Advocate (Dr.) Prashant Mali's Blog

Jurisdiction of Courts in India under The IT Act,2000 A Division Bench of the Allahabad High Court had occasion to deal with the statutory framework pertaining to data breaches in a proceeding for quashing of FIR. In   Amit Kumar Jaduan v State of UP and  others [MANU/UP/3289/2018] the court examined Sections 43, 47 and 66 of the Act. Some of the important observations of the court are summarised hereunder: The act of default must have been committed without the permission of the person who is owner or a person-in-charge of the computer, computer system or computer network. The act of the defendant must have caused some damage or loss to the person so affected. The difference between Section 43 and 66 is that the pre-requisite of the latter is the existence of  mens rea , while under Section 43 of the Act, it is whether the Act committed is without the permission of the owner or person who is in charge of the computer, computer network, or computer system Simultaneous ac...

The Consumer Protection Act, 2019 today becomes a Law in India: Whats New? Why New Law was needed ? New modes of business like telemarketing, direct selling, multilevel marketing, e-commerce etc which were not envisaged thirty years before and now had made consumers more vulnerable to unfair trade practices. Earlier, direct selling and multilevel marketing were regulated through guidelines issued by state governments and the consumer affairs ministry. This new Consumer Protection Act brings these activities in its fold. Besides expanding the scope of grievances that consumers can complain against, the new framework also gives the regulator suo moto powers. The 1986 Act had a three-tier structure that could be utilised by an aggrieved consumer for adjudicating any complaint. However, it did not provide for a regulator who could initiate or intervene on a preventive basis. For instance, direct product recalls or withdrawal of services which are dangerous or unsafe, dir...

Certificate Under Section 65B(4) Evidence Act Is Compulsory for Admissibility of Electronic Evidence: Three Judge Bench of SC - 14 July 2020 Case Law :   Arjun Panditrao Khotkar v. Kailash Kushanrao Gorantyal,  2020 SCC OnLine SC 571   , decided on 14.07.2020 The Indian Supreme Court has held in the above case that the certificate required under Section 65B(4) is a condition precedent to the admissibility of evidence by way of an electronic record. The bench headed by Justice RF Nariman further held that, in a fact-circumstance where the requisite certificate has been applied for from the person or the authority concerned, and the person or authority either refuses to give such certificate or does not reply to such demand, the party asking for such certificate can apply to the Court for its production under the provisions aforementioned of the Evidence Act, CPC or CrPC. The bench has also clarified that the required certificate under Section 65B(4) is unnecessary if the o...

Zohnerism Why we need to Avoid watching too much of breaking news, panel discussions, twitter feeds, WhatsApp university gyan on Cyberspace and TV news channels now a  days! Specially local TV channels. The notorious concept of  Zohnerism  Z ohnerism -  all about twisting of simple facts to confuse people.  In 1997, 14 year old Nathan Zohner presented his science fair project to his classmates, seeking to ban a highly toxic chemical from it’s everyday use. The chemical in question? Dihydrogen monoxide. Throughout his presentation, Zohner provided his audience scientifically correct evidence as to why this chemical should be banned. He explained that dihydrogen monoxide: Causes severe burns in while it’s in gas form Corrodes and rusts metal Kills countless amounts of people annually Is commonly found in tumors, acid rain etc. Causes excessive urination and bloating if consumed Zohner also noted that the chemical is able to kill you if you depend on it and then ex...

TikTok was a data collection service that was thinly-veiled as a social network, for tons of data few rupees were paid to TikToker’s. It use to get information on you, your contacts, or your device,  Phone hardware (cpu type, number of course, hardware ids, screen dimensions, dpi, memory usage, disk space, etc),  Other apps you have installed. Privacy Violated to the core. Everything network-related (ip, local ip, router mac, your mac, wifi access point name),  Whether or not you're rooted/jailbroken. Some variants of the app had GPS pinging enabled at the time, roughly once every 30 seconds - this is enabled by default if you ever location-tag a post IIRC. They set up a local proxy server on your device for "transcoding media", but that can be abused very easily as it has zero authentication. The scariest part of all of this is that much of the logging they're doing is remotely configurable, and unless you reverse every single one of their native libraries and manual...

The French Supreme Court of Administrative Law  rejected  Google’s claim that it had to pay a $57 million fine last year for failing to tell its users how to handle their personal information. On June 19, the French State Council officially released the trial results, confirming the previous investigation results of the data regulator CNIL,  that Google did not provide Android users with “clear enough” information reminders. This  means that it did not have lawful consent to use user data for specific advertising. Considering the seriousness and continuity of Google’s violations, the $57 million fine is also justified. More importantly, the court also confirmed the French national regulatory authority’s jurisdiction over Google. Based on the GDPR regulations, the multi-million-dollar fines faced by Google are by far the highest fines against technology giants. This incident will also have a certain symbolic significance, mainly for those who think whether the GDPR c...

Indian  Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) on 9th February has arrested the country's first 'darknet' narcotics operative who allegedly shipped hundreds of psychotropic drug parcels abroad in the garb of sex stimulation medicines.  Dipu Singh, 21, son of a retired army officer, was arrested by the sleuths of the Delhi zonal unit of the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) from Lucknow recently.  Darknet refers to the deep hidden internet platform that is used for narcotics sale, exchange of pornographic content and other illegal activities by using the secret alleys of the the onion router (ToR) to stay away from the surveillance of law enforcement agencies. Owing to its end-to-end encryption, darknet is considered very tough to crack when it comes to investigating criminal activities being rendered over it.  Singh was a major player on the darknet. His listings were found in one of the biggest and reliable darknet markets like Empire Market and Majestic Garden. Accused ...