The Times Of India

CAUGHT IN THE WEB

After attaining the status of Cyberabad, the city has now also earned the dubious distinction of a ‘hackers paradise’. And, it’s the young crowd that’s committing cyber crimes, often unknowingly though, discovers
Debasmita Ghosh

Sonal, a technical writer in an e-learning company, shivered at the thought of checking her mails because every morning she logged in, she was flooded with dirty emails. But the mails contained a ‘self-destructing’ link that on clicking displayed some obscene messages for a few seconds before vanishing forever. They neither displayed the name nor the e-mail ID of the sender. Police officials refused to touch the case unless she filed an FIR. Threatened and scared, Sonal finally approached a private ethical hacking agency, which, after examining the e-mails tracked down the IP address of the computer used for the act. To her horror, the culprit turned out to be none other than her 30 something boss, who seem to be sending her the mails from a cyber cafe every evening.

In another incident in the city, a man got mails containing lewd images of his 17-year-old college going daughter. On investigation by an Information Technology (IT) security company it was discovered that the morphed images were sent by his daughter’s classmate, that too from his personal computer using someone else’s IP address. Complicated, but no big deal really for those who’ve mastered this ‘art’ - be it for spreading terror, blackmailing or simply gaining cheap thrills.

Believe it or not, in the past five years, cyber crime has increased in the country by 110 per cent and tech-savvy Hyderabad, having earned the tag of ‘hackers paradise’, is contributing the most to it. Local IT security companies report that at least 10 to 15 cyber harassment cases are lodged with them every month and on an average around 200 a year. But that'’s just a handful as most such cases either get lost in investigation or simply remain under the wraps. Surprisingly, till date not a single person from the city has been convicted under the IT Act that allegedly has under its purview crimes like threat mails, illegal hacking, transfer of pornographic material and intimidation through electronic devices like computer systems, mobile phones, PDAs etc. And, a majority of the people who are engaging in such unwarranted acts fall in the age group of 11 to 25. What is it that’s driving this young group to such acts, forget whatever happened to moral policing at home and monitoring activities by ‘authorities concerned’.

Dr Zaki Qureshey, founder and chairman, E2Labs Information Security Pvt Ltd, an ethical hacking agency in town, attributes the rise to sheer lack of awareness. “Cases like the Delhi Public School student which the whole world watched and downloaded, corporate hacking, specially financial institutions like the HSBC where the credit card information of thousands of customers were leaked, hundreds of websites defaced by Pakistani and Chinese hackers are all virus and worm attacks. Now ‘Hacktivism’ and ‘Script Kiddie Farms’ are on the rise,” he points out. “Still, there is no awareness about such issues even amongst the large IT community of Hyderabad. They don’t know what basic cyber laws are. It's like a weapon without a license,” Dr Qureshey avers.

Now, that’s pretty intimidating especially as the city hosts some of the biggest IT firms and business process and outsourcing (BPO) outlets, handling confidential information of millions of customers across the world. Raja Suresh Kumar, CEO, Synchroserve Global solutions and ex vice president, Genpact, Hyderabad, says, “We constantly need to tighten our premises to ensure complete security of data. Right from monitoring physical security through access restrictions to certain zones, putting up close circuit televisions to installing user authentications, firewalls, intrusion detection softwares on every system, there should be a comprehensive check." Agrees Kulwinder Singh, head, global marketing and communications, Satyam BPO, “To ensure the security of highly sensitive information that BPOs handle, they must ensure a certification of data and information security for the safety of both their clients and employees. In our premises, we do not allow employees to bring in their mobile phones or even a piece of paper in certain zones. All sites visited are constantly under vigilance and every step of an employee is monitored.” But what about the basic crowd behaviour? Dr Anuradha Kabra, consulting clinical psychologist, Apollo hospitals blames it to the ‘loss of identity’ syndrome whereby people get a peculiar thrill by conducting crimes in anonymity. “The purpose is to satisfy themselves than harm others. Some also use it as a tool to express their grudge. The recent case of a city chap blogging against Sonia Gandhi is a glaring example. Again, some people, who lack assertiveness, take to social networking sites to get accepted on a macro level without revealing their true identity by being someone else. They use us it as an emotional outlet,” she says. “Criminal instincts show up when all this becomes an obsession and people get addicted to getting a high by not just flirting, chatting or watching porn online but also by harassing others by sending objectionable texts or images,” elaborates Kabra. With the internet entering every household, access to independent technology has become easier. Be it kids or teenagers, the rush of adrenalin is anytime higher and welcoming in winning an online road race than filling circles and triangles with crayons or even playing lawn tennis for that matter. The rest is done by television programmes. It all begins from a young age when parents, instead of monitoring their kids indulge them. Some parents are either too busy to keep a tab on their kids’ activities or are technologically illiterate so they don’t even understand what their kids are up to. “Teenage being the age of curiosity, what initially begins as fun ends up as a crime with youngsters using the internet and other electronic devices as a safe haven to do things that they otherwise wouldn’t have dared to dream of,” feels Gita Karan, director, Gitanjali group of schools. N Murthy, a father of a 14-year-old kid is a victim of such a situation. “Both my wife and me are working. We bought a computer for our son so that it helps his studies but saw that he spends more time chatting with friends than doing his tasks. When we disconnected the connection he started spending on cafes. We can stop him at home but what he does outside, especially when we are away is difficult to monitor,” laments Murthy. According to Dr Kabra, the task isn’t so difficult. “If parents are unable to monitor themselves, ask service providers to block certain sites. Do not give your kids money to go to cyber cafes or buy them expensive mobile phones or any such gadget just because they ask for it. One needn’t spy on one’s kid but at least counsel them in a friendly manner and make them aware that you know what they are doing,” says Kabra. D Satya Prakash, a railway employee and father of a teenager does just that. “Suspicion creates curiosity so I don’t take obvious measures. I regularly check the history of the sites visited by my daughter and if I ever find anything objectionable, I counsel her in a discreet manner generalising the ill effects of certain things,” says Prakash.

At home there still exists hope but what about cyber cafes? Hyderabad has the highest number of cyber cafes and the best available bandwidth with the highest number of home users compared to other south Indian cities.

Surprisingly, 85 per cent of the cyber cafes have no coordination with the cyber crime cell or any policies of the government. “Almost all the cyber cafes allow customers without any background check or identity. No logs are maintained and there’s neither any cyber cafe association formed in the state as yet,” says Dr Qureshey.

No spiderman will come to extricate us out of this web. Only a combined action of both the government and the masses can probably save us of this creeping evil. DISCREET H E L P

Is it just the lack of awareness amongst the masses or is it the authority's inefficiency that's making victims turn to private ethical agencies instead of the special cyber crimes wing that was introduced into the city police four years ago? "The silicon valley of South India is like an unfenced territory which lacks the continuous monitoring of a strict watchman. In fact, half the people don't even know that they have fallen prey until it’s too late. Approaching the police only complicates things and the results are a far dream," believes P Venkatesham Gupta, Chairman, managing director and CEO, Alberg software, that manages the data security of our newly constructed airport at Shamshabaad. Incidentally, it also runs a six month course on ethical hacking.

Like Alberg, there are several other IT security providers, who have introduced crash courses on ethical hacking assuming that there will always be a need for trained professionals in this field. Perhaps it’s also the lack of faith in expertise as well as dealing procedures of the government run cyber crime cell that stops victims from approaching them. “I would prefer my case to be solved silently because the approach of the police is far too loud. They'd rather harass the victim by interrogating him to death and barging into his privacy and in turn may be warn the true culprit," says Rucha Katar, a student at St Mary's, who recently approached a private agency with her case.