Information Technology Act, 2000
The Information Technology Act, 2000 is an Act of the Indian Parliament notified on 17 October 2000. It is the primary law in India dealing with cybercrime and electronic commerce.
Secondary or subordinate legislation to the IT Act includes the Intermediary Guidelines Rules 2011 and the Information Technology Rules, 2021.
Background
The bill was passed in the budget session of 2000 and signed by President K. R. Narayanan on 9 May 2000. The bill was finalised by a group of officials headed by the then Minister of Information Technology, Pramod Mahajan. After passing the IT Act, 2000, India became 12th nation in the world to have its own separate legislation on IT.Summary
The original Act contained 94 sections, divided into 13 chapters and 4 schedules, out of which the third and fourth schedule were omitted later. The law applies to the whole of India. If a crime involves a computer or network located in India, persons of other nationalities can also be indicted under the law.The Act provides a legal framework for electronic governance by giving recognition to electronic records and digital signatures. It also defines cyber crimes and prescribes penalties for the civil wrongs. The Act directed the formation of a Controller of Certifying Authorities to regulate the issuance of digital signatures. It also established a Cyber Appellate Tribunal to resolve disputes rising from this new law. Subsequentl, the Cyber Appellate Tribunal is merged with the Telecom Dispute Settlement Appellate Tribunal. The Act also amended various sections of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, the Indian Evidence Act, 1872, the Banker's Books Evidence Act, 1891, and the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934 to make them compliant with new technologies. In 2023, the Parliament of India passed the three statutes and brought in to force new criminal laws, instead of the old IPC, Evidence Act and Criminal Procedure Code. Now the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita defines the offences and provides for the punishments, the. Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam deals with the provisions relating to Evidence and the Bharatiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita deals with the procedure in the court and investigation. The Parliament of India has passed the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2022 for protecting the privacy and individual data with the provisions for informed consent.
Amendments
A major amendment was made in 2008. It introduced Section 66A which penalized sending "offensive messages". It also introduced Section 69, which gave authorities the power of "interception or monitoring or decryption of any information through any computer resource". Additionally, it introduced provisions addressing pornography, child porn, cyber terrorism and voyeurism. The amendment was passed on 22 December 2008 without any debate in Lok Sabha. The next day, it was passed by the Rajya Sabha. It was signed into law by the then President Pratibha Patil, on 5 February 2009. The amendment of 2009 brought in 6 different offences under Section 66, which are incorporated with Section 66 A to 66F.Offences
The Information Technology Act, 2000 provides for the offences under Chapter 11 under Section 65 to 74. Following is a list of offences and the corresponding penalties under the 2000 Act:| Section | Offence | Penalty |
| 65 | Tampering with computer source documents | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹2,00,000 |
| 66 | Hacking with computer system | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹5,00,000 |
| 66B | Receiving stolen computer or communication device | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 66C | Using password of another person | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 66D | Cheating using computer resource | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 66E | Publishing private images of others | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine up to ₹2,00,000 |
| 66F | Acts of cyberterrorism | Imprisonment up to life. |
| 67 | Publishing information which is obscene in electronic form. | Imprisonment up to five years, or/and fine up to ₹10,00,000 |
| 67A | Publishing images containing sexual acts | Imprisonment up to seven years, or/and fine up to ₹10,00,000 |
| - | - | |
| 67C | Failure to maintain records | Imprisonment up to three years, or/and fine. |
| 68 | Failure/refusal to comply with orders | Imprisonment up to 2 years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 69 | Failure/refusal to decrypt data | Imprisonment up to seven years and possible fine. |
| 70 | Securing access or attempting to secure access to a protected system | Imprisonment up to ten years, or/and fine. |
| 71 | Misrepresentation | Imprisonment up to 2 years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 72 | Breach of confidentiality and privacy | Imprisonment up to 2 years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 72A | Disclosure of information in breach of lawful contract | Imprisonment up to 3 years, or/and fine up to ₹5,00,000 |
| 73 | Publishing electronic signature certificate false in certain particulars | Imprisonment up to 2 years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
| 74 | Publication for fraudulent purpose | Imprisonment up to 2 years, or/and fine up to ₹1,00,000 |
Notable cases
Section 66
- In February 2001, in one of the first cases, the Delhi police arrested two men running a web-hosting company. The company had shut down a website over non-payment of dues. The owner of the site had claimed that he had already paid and complained to the police. The Delhi police had charged the men for hacking under Section 66 of the IT Act and breach of trust under Section 408 of the Indian Penal Code. The two men had to spend 6 days in Tihar jail waiting for bail.
- In February 2017, a Delhi based e-commerce portal made a complaint with Hauz Khas Police Station against some hackers from different cities accusing them of IT Act / Theft / Cheating / Misappropriation / Criminal Conspiracy / Criminal Breach of Trust / Cyber Crime of Hacking / Snooping / Tampering with Computer source documents and the website and extending the threats of dire consequences to employees. As a result, four hackers were arrested by South Delhi Police for Digital Shoplifting.
Section 66A
- In September 2012, a freelance cartoonist Aseem Trivedi was arrested under the Section 66A of the IT Act, Section 2 of Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act, 1971 and for sedition under the Section 124 of the Indian Penal Code. His cartoons depicting widespread corruption in India were considered offensive.
- On 12 April 2012, a Chemistry professor from Jadavpur University, Ambikesh Mahapatra, was arrested for sharing a cartoon of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the then Railway Minister Mukul Roy. The email was sent from the email address of a housing society. Subrata Sengupta, the secretary of the housing society, was also arrested. They were charged under Section 66A and 66B of the IT Act, for defamation under Section 500, for obscene gesture to a woman under Section 509, and for abetting a crime under Section 114 of the Indian Penal Code.
- On 30 October 2012, a Puducherry businessman Ravi Srinivasan was arrested under Section 66A. He had posted a tweet accusing Karti Chidambaram, son of the then Finance Minister P. Chidambaram, of corruption. Karti Chidambaram had complained to the police.
- On 19 November 2012, a 21-year-old girl was arrested from Palghar for posting a message on Facebook criticising the shutdown in Mumbai for the funeral of Bal Thackeray. Another 20-year-old girl was arrested for "liking" the post. They were initially charged under Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code and Section 66A of the IT Act. Later, Section 295A was replaced by Section 505. A group of Shiv Sena workers vandalised a hospital run by the uncle of one of the girls. On 31 January 2013, a local court dropped all charges against the girls.
- On 18 March 2015, a teenaged boy was arrested from Bareilly, Uttar Pradesh, for making a post on Facebook insulting politician Azam Khan. The post allegedly contained hate speech against a community and was falsely attributed to Azam Khan by the boy. He was charged under Section 66A of the IT Act, and Sections 153A, 504 and 505 of the Indian Penal Code. After Section 66A was struck down by the Supreme Court on 24 March 2015, the state government said that they would continue the prosecution under the remaining charges. The Supreme Court in the case of Shreya Singhal v. Union of India held that the provision under Sec. 66 A is violative of Article 19 of the Constitution of India and is operating against the fundamental right of freedom of speech and expression.
Section 69A
- On 29 June 2020, the Indian Government banned 59 Chinese mobile apps, most notably TikTok, supported by Section 69A and citing national security interests.
- On 24 November 2020, another 43 Chinese mobile apps were banned supported by the same reasoning, most notably AliExpress.
- 54 more apps, including popular video game Garena Free Fire, were banned on 14 February 2022 under the same section. There are diverse opinions about the power of the executive under Sec 69 A amongst the legal experts.
Section 79
- ''Asian News International vs. Wikimedia Foundation''
Criticisms
Section 66A and restriction of free speech
From its establishment as an amendment to the original act in 2008, Section 66A attracted controversy over its unconstitutional nature:| Section | Offence | Description | Penalty |
| 66A | Publishing offensive, false or threatening information | Any person who sends by any means of a computer resource any information that is grossly offensive or has a menacing character; or any information which he knows to be false, but for the purpose of causing annoyance, inconvenience, danger, obstruction, insult shall be punishable with imprisonment for a term which may extend to three years and with fine. | Imprisonment up to three years, with fine. |
In December 2012, P Rajeev, a Rajya Sabha member from Kerala, tried to pass a resolution seeking to amend Section 66A. He was supported by D. Bandyopadhyay, Gyan Prakash Pilania, Basavaraj Patil Sedam, Narendra Kumar Kashyap, Rama Chandra Khuntia and Baishnab Charan Parida. P Rajeev pointed out that the cartoons and editorials allowed in the traditional media were being censored in the new media. He also said that the law was barely debated before being passed in December 2008.
Rajeev Chandrasekhar suggested that 66A should only apply to person-to-person communication pointing to a similar section under the Indian Post Office Act, 1898. Shantaram Naik opposed any changes, saying that the misuse of law was insufficient to warrant changes. The then Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Mr Kapil Sibal, defended the existing law, saying that similar laws existed in the US and the UK. He also said that a similar provision existed under the Indian Post Office Act, 1898. However, P Rajeev said that the UK law dealt only with communication from person to person.