Parliament panel pulls up govt on Cyber Laws A report of Parliamentary standing committee has criticized the recent amendments to the IT Act, by describing it as short cut route of making changes in the existing norms instead of drawing new laws. The report further states: "The law pertaining to IT should be self-containing and easily comprehensible to the global village community... Despite the experience gained in about seven years in the administration of the IT Law, no effort has been made to bring a new and exclusive legislation." Related News Parliament panel pulls up govt on cyber laws Govt mulls review of IT Act, more laws on card Report of Standing Committee on IT Laws Menon Committee submits report Who will tackle cyber crime: Delhi Police Amendments to IT Act stalled

India 1. BSE, NSE threat mail: Case registered The Cyber Crime Investigation Cell (CCIC) of the city crime branch on Tuesday registered a case against a person called Abdul for sending an e-mail threatening to blow up the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and the National Stock Exchange (NSE). The bomb threat proved to be a hoax. Read Story | Discuss 2. Rahul sitting duck for cyber squatters The younger generation of Nehru family has become money-spinning names in cyber space, thanks to cyber squatters whose commercial interest recently got a fillip with the appointment of Rahul Gandhi as AICC General Secretary. Read Story | Discuss 3. CBI to get Rs. 35 mn to combat cyber crimes The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is going to get Rs.35 million to fight cyber-related crimes, said Minister of Communications and Information Technology. We will provide Rs.3.5 crore (Rs.35 million) to the CBI for developing advanced software and procuring latest software and tools to fight cyber crimes more efficiently. Read Story | Discuss 4. Attackers turn Bank of India site into malware bazaar Bank of India IT staff are mopping up the mess left by attackers who rigged the firm's website to feed malware to customers trying to access online services. Read Story | Discuss 5. Jharkhand to set up cyber crime cell Jharkhand will set up a separate cyber crime cell to deal with rising cyber crimes in the state. Read Story | Discuss 6. Now Prove identity to log on in Calcutta too Identity proof will soon become mandatory in cyber cafes to help Calcutta police keep a tab on terrorist activities and Internet crime in the city. Read Story | Discuss USA 1. Identity Theft Enforcement and Restitution Act of 2007 Introduced The Identity Theft Enforcement and Restitution Act of 2007 recently was introduced to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary by Senator Patrick Leahy, the Chair of that Committee. The purpose of the bill is “to enable increased federal prosecution of identity theft crimes and to allow for restitution to victims of identity theft.” Read Story | Discuss 2. House Panel Approves International Internet Freedom Bill The House Foreign Affairs Committee on Tuesday approved a bill that aims to shield the citizens of repressive regimes from the overbearing reach of their government officials. It would make US companies liable in the United States for providing foreign governments with their local customers' personally-identifiable information. Read Story | Discuss 3. Attorney unveils anti-cyber crime strategy Attorney General Martha Coakley has unveiled a plan to battle cyber crimes in Massachusetts. It sets out a series of key initiatives including better training for law enforcement officers in cyber crime technology and enhanced processing of digital forensic evidence. Read Story | Discuss 4. ICANN to release single-digit domains ICANN has started a comment period to make the remaining single-digit generic TLDs available. To be considered by ICANN, ideas on potential allocation methods should be submitted no later than 23:59 UTC, 15 November 2007 to allocationmethods@icann.org. Comments may be viewed on the ICANN site - http://forum.icann.org/lists/allocationmethods/ Read Story | Discuss 5. Massive Online Poker Cheating Scandal Uncovered Online poker cheating takes many forms (collusion among players conversing through IM is a common one), but to date I've never seen a poker site operator implicated as implicit in the crime, even if it's through just having poor security. Read Story | Discuss 6. Europe says No to Online Advertisement Monopoly- Google-DoubleClick Deal Google, the search engine giant, has informed that it intends to buy the digital marketing company DoubleClick for US$3.1 billion. Opponents fear both massive violation of privacy rights and monopoly in the online advertisement market. Read Story | Discuss Europe 1. Lawsuit over Virgin Mobile's use of Flickr girl blames Creative Commons Virgin Mobile is being sued by woman who says that a photo of her daughter was taken from a photo-sharing site and used in an ad campaign without permission. The photographer is also suing, claiming he was not warned that his photo could be used in ads. Read Story | Discuss 2. Tech industry launches initiative to boost software security A major new industry initiative has been launched at this year’s RSA Conference Europe, designed to improve the quality and security of software by promoting and sharing best practices among the vendor community, and engaging with government and critical infrastructure providers. Read Story | Discuss 3. Jailed terror student 'hid' files in the wrong Windows folder Careless use of Windows folders cost a Scottish student a lengthy prison stretch today, as an Edinburgh High Court Judge sentenced Mohammed Atif Siddique to eight years for possession of terrorism-related items. Read Story | Discuss 4. U.K. Government Urges Action Against Cybercrime The technology committee of the House of Lords is urging the government to act to protect individual Internet users against online crime. Read Story | Discuss 5. UK Bans Porn Made in the USA Internet porn suffered a blow this week when a British judge ruled that the content of American Web sites could be subject to British jurisdiction. The landmark ruling, issued Wednesday, is a victory for British authorities, who have battled porn on the Internet for years. But privacy advocates worry the ruling could pose a threat to privacy rights. Read Story | Discuss 6. Germany says Chinese state is behind cyber spying The Chinese state is behind almost daily Internet espionage attacks on German companies and government bodies, a top German intelligence official said on Monday. Read Story | Discuss Asia & Africa 1. Chinese cyber-dissident jailed for 4 years A Chinese cyber-dissident has been sentenced to four years in jail after he was convicted of "inciting the government's overthrow". Read Story | Discuss 2. Cheap Domain Names Fuels Cyber-squatting In Asia With the costs of domain names falling, cyber-squatting is on the increase. Cyber-squatting has always been a global problem, but now with domain names being as cheap as $3, it is only going to get worse. Read Story | Discuss | Buy Domains 3. Chinese hacking into top army personnel's e-mails Terrorism in India is a growing concern. And while the security agencies are busy dealing with this problem, another headache has cropped up in the form of hackers hacking into sensitive information such as military data and also e-mails of key persons in the government. Read Story | Discuss 4. Opposition Web sites shut down in Kazakhstan Four opposition news Web sites in Kazakhstan were temporarily blocked during the last weeks. The oil-rich Central Asian country with strong ambitions to chair the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in 2009 has tightened the leash on the Internet in another move to crack down freedom of speech. Read Story | Discuss 5. Nepal: Cyber Law to Come into Force, Finally The Electronic Transaction Act is finally coming into effect three years after its endorsement, as the Ministry of Environment Science and Technology (MoEST) is all set to appoint the Controller of the Certification Authority (CCA), who is responsible to carry on its operation. Read Story | Discuss 6. Hackers Threaten Cyber Money Sites Korea’s W1 trillion (US$1=W919) digital money market is reeling after a series of virtual-item trading sites on the web started to encounter connection problems since the end of last month. Internet users are increasingly alarmed amid rumors that hackers have broken into the sites demanding money from the online trading firms. Read Story | Discuss 7. First Criminal Online Libel Verdict in Bhutan Kuensel Online, the electronic version of Bhutan's English-language national newspaper, reported last week that a man who posted comments on its discussion forums was convicted of criminal libel. This is the first ever cyber defamation case in bhutan. Read Story | Discuss 8. Thailand's anti-computer crime law takes effect Information and Communications Technology Minister Sitthichai Pookaiyaudom said the law, implemented for the first time on Wednesday, to counter cyber crimes, will not affect the public's use of computers or Internet services and was only designed to combat crimes involving national security, lese majeste, medical and pornography offenses. Read Story | Discuss 9. Botswana: House adopts Information Communications Technology policy Parliament has adopted the draft national Information Communications Technology (ICT) Policy after two weeks of debate. Supporting the policy before it went through the final stages on Monday, Maun West MP, Mr Ronald Ridge, said the policy would need certain support structures such as relevant legislation for it to be implemented. Read Story | Discuss 10. South Africa a soft touch for cyber-criminals With ten percent of South Africans already using the internet, cyber crime is increasing dramatically making it the fastest growing white collar crime in the country and an increasing risk worldwide. Read Story | Discuss