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Rajnath Singh tells police to be prepared to tackle rising cybercrime cases in India
Home minister Rajnath Singh had earlier said social media is being increasingly used to spread rumours and terror propaganda.
Union home minister Rajnath Singh has told heads of state police that the rising rate of cybercrime in India is among the latest challenge for law enforcement agencies and both state and central authorities in India must be prepared to deal with the issue effectively.
Singh made the comments during the three-day conference of the country’s top police officials at the Border Security Force (BSF) Academy in Madhya Pradesh’s Tekanpur.
Singh cited the data by the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), which says there cybercrime has increased by 21% every year, during his speech at the Annual Conference of Director Generals of Police (DGPs) and Inspector Generals of Police (IGPs).
CERT-In, an office within the ministry of electronics and information technology, is the nodal agency to deal with cybersecurity threats.
“Mr Rajnath Singh said that social media is increasingly being used to spread rumours and defame public personalities. He also said that social media was being used to disturb the peace and spread terror propaganda,” a home ministry official told the Hindustan Times.
“Officers present at the conference were asked to hold discussions on effective monitoring of social media,” the officer added.
The home minister also spoke about the misuse of social media and internet, a home ministry official told the HT earlier.
The government told the Rajya Sabha last week that cyber crimes cases in the country have grown in the last three years, with the number rising from 9,622 and 11,592 to 12,317 during 2014, 2015 and 2016 respectively.
Minister of electronics and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad told the Upper House that according to CERT-In, 79 phishing incidents affecting 22 financial organisations, 13 incidents affecting ATMs, Point of Sales (POS) systems and Unified Payments Interface (UPI) were reported.
The Reserve Bank of India has registered 13,083, 16,468, 13,653 and 12,520 cases of frauds involving credit cards in 2014-15, 2015-16, 2016-17 and between April-September 2017 respectively, he added.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval are also taking part in the conference that is being attended by officers of DGP and IGP rank from all the states and central police organisations.
Modi, who is expected to speak on Monday, is likely to address issues related to law and order including cybersecurity.
(With PTI inputs)
