Cyber crime has to take back seat; upgraded ‘cyber lab’ commissioned

By Gopal Ethiraj, Chennai

CHENNAI, 14 August (asiantribune.com): The upgraded ‘cyber lab’ at the city police commissionerate at a cost of Rs. 70 lakh was formally inaugurated on Friday by City Police Commissioner T Rajendran. Now equipped with most sophisticated facility in the country, IT- related crimes will be solved faster, the CoP said.

Of late cyber crimes is on the increase in the city. Although special training is given to the police in cyber crimes, for want of latest technological facility, the police was dependent on the private companies to solve the crimes related to computers, SMS, internet, cell phones, satellite phones and credit cards. Mumbai and Delhi have advanced cyber labs, and so the Deputy Chief Minister M K Stalin had permitted to go ahead with the modernization project.

The equipment were bought from US and Isreal. The new cyber lab has 68 forensic tools, 43 relating to hardware and 25 to advanced software. The system has an external memory hard disk, which has a storage capacity of 320 gigabyte, as well as an in-built storage facility.

The police had a successful test run with the new facility. They nabbed the Haryana kabaddi player Sumith, who killed his team-mate in Chennai, by using the advanced technology installed, a senior police officer said.

The lab will be under the direct supervision of deputy commissioner of police, central crime branch, Sudhakar. There is a proposal to upgrade the cyber crime wing attached to the level of deputy commissioner of police because the wing plays a dominant role in cracking white-collar crime as well as other crimes such as murder for gain, a senior police officer said.

The cyber lab will also be useful in investigating cases involving issues of tampering, destruction, restoration and retrieval of stored data, hackers who get into protected networks, defamatory and illegal publications, and intellectual property rights and crimes.

The police commissionerate had a cyber crime wing functioning since 2003, and so far it has handled 133 cases and more than 2,500 petitions, sources said.