High-level panel formed to examine digital arrest issues: MHA tells Supreme Court

New Delhi: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Thursday informed the Supreme Court that it had formed a high-level committee to examine issues regarding digital arrest scam cases.

Digital arrest is a growing form of cybercrime in which fraudsters pose as law enforcement, court officials or personnel from government agencies to intimidate victims through audio and video calls. They hold the victims hostage and put pressure on them to pay money.

Earlier in December last year, the apex court had asked the CBI to carry out a unified pan-India probe into digital arrest scam cases. It had passed the directions in a suo motu case registered on the complaint of an elderly couple from Haryana.

It had also sought the views of various Union ministries, including the MHA, on how to deal with cybercrime cases.

The MHA submitted that a high-level inter-departmental committee under the chairmanship of the special secretary (internal security) had been constituted to comprehensively examine digital arrest cases.

It said the committee's mandate was to examine real-time issues faced by enforcement agencies, consider the amicus curiae's (friend of the court) recommendations and court directions, identify relevant legislations, rules, circulars and implementation gaps, suggest corrective measures and provide inputs for further directions.

According to the submissions, the members of the committee comprise officers from the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), Department of Financial Services, Ministry of Law and Justice, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Reserve Bank of India (RBI), Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), National Investigation Agency (NIA), Delhi Police and the Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C).

The MHA said that the chief executive officer (CEO) of I4C would be the committee's member-secretary. The committee would meet every two weeks, it added.

It said the first meeting of the committee was held on December 29, when the CBI suggested having a monetary threshold for cases.

According to the MHA, the MeitY emphasised during the meeting the need for strengthening and activating the adjudication mechanism under the Information Technology Act provision. It said the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) informed that the draft rules under the Telecommunications Act, upon notification, would address concerns, including those regarding negligence in issuance of SIM cards, multiple SIM issuance to a single individual and others.

The MHA said that I4C had informed that standard operating procedures (SOPs) for immediate freezing, de-freezing, recovery and restoration of money to victims were under final consideration. Besides, the revamping of the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) and the 1930 helpline were being actively considered.

It said that the committee also considered the amicus curiae's suggestion for victim compensation and agreed that such relief could be provided where the loss was attributable to negligence or there existed a deficiency of service or fraud on the part of banks or telecom service providers.

The MHA said the committee observed that victims should not suffer due to systemic failures or regulatory non-compliance.

It sought a month from the apex court for further deliberation and inputs, following which the matter was posted for further proceedings on January 20.