affiliate marketing Law & Order: August 2011

Sunday 14 August 2011

Some major defects in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act. 2006 (PART 3) Provisions related to Cyber Appellate Tribunal

(PART 3) Provisions related to Cyber Appellate Tribunal

Sec.82: Establishment of Cyber Appeal Tribunal. –
(1) The government shall by notification in the official gazette, establish one or more appellate tribunal to be known as Cyber Appellate Tribunal.
(2) The Cyber Appeal Tribunal will be comprised of a chairman and two members appointed by the government.
(3) The chairman will be such person who was a justice of the Supreme Court or is continuing his post or capable to be appointed judicial executive as a district judge or he may be retired and the other will be a person having the knowledge and experience in information technology that is prescribed.
(4) The chairman and other members will be in their post for minimum 3 years and maximum 5 years and the conditions of their service will be decided by the government.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
Here in sub-section (4) of the section it is said that the chairman and other members will be in their post for minimum 3 and maximum 5 years. Including maximum is ok but for including minimum the suspension of any of them for any breach will violate it. So it was to be included that “unless they commit any breach.”

Sec.83: Procedure and power of Cyber Appellate Tribunal. –
(1) The Cyber Appellate Tribunal shall have the power to here and settle the appeal made against the judgement of Cyber Tribunal and Session Court.
(2) In case of hearing and setting any appeal, the Cyber Appeal Tribunal will follow the rules made there under and if the procedure is not fixed by making rules, those rules with proper adoption will be followed which the High Court Division will follow in case of criminal justice by the appeal tribunal.
(3) The Appeal Tribunal will have the authority of supporting, cancelling changing or editing the judgement of Cyber Tribunal.
(4) The decision of the Appeal Tribunal will be final.

Comment:
There is no need for amendment of this section.

Sec.84: Appealing procedure in case of not establishing Cyber Appeal Tribunal. –
Under this part of the Act if the Cyber Appeal Tribunal is not established, whatever may be in the Code of Criminal Procedure appeal may be made to High Court Division of the Supreme Court against judgement of Session Judges or Cyber Tribunal.

Comment:
If the appeal is made to the High Court Division then which law it’ll follow as there are some ambiguities between cyber law and CrPC. It was also to be clarified.

Thursday 4 August 2011

Some major defects in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act. 2006

(PART 2) Provisions related to Cyber Tribunal

Sec.75: The procedure to be followed by the session judge. –
(1) The session court will follow the section 23 of the Code of Criminal Procedure while judges judging the crimes under this Act.
(2) Whatever there may be in the Code of Criminal Procedure, without the report of any official having the status not less than a sub-inspector and any approval of any official appointed by the controller for the purpose any session court as its original jurisdiction, will not take any case to judge.

Comment: As said in section 69, autonomous power to sub-inspector.

Sec.76: The power of investigation of crime etc. –
(1) Whatever may be in the Code of Criminal Procedure, controller or any other authority having authority from the controller or any police official having the rank not less than sub-inspector, will investigate the crimes under the Act.
(2) The crimes under this Act shall be considered as non-cognizable.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
As to the section, offences will be non-cognizable. For this the law enforcers could not take steps against such offences because of the clause. For crimes such as online dissemination of pornographic contents or online sexual harassment, some offences under the act should be made cognizable. The Criminal Investigation Department at a conference of the police in May 2010 gave a brief presentation on the elimination of drawbacks in the act in fighting cyber crimes. High officials who attended the conference agreed on the issues.
Sec.77: Confession. –
(1) Any computer, computer system, floppies, computer disks, tapes, drives or any other accessories related therein respect of which any provision of this Act, rules, regulations made there under has been or is being contravened, or in respect of which any offence has been committed, shall be liable to confiscation by an order of the court trying an offence or contravention.
(2) If the court has been satisfied that the person in whose possession, power or control any such computer, computer system, floppies, compact disks, tape drives or any other accessories relating thereto is found not responsible for the contravention of the provisions of this Act, rules, orders or regulations made there under, the confiscation will not take effect.
(3) Any legal computer, computer system, floppies, compact disks, tape drives or any other accessories related thereto, is found with the confiscated computer, computer system, floppies, compact disks, tape drives or any other accessories related thereto, the legal ones will also be confiscated.
(4) Whatever may be in this section, if at the time of doing crime under sub-section (1) of the section, any computer or any related things of any government or registered government officials is used, then those will not be confiscated.

Comment:
As to sub-section (3) of the section, legal computer, computer system, floppies, compact disks, tape drives or any other accessories which found with the confiscated computer, computer system, floppies, compact disks, tape drives etc will also be confiscated. It should have mentioned the reason for confiscating legal ones.

Sec.79: Network service providers not to be liable in certain cases. – For the removal of doubts, it is hereby declared that no person providing any service as a network service provider shall be liable under this Act, or rules and regulations made there under, for any third party information or data made available by him if he proves that the offence or contravention was committed without his knowledge or that he has exercised all due diligence to prevent the commission of such offence or contravention.
Explanation: For the purpose of this section-
(a) “Network Service provider” means an intermidiary’
(b) “Third party information” means any information dealt with by a network service provider with his capacity as an intermediary.

Comment:
Network service providers may not be held liable for any faults or crimes committed by the computer uses but legal liability may arise to a third party when crime information stored in their service are not regularly reported to the national security authority.

Sec.80: Power to arrest in public places. - In the work of investigation under this Act Controller, any authorized person or any police officer, not below the rank of an inspector of police, may enter any public place and search and arrest without warrant any person found there in who is reasonably suspected having committed or of committing or of being about to commit any offence under this Act by stating the reasons of searching in a written form.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
As to the section any suspected person can be arrested by inspector of police but the bail process provided by sec. 76 is not so easy. So this may cause harassment to people who are not guilty and they may be wrongly be poisoned.
Beside as to the section Controller, Police officer may enter into any public place for investigation, but what will happen in private place? This has to be clarified.

Sec.81: The process of searching etc: - If there is nothing contradictory in the Act every investigation, notice, search, arrest or confiscation under this Act will follow the Code of Criminal Procedure.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
There are certain proceedings in Code of Criminal Procedure which are contradictory to this Act. What will happen in such situation has to be clarified.

Wednesday 3 August 2011

Some major defects in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act. 2006

(PART 1) Provisions related to Cyber Tribunal

Sec.68: Establishment of Cyber Tribunal. -
(1) Government by gazette notification, for the purpose of quick and effective trial of the crimes committed under the Act, may establish one or more cyber tribunal.
(2) The cyber tribunal that is stated in sub-sec(1) will be comprised of a Session Judge or an Assistant Session Judge appointed by the government consulting the supreme court; and such appointed judge will be introduced “Judge, Cyber Tribunal”.
(3) The cyber tribunal under the section may be given jurisdiction of whole Bangladesh or one or more session jurisdiction; and the tribunal will only judge cases of crimes under the Act.
(4) The special tribunal may sit and continue its procedure on a place at a certain time and the government will dictate all this by its order.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
As to this section, one or more cyber tribunal can be formed by the govt for the purpose of quick and effective trial of the crimes. The section could have included establishment of a permanent cyber tribunal for monitoring cyber activities.
Besides, it says that the tribunal will comprise of a Session Judge or Assistant Session Judge. But it didn’t mention how many members to be in the tribunal as we know a tribunal can’t be of a single person. Moreover, it could have used the term “Cyber specialist or Expert” so that not all but only those who have experience in field could be selected.

Sec.69: Procedure of trial of the Cyber Tribunal. -
(1) The special tribunal will not take any case for trial unless there is a written report by any Police Officer not under the rank of Sub-Inspector and approval of the controller or such person having authority from the controller for the purpose.
(2) The tribunal during trial under the Act will follow chapter 23 of the Code of Criminal Procedure for trial in session court; provided that it will not be contradictory with this Act.
(3) Any tribunal for the purpose of justice if considered unnecessary without registering it can’t stop proceeding of a case.
(4) Where there is reason to believe for the tribunal that the accused person is missing or hiding himself for which it is not possible to arrest him earlier, in that case the tribunal by its order, may ask that person to be present in the court by publishing it in two prominent local newspaper at a prescribed time and if that person fails to do so, the trial will be held with his absence.
(5) The accused person or the person having bail, after being present before the tribunal, if he is missing, or if he fails to present in front of the tribunal the process stated in sub-section (4), will not be applicable and that tribunal with absence of the person try him registering its decision.
(6) If the person having bail or after presenting the court, fails to present before the court, the procedure stated in sub-section (4) of the section shall not be applied and the tribunal may in written form give judgement without the presence of the accused.
(7) The tribunal on the basis of the application presented before it, or by its own effort, give the order to reinvestigate any case made under the Act and give the order to submit report in a prescribed time by the authority to any police official, or in cases any person having the authority from the controller.


Reason for amendment of this provision:
The provision entitles only Police officer of the rank of Sub-Inspector or higher to report to the tribunal which is providing monopoly power to him which could easily be misused.
Besides, it was needed to be mentioned that only qualified or expert sub-inspector so that a person who is familiar to computer programming and operating and cyber crimes could investigate as very few officials of our country are familiar with the terms related to cyber world.

Sec.70: The application of the criminal procedure in the procedure of the tribunal. -
(1) The laws of the criminal procedure, as far as possible being not contrary to this Act will be applicable to the procedure of the tribunal and the tribunal will have all the original jurisdiction of the session judge.
(2) The advocate on behalf of the govt shall be known as the public prosecutor.

Reason for amendment:
It could have included the qualifications necessary for an advocate to be able to deal with cyber matters as most of the lawyers in our country are not that much involved in cyber world and very few know about various terms and crimes in cyber world. Moreover, as it is not long internet started being widely used in the country so proper knowledge is also necessary for advocates.


Sec.71: Rules regarding bails. - Judge of the cyber tribunal will not give bail to any person accused under the Act unless-
(a) The government side is given scope for hearing on the ground of bail;
(b) The Judge is satisfied that-
1. There is enough ground to believe that the accused might not be proved guilty.
2. The crime in prima facia view is not too heavy and the punishment, even the crime is proved, will not be hard.
(c) He registers all those satisfactory grounds in written form.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
On technical matters expert opinion/evidence is necessary. It could have included that for judge to be satisfied.
Section 80 empowers the authority to arrest someone and search and confiscate related belongings if that authorized person ‘believe’ that such crime has been committed. Then again, bail seems very difficult under this section. By the time a verdict is given by the court, a person can get harassed while the ‘authority’ enjoys immunity under section 86.

Sec.72: Time limit for judgement. -
(1) The judge of the tribunal from the date of finishing examination of witness or evidence or hearing, whichever occurs later, will give judgement within ten days if he does not extend the time not more than ten days with written statement.
(2) When the judgement is given under the sub-section (1) of the section or if any appeal to the cyber tribunal is made against the judgement then the copy of the appeal judgement will be sent to the controller by the cyber tribunal or appeal tribunal to reserve it according to the section 18 (7) of the Act; if such any copy is sent the controller will take proper action to reserve it with proper process.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
The section provides judge to pronounce judgement within ten days of the completion of examination of witness or hearing which is contradictory to the Code of Criminal Procedure as the judgement pronounced after conclusion of trial which means after 342 statement of the accused person. So this provision should have been clarified.
Beside there is no time limit mentioned for filing appeal against the judgement of cyber tribunal. It could have specified that.



Sec.73: Time limit of disputing a case by the tribunal. -
(1) The judge of the tribunal will complete the judgement procedure within six months of filing the case.
(2) If the judge fails to finish the case within the time prescribed under sub-section (1) of the section he may increase the time not more than three months by stating written reasons behind the delay.
(3) If the judge fails to finish a case within the time limit under sub-section (2) of this section, he may continue the process by submitting a paper to High Court and the Controller stating the reasons behind the delay.

Reason for amendment of this provision:
Sub-section (1) and sub-section (2) of this section is ok. But sub-section (3) could have included a maximum period for finishing the case as there is no period mentioned, the judge could go through the case for lifelong!

Sec.74: Justice by session court. - Whatever may be in the Code of Criminal Procedure, unless special tribunal is formed, the crimes made under the Act shall be judged under session judge.

Comment: No reason to be amended.

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