Although the digitalization of the economy is significant to India's financial system, the digital push must be accompanied by stronger security of digital transactions to prevent the tsunami of cybercrimes. India's enforcement mechanisms, laws and policies must be re-examined to ensure that the theft of data or money is dealt with, swiftly and transparently.
A recent ASSOCHAM-PwC study found that cybercrime in India arose almost 300% between 2011 and 2014, especially since the recent demonetisation, according to The Hindu. As smartphones become the preferred mode of digital transactions, hacking, phishing and malware attacks are becoming a serious concern. In fact, the Nokia malware report showed a 96% surge in mobile device infections in 2016.
The judiciary role in dealing with cybercrime necessarily means upgrading the capabilities of law enforcement, either through new recruitment or by imparting technical training to existing employees. However, the prescription comes with its own challenges, such as the limited supply of qualified people, according to Legal India.
One much promising option would be Public Private Partnership (PPP) to combat cybercrime. Such partnership model, which already exist and seen fairly successful, will extract skills in the private sector to train the police, while giving practical experiences of dealing with cybercrimes to corporate employees.
One example is the National Cyber Forensic Training Alliance (NCFTA) in the U.S., a non-profit platform that combats cybercrime through partnerships with subject matter experts in the public, private, and academic sectors. A similar set-up in India is the NASSCOM-affiliated Data Security Council of India (DSCI) that establishes cyberlabs in different cities and imparts training - a model that is now ripe for scale-up across the country and can be tapped into by the jurisdictional police to prevent cybercrime.
Having said that, it is necessary to reshape India's current cybercrime laws to address the future waves of offences following digitisation. Given the borderless nature of cybercrimes, the jurisdiction need to be able to pursue offenders with confidence, and if possible, even consider establishing a pan-India cyber-enforcement force.
