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At least one cyber crime is reported every

10 minutes in India

And you could be the next victim.

• Cybercrimes can be defined as: “Offences that are committed against

individuals or groups of individuals with a criminal motive to

intentionally harm the reputation of the victim or cause physical or

mental harm, or loss, to the victim directly or indirectly, using modern

telecommunication networks such as Internet (networks including

chat rooms, emails, notice boards and groups) and mobile phones

(Bluetooth/SMS/MMS)”.

Definition of Cybercrime

• To seek commercial gain by hacking banks and financial

institutions.

• To attack critical assets of a nation.

• To penetrate into both corporate and military data servers to

obtain plans and intelligence.

• To hack sites to virally communicate a message for some

specific campaign related to politics and society.

Motives behind Cyber Attacks

• Malware, short for malicious software refers to any kind of

software that is designed to cause damage to a single computer,

server, or computer network. Ransomware, Spy ware, Worms,

viruses, and Trojans are all varieties of malware.

• Phishing: It is the method of trying to gather personal

information using deceptive e-mails and websites.

• Denial of Service attacks: A Denial-of-Service (DoS) attack is an

attack meant to shut down a machine or network, making it

inaccessible to its intended users.

Types of Cyber Attacks

• DoS attacks accomplish this by flooding the target with traffic, or

sending it information that triggers a crash.

• Man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks, also known as eavesdropping

attacks, occur when attackers insert themselves into a two-party

transaction. Once the attackers interrupt the traffic, they can

filter and steal data.

Types of Cyber Attacks

• The Crowd Strike Work Security Index has said that

there was a 100x increase in Covid-19 themed malicious

files between February and March.

• A total of 4,048 senior decision-makers in India,

Australia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Japan,

Netherlands, Singapore, and the U.S across major

industry sectors were part of the survey.

Key Points

• Cybercrime In India Surges Amidst Coronavirus Lockdown

• Attacks have soared 86% in the four weeks roughly between

March and April, according to a recent Reuters report.

• The spike in cybercrimes and attacks has predictably targeted

private citizens’ wallets and personal data given the sharp

increase in the percentage of India Inc.’s workforce remotely

working as a result of the nationwide shelter-in-place measures

instituted by the government

Key Points

• Chief among these is the ‘PM CARES’ coronavirus fund,

established by the prime minister’s office.

• At least a half dozen fake versions of the site have emerged and

have successfully solicited thousands of dollars from

unsuspecting individuals.

• Senior officials from India’s Home Ministry said that more than

8,000 complaints had been received from Indians both home

and abroad who had duped into giving money to fake versions

of the government’s flagship fund

Key Points

• Cybercrime constitutes a serious problem for India even outside of

crisis periods. India was among the top five most targeted

countries in the world by cyber criminals in recent years,

reflecting the significant amount of work still outstanding in

strengthening the country’s cyber defenses.

• More than 550 million Indians that have connected to the Internet

in recent years, fueled by rural growth. But the rapid proliferation of

Internet users and of the Internet of Things (IoT) has also left the

country’s public and private sectors vulnerable to cyber attack.

The Internet Crime Report for 2019, released by USA’s

Internet Crime Complaint Centre (IC3) of the Federal Bureau

of Investigation, has revealed that India stands third in the

world among top 20 countries that are victims of internet

crimes.

As per the report, excluding the USA, the UK tops the list with

93,796 victims of internet crimes followed by Canada (3,721)

and India (2,901).

According to the latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data, a

total of 27,248 cases of cyber crime were registered in India in 2018.

In Telangana, 1,205 cyber crime cases were registered in the same

year.

The National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal that was started last year by

the Central government received 33,152 complaints till now, resulting in lodging of 790 FIRs.

• The key to lowering cybercrime risk for private companies is by “gaining

domain knowledge and putting in place a user-friendly cyber policy along

with implementing a secure system.”

• This includes “training users, monitoring the system and real-time

response where a user requires assistance in operating the secure

network.”

• On the government side, bolstering information sharing mechanisms,

building attribution capability and strengthening the coordination of

vulnerability disclosure processes are just some steps New Delhi can

take to better protect the country from the onslaught of ongoing cyber

attacks.