber space located in India. For example, Website
offering pornographic materials has set up its server in America, in which there is no ban on
selling obscene material above legal age, whose owner resides in France and the customer from
India buys some material from the same, which prohibits such transmission and distribution of
such material. Here the question arises where the transaction has taken and who is liable. The
continuous outreach of Internet has made it difficult to limit the use pornography; it has even

reached to the hands of childrens on a large scale. Indian Police finds itself in a dilemma, how to
arrest the person, located outside India. Child pornography is not prohibited in many countries.
In this project, the author tries to cover the different aspects relating jurisdiction of Indian Court
in cases of pornography.
Objectives of the Study
To know about the jurisdiction of Indian Courts on matters relating to pornography.
To enquire about the effect of pornography on society.
To find out the International rules and regulations effecting pornography
To analyze the working of the Cyber Regulation Appellant Tribunal
Hypotheses
The author in the project is of the view that in cases relating to pornography, the Indian courts
have a limited jurisdiction.
Cyber Crime
Cyberspace was coined by the science fiction author William Gibson, when he sought a name
to describe his vision of a global computer network, linking all peoples, machines and sources of
information in the world, and through which one could move or navigate as through a virtual
space. The Oxford Dictionarymeaning of cyber is forming words relates to electronic
communication network and virtual reality.
All those who live by computers will one day commingle in a jointly created virtual reality:
mankinds unthinkably complex consensual hallucination, the matrix, cyber space, where the
great corporate hot cores burned like noen novas, data so dense you suffered sensory overload if
you tried to apprehend more than the merest outline.
From the legal point of view the term Cyberspace, can be defined as a conceptual world of
information and electronic network accessible via the internet and can be rightly called space
without frontiers, whose boundaries seems limitless.
Cyber Crime is the use of computers and other electronic devices and Internet by criminals to
execute fraud and other crimes against companies, consumers and other individuals. It is a broad
term which is used to describe criminal activity committed on computers or on the internet.
Cyber Offences are Offences that are committed against individuals or groups of individuals
with a criminal motive to intentionally harm the reputation of the victim or cause physical or
mental harm to the victim directly or indirectly, using modem telecommunications network such
as Internet (Chat rooms, emails, notice boards and groups) and mobile phones (SMS/MMS).

History And Evolution of Cyber Crime

In the present context, use of computers is known to a large percentage of populations. But,
going back to 1950s and 1960s their use was not common. Only selected parts of the population
have access to these bulky machines. IBMs introduction of its stand alone personal
computers in 1981, computers begin to enter into the life of the individuals. Today it is estimated
that 53.7 million households have personal computers. With the fast scale development and
improvement in the technology more and more individuals begin to use computers as a medium
both for positive and negative purpose. This led to the evolution of computer crimes on a large
scale.
Year 1820 was the benchmark in the computer crime wherein the first such crime took place. In
1820, Joseph-Marie Jacquard, a textile mill owner in France, produced the loom. This help
device allowed the repetition of a series of steps in the weaving of special fabrics. As a
consequence, there was fear among the Jacquards employees that their traditional employment
and livelihood were being threatened. They committed the acts of sabotage to discourage
Jacquard from further use of the new technology. This is the first recorded Cybercrime.
Definition And Nature of Cyber Crime
A General definition of cyber-crime may be unlawful act wherein the consumer is used, either
as a tool or a target or both.Any criminal activity that uses a computer either as an
instrumentality, target or a means for perpetuating further crimes comes within the ambit of
cyber-crimes.
The Internet is fast changing the lifestyle of every individuals whether be it students,
businessmen, doctors, lawyers, engineers, etc. it is becoming a way of life for millions of people.
With this, the criminals are also not lagging behind. Their area of operation has also widened
with such technological progress.
There are difficulties in providing a description of cybercrimes, as there is no uniform or
universally accepted definition of cybercrime. It is used as an umbrella term for a set of activities
that have yet to be incorporated fully into the national legal regimes around the world and is used
interchangeably with computer crimes, computer misuse, or IT crimes
Despite the frequent use of the term, there is no commonly accepted definition. Cybercrimes is
related to computers, however, there is no consensus on whether those computers have to be
interconnected or not.
a. The UN Manual on the Prevention and Control of Computer- Related Crimes:
Computer crime can involve activities that are traditional in nature, such as theft, fraud,
forgery and mischief, all of which are generally subject everywhere to criminal sanctions. The

computer has also created a host of potentially new misuses or abuses that may, or should be
criminal as well
b. UK National Criminal Intelligence Service:
An offence in which a computer is directly and significantly instrumental in the commission of
the crime
c. Pavan Duggal
Cyber Crime refers to all the activities done with criminal intent in cyberspace or using the
medium of internet. These could either the criminal activities in the conventional sense or
activities, newly evolved with the growth of the new medium. Any activity, which basically
offends human sensibilities, can be included in the ambit of cybercrimes.
Difference Between Cyber Crime And Conventional Crime
1. Cyber Crimes always involve use of computers and technology.
2. Cyber Crimes can be committed in the jurisdiction without the criminal being physically
present in it, i.e. it knows no geographical limitations, boundaries or distances.
3. Cyber Crimes is not always clearly illegal as compared to conventional crimes. This is because
of lack of law punishing them.
4. It requires only small resources as compared to the resultant damage caused by the
commission of the crime.
Types Of Cyber Crimes
1. Hacking: - Hacking means unauthorized access to a computer system. As defined in Section
66 of the Information Technology Act, 2000, hacking is whoever with the intent to cause or
knowing that he is likely to cause wrongful loss or damage to the public or any person destroys
or deletes or alters any information residing in a computer resource or diminishes its value or
utility or affects it injuriously by means commits hacking
2. Virus, Trojans and Worms: - A Computer virus is a program designed to affect the health of the
computer. They destroy or hampers the computer systems. Trojan is defined as a maliciously,
security breaking program that is disguised as something benign such as a directory lister,
archive, game, or a program to find and destroy viruses.
3. Cyber Pornography: - Cyber pornography is pornographys which is distributed via the
internet, primarily websites, peer-to peer file sharing or Usenet newsgroups. This is a crime that
is clearly illegal, both on and off the internet
4. Cyber Stalking: - Cyber Stalking is defined as the repeated acts of harassment or threatening
behaviour of the cybercriminal towards the victims by using internet services.

5. Cyber Terrorism: - Cyber terrorism may be defined to be the premeditated use of disruptive
activities, or the threat thereof, in cyber space, with the intention to further social, ideological,
religious, political or similar objectives, or to intimate any person in furtherance of such
objectives
6. Cyber Crimes related to Finance: - Crimes over internet for earning financial or monetary gain
thorough illegal means. It may occur in many forms, but the most recognized technique is online
fraud and spoofing. This would include cheating, credit card frauds, money laundering, etc.
7. with mobile and Wireless Technology: - due to the development in mobile and wireless
technology, much work can be carried out on mobiles phones, which was earlier possible only on
computers. Emergence of mobile money, telephone banking, etc. has raised the threat of crimes
committed through this medium.
8. Data Diddling: - This kind of an attack involves altering the raw data just before a computer
processes it and then changing it back after the processing is completed.
9. Internet time thefts: - This connotes the usage by an unauthorized person of the internet hours
paid for by another person. This type of crime was unheard until the victim reported it.
10. Logic bombs: - this is an event dependent program. This implies that this program is created
to do something only when a certain event occurs.
Statuary Provisions (Information Technology Act, 2000)
The first step in the field of cyber law was the Model Law which was drafted under the United
Nations Commissions on International Trade law, 1986. Then, the United Nations general
assembly on 30th January, 1999 passed a resolution to regulate e-commerce through uniform set
of laws applicable to its members countries.
Being a signatory to the resolution, Parliament of India has a passed the Information Technology
Act, 2000 on 17th may, 2000.
The preamble of the Act states that the objectives of the act is to legalise e-commerce and further
amend the Indian penal Code, 1860, the India Evidence Act,182, the Bankers Book Evidence
Act, 1891and the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934 to make compatible with this Act.
The Act consists of 13 Chapters and governs laws relating to Electronic Contract, Electronic
Record, Digital Signature and the use of the electronic records and signature in Government
records. It also regulates the activities of the Network Service Providers, Internet Service
Providers (ISPs).

Punishments And Offences

The main aim of the act is to legalize the digital language so that people can easily and without
fear use the electronic devices for their own purposes like doing business or for entertainment. It
prescribes certain offences and penalties to keep a check on the cyber crime, the main of them
are:
Section 65: Tampering with Computer Source Documents
Section 66: Hacking with Computer System
Section 67: Publishing of obscene information which is obscene in electronic form.
Section 70: breach of confidentially and privacy.
In addition to above, Section 77 of the Act states that No penalty imposed or confiscation made
under this Act shall prevent the imposition of any other punishment to which the person affected
thereby is liable under any other law for the time being in force. which means the civil crimes
can also be made as Criminal Act, as
Computer Network Breaking and Hacking: - S. 66(2) of I.T. Act and S. 441 of IPC
Child Pornography: - S. 67 of I.T. Act and S. 294 of IPC
Email- bombing: - S. 43(e) of I.T. Act and S. 425-441 read with S447 of IPC
Password Sniffing: - S. 43(a), (g) of I.T. Act and S. 419 of IPC
Credit Card Fraud: - I.T. Act and S. 443 (a) and (g) read with 426, 427 and 447 of IPC.
Jurisdiction Issues
Jurisdiction is one of the debatable issues in the case of cyber crime due to the very universal
nature of the cyber crime. With the ever-growing arm of the cyber space the territorial concept
seems to vanish. New Methods dispute resolution should give way to the conventional methods.
Thus, the Information Technology Act, 2000 is silent on these issues.
Though S. 75 provides for extra-territorial operations of this law, but they could be meaningful
only when backed with provisions recognizing orders and warrants for Information issued by
competent authorities outside their jurisdiction and measure for cooperations for exchange of
material and evidence of computers crimes between law enforcement agencies.
Pornography
The word Pornography is derived from the Greek words Porne means prostitute graphein
means to write. It further implies that the subject is not mutual love or love at all, but domination
and violence against women. It ends with a root graphos, which means writing about or
description of which puts still more distance between the subjects and objects. Thus, it induces
a spontaneous deep desire for closeness with object and voyeur, a dangerous situation rendering
a person to become a covert, passive, and powerless observer of the pornographic activities

written or otherwise available in cyberspace. Originally, limited to any art or literary work
dealing with sex and sexual themes, its scope has now broadened. Pornography is easily
recognized but is often difficult to define concisely.
Pornography being a international problem had been a query for many of law formulating
agency, there are various problem in describing the term pornography. Even in I.T. Act, 2000 in
India, the term has not been defined.
The Canadian dictionary of English language defines it as sexually explicit material that
sometimes equates sex with power and violence. This definition includes only the concepts of
power and violence.The Encyclopaedia of Ethics has defined Pornography as the sexual
explicit depiction of person, in words or images, created with the primary aim and reasonable
hope, of eliciting significant sexual arousal on the part of the consumers of such materials. It is a
verbal or visual representation of sexual acts it portrayed of people as sexual objects for
pleasure of others. Pornographic materials are intended to arousal stimulation.
Pornography is seldom attempted to be defined by lawmakers. It was attempted to be defined by
Mackinnon-Dworkin as graphic sexually explicit subordination of women, whether in picture
or in words, that includes women being presented dehumanized as sexual objects, things or
commodities or they being presented as sexual objects who enjoy pain or humiliation or being
presented as sexual objects who experience sexual pleasure in being raped or being presented as
sexual objects tied up or cut up or mutilated or bruised or physically hurt or being presented in
postures of sexual submission, servility or displays or womens body parts not limited to
vaginas, breasts and buttocks- are exhibited, such that women are reduced to those parts or
women are presented as whores by nature or women being penetrated by objects or animals or
women being presented in scenarios off degradations, injury, torture, shown as filthy or inferior,
bleeding or hurt in a context that makes these conditions sexual. Pornography not only includes
the female sex workers also about subordination of Children (both male and female) and adult
male workers.
Thus, there is no particular category named as pornography in law. It is also considered to be a
more aggravated form of Obscenity. Pornography is usually regulated by the obscenity laws.
Thus, there is no unanimous agreement upon definition of pornography among scholars. Courts
have also refrained from attempting to resolve the debate of definition of pornography.
Cyber Pornography
Cyber pornography refers to stimulating sexual or other erotic activity over the internet.It would
include pornographic websites; pornographic magazines produced using computers (to publish
and print the material) and the Internet (to download and transmit pornographic pictures, photos,
writing, etc.)

Information technology made it much easier to create and distribute pornographic materials
through the Internet, as it can be transmitted in any part of the world within a few seconds.
The pornographic industry is larger than the revenues of the top technology companies
combined: Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Yahoo!, e-bay, and the likes.
The growth of technology has flip side to it causing multiple problems in everyday life. Internet
has provided a medium for the facilitation of crimes like pornography. As a result 50% of the
websites exhibit pornographic material on the internet and thus, considered to be, one of the
largest businesses on the Internet today. The increasing numbers of pornographic websites that
flourish on the Internet are evidence to it.
Owing to the fast reproduce on new storage media like Hard-disk, CD-ROMS, Pen- Drives, etc.
it proves as a fast means of its distribution.
Reasons For Rise In Cyber Pornography
a. Firstly, the technological development has reached to such an extent that life without such
communication devices is not possible. This led to fast and easy access to these technologies,
making it more and more effortless as compared to the traditional form. With this, one can access
the pornographic material online. One can view this content at free of cost in the privacy of their
own home.
b. One finds it difficult to purchase this type of content in the printed form, especially the
youngsters and childrens. There was a fear among them which comes with purchasing
pornographic materials or embarrassment of being caught or with it. Such hurdles has now been
removed as it is available in a matters of seconds and without any fear of being caught.
Legal Framework/Statutory Guidelines
1. Information Technology Act, 2000
The issue of cyber pornography has been dealt with in Section 67 of the IT Act where publishing
of information which is obscene in electronic form has been made an offence. The section states
that
Whoever publishes or transmits or causes to be published in the electronic form, any material
which is lascivious or appeal to the prurient interest or if its effect is such as to tend to deprave
and corrupt persons who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or
hear the matter contained or embodied in it, shall be punished on first conviction with
imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to five years and with fine
which may extend to one lakh rupees and in the event of a second or subsequent conviction with
imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to ten years and also with fine
which may extend to two lakh rupees.

2. Indian Penal Code

Section 292 of Indian Penal Code states that: [(1) For the purposes of sub-section (2), a book, pamphlet, paper, writing, drawing, painting,
representation, figure or any other object, shall be deemed to be obscene if it is lascivious or
appeals to the prurient interest or if its effect, or (where it comprises two or more distinct items)
the effect of any one of its items, is, if taken as a whole, such as to tend to deprave and corrupt
person, who are likely, having regard to all relevant circumstances, to read, see or hear the matter
contained or embodied in it.]
[(2)] Whoever
(a) sells, lets to hire, distributes, publicly exhibits or in any manner puts into circulation, or for
purposes of sale, hire, distribution, public exhibition or circulation, makes, produces or has in his
possession any obscene book, pamphlet, paper, drawing, painting, representation or figure or any
other obscene object whatsoever, or
(b) imports, exports or conveys any obscene object for any of the purposes aforesaid, or knowing
or having reason to believe that such object will be sold, let to hire, distributed or publicly
exhibited or in any manner put into circulation, or
(c) takes part in or receives profits from any business in the course of which he knows or has
reason to believe that any such obscene objects are for any of the purposes aforesaid, made,
produced, purchased, kept, imported, exported, conveyed, publicly exhibited or in any manner
put into circulation, or
(d) advertises or makes known by any means whatsoever that any person is engaged or is ready
to engage in any act which is an offence under this section, or that any such obscene object can
be procured from or through any person, or
(e) offers or attempts to do any act which is an offence under this section,
shall be punished [on first conviction with imprisonment of either description for a term which
may extend to two years, and with fine which may extend to two thousand rupees, and, in the
event of a second or subsequent conviction, with imprisonment of either description for a term
which may extend to five years, and also with fine which may extend to five thousand rupees].
The test of obscenity in of Section 67 of I.T. Act is same that of Section 292 of Indian Penal
Code, 1860 which was introduced in Samaresh Bose v. Amal Mitra.
3. Indecent Representation of Womens Act, 1986
This act was enacted with the aim of prohibiting indecent representation of women through the

means of advertising or publication, writing, figure or in any other manner and for matters
connected therewith or incidental thereto
4. Young Person (Harmful Publication) Act
This act covers pornography that depicts sexual violence against women and children portraying
rape, sexual; assault and like crimes.
Cyber Jurisdiction
The internet can be seen as a multi jurisdictional because of the ease which a user can access of
website anywhere in the world. It can be even viewed as a jurisdictional in the sense that from
the users perspective that the state and national borders are essentially transparent. For courts
determining jurisdiction situation is more problematic. The court in Zippo mfg. v. Zippo dot com
inc said that there is a global revolution looming on the horizon and the development of the law
in dealing with the allowable scope of personal jurisdiction based on internet use in its infancy
The developing law of jurisdiction must addressed whether a particular event in cyber space is
controlled by the law of state or country where the website is located, by the law of the state or
the country where the internet service provider is located. A number of commentators have
voiced their opinion that cyber space should be treated as separate jurisdiction. In practice this
view has not been supported or addressed by the law makers
Cyber jurisdictional cases have been dealt with primarily in civil courts. Since the advent of US
v. Thomas, infra and Minnesota v. Granite gate resort,
Cyber jurisdictions issues have been began to be examined in criminal courts as well.
Cyber Jurisdiction in Criminal Cases: - the question of cyber jurisdiction came to a forefront of
attention of early 1996 in US. v. Thomas where the sixth circuit upheld the conviction of a
couple operating a pornographic bulletin from their home. The defendant began, operating the
amateur computer bulletin broad system (AABBS) from their home199.
The AABBS content approximately 14000 gif files. These files should be easily accessed or
retrieved or download by one who possessed a password. 1994, a US magistrate judge issued a
search warrant which led to authorizing the confiscation of the defendant computers. The
defendant was convicted in the district courts against which they appealed. The court held that
the statute must be construed to affect the intent of the Congress which was to prevent any
obscene matter. D argued that the internet environment provides broad ranging connections
among people in cyberspace. As such that notion obscenity tied to geographical local would put a
chill on protected speech.
Dasserted a more flexible definition was needed was DMS operator could not select to receive

their materials.
The court ruled out that the D had pre existing method of screening potential members by prescreening their members; they could protect themselves from being subjected to liability in
jurisdiction with less tolerant standards. This could be further said that D was to tailor their
message on as selective to the communities it should to serve so there no need to develop any
definition.
Liability Of Internet Service Providers
Internet service Providers acts a link for the activities that takes place on the internet. He runs the
risk of being liable for information that is transmitted over the information system provide by his
services. S.79 of I.T. Ct, 200 provides the network service providers is not subject to any civil or
criminal liability under this act for any third party information or data made available by him, if,
he proves that the offence was committed without his knowledge., or that he had exercised all
due diligence to prevent the commissioning of such offence. NSPs will be held liable for their
consent or third party consent that they adopt or approve of.
With transactions occurring over an open network environment, questions are raised as to the
liability of the carriers of their transactions, disputes and problems arise. In the physical world,
intermediaries such as publishers for the content published by the authors. However, in the
electronic there are some classes of intermediaries who carry the data and do not exercise the
direct control over the content. For promoting the electronic transaction it is important to clarify
the liability if such NSPs. It is proposed that intermediaries who are ISPs are not responsible for
thirds party content for which they mere provide access to. It is necessary to insure that providers
do not shirk their responsibilities under the licensing scheme to regulate the undesirable content.
The provision therefore makes it clears that it will absolve ISPs from their licensing obligations.
Judicial Trends
1. Avnish Bajaj vs. State (N.C.T.) of Delhi, (2005) 3 Comp, LJ 364 (Del) 116 (2005) DLT 427,
2005(79) DRJ 576
Facts of the case: Avnish Bajaj (Appellants), CEO of Baazee.com, an online auction website, was arrested for
distributing cyber pornography. The charges stemmed from the fact that someone had sold copies
of a pornographic CD through the Baazee.com website.
Issues raised by the Prosecution
1. The accused did not stop payment through banking channels after learning of the illegal nature
of the transaction.
2. The item description "DPS Girl having fun" should have raised an alarm.

Issues raised by the Defence

1. Section 67 of the Information Technology Act relates to publication of obscene material. It
does not relate to transmission of such material.
2. On coming to learn of the illegal character of the sale, remedial steps were taken within 38
hours, since the intervening period was a weekend.
Factors considered by the court were:
1. There was no prima facie evidence that Mr. Bajaj directly or indirectly published the
pornography,
2. The actual obscene recording/clip could not be viewed on Baazee.com,
3. Mr. Bajaj was of Indian origin and had family ties in India.
Findings of the court:
1. It has not been established from the evidence that any publication took place by the accused,
directly or indirectly.
2. The actual obscene recording/clip could not be viewed on the portal of Baazee.com.
3. The sale consideration was not routed through the accused.
4. Prima facie Baazee.com had endeavoured to plug the loophole.
5. The accused had actively participated in the investigations.
6. The nature of the alleged offence is such that the evidence has already crystallized and may
even be tamper proof.
7. Even though the accused is a foreign citizen, he is of Indian origin with family roots in India.
8. The evidence that has been collected indicates only that the obscene material may have been
unwittingly offered for sale on the website
9. The evidence that has been collected indicates that the heinous nature of the alleged crime may
be attributable to some other person.
Decision of the court given on 21.12.2004
1. The court granted bail to Mr. Bajaj subject to furnishing two sureties of Rs. 1 lakh each.
2. The court ordered Mr. Bajaj to surrender his passport and not to leave India without the
permission of the Court.
3. The court also ordered Mr. Bajaj to participate and assist in the investigation.
2. State of Tamil Nadu v/s Dr. L. Parekh
Summary of the case:
State of Tamil Nadu v/s Dr L. Prakash was the landmark case in which Dr L. Prakash was
sentenced to life imprisonment in a case pertaining to online obscenity. This case was also
landmark in a variety of ways since it demonstrated the resolve of the law enforcement and the
judiciary not to let off the hook one of the very educated and sophisticated professionals of India.
3. State of Tamil Nadu v. Suhas Katti

Facts: This case is about posting obscene, defamatory and annoying message about a divorcee
woman in the Yahoo message group. E-mails were forwarded to the victim for information by
the accused through a false e- mail account opened by him in the name of the victim. These
postings resulted in annoying phone calls to the lady. Based on the complaint police nabbed the
accused. He was a known family friend of the victim and was interested in marrying her. She
married to another person, but that marriage ended in divorce and the accused started contacting
her once again. And her reluctance to marry him he started harassing her through internet. Held:
The accused is found guilty of offences under section 469, 509 IPC and 67 of IT Act 2000 and
the accused is convicted and is sentenced for the offence to undergo RI for 2 years under 469
IPC and to pay fine of Rs.500/-and for the offence u/s 509 IPC sentenced to undergo 1 year
Simple imprisonment and to pay fine of Rs.500/- and for the offence u/s 67 of IT Act 2000 to
undergo RI for 2 years and to pay fine of Rs.4000/- All sentences to run concurrently.
The accused paid fine amount and he was lodged at Central Prison, Chennai. This is considered
the first case convicted under section 67 of Information Technology Act 2000 in India.
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# According to statistics provided Web Usage Statistics at last assessed on 15 September,
2012
# UN Manual on the Prevention and Control of Computer-related Crime,
# last assessed on 25 September, 2012
# UK National Criminal Intelligence Service(UKNCIS), Project Trawler, 1996 <
http://www.ncis.co.uk/newpage1.htm> last assessed on 25 September, 2012
# Pavan Duggal, Cyberlaw the Indian Perspective, at 256 (2002)
# Dr. R. K. Chaubey, An introduction to Cyber Crime and Cyber Law, 2008 Edition, Kamal Law
House (Kolkata) at pg. 145
# Ling Rich, the mobile Connection: the Cell Phones Impact on Society, 2004
# ACT 21 of 2000
# Report by Mcconnel International, Cyber Crime and Punishment? Archaic laws Threaten
Global Information, December 2000 available at< www.mcconnellinternational.com, last
accessed on 20th September, 2012
# Preamble of the Information Technology Act, 2000, Supra n. 17
# G.S. Bajpai, On Cirme and Cyber Law, First edition (2011) Serials Publication (New Delhi) at
pg. 25
# Excerpted from Oxford Talking Dictionary. Copyright 1998 the Learning Comonay Inc.
# Supra note 3 at pg. 120
# Easten, Susan . Pornography Encyclopedia of Applied Ethics. Toronto: Academic Press,
1998
# Van De Beer, Donald. Pornography Encyclopedia of Ethics. New York: Garland
Publishing, 1992
# In the year 1983, Ordinance for Minneapolis by Andrea Dworkin and Catherine Mackinnon as
appeared in Brajesh Rajak, Pornography Law: XXX MUST NOT BE TOLERATED Universal
Law Publishing New Delhi at pg. 1
# Brajesh Rajak, Pornography Law: XXX MUST NOT BE TOLERATED Universal Law
Publishing New Delhi at pg. 1-2
# SEE www.internetfraud.usdoj.gov (last visited on 15 September, 2012
# Available at http://internet-filter-review.toptenreviews.com/internetpornography-statics.html
last visited on 28 September, 2012.
# AIR 1986 SC 967
# See: http://www.cyberlawconsulting.com/cyber-cases.html last assessed on 2nd October, 2012

# Legal Service India < http://legalservicesindia.com/article/article/offences-&-penalties-underthe-it-act-2000-439-1.html> last assessed on 2 Octobe, 2012

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