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India has been taking significant strides in popularizing Alternate Dispute Resolution mechanisms such as Arbitration and Mediation because of the special interest shown by the Modi Government. On 31st December 2015, the Indian Arbitration and Reconciliation Act 1996 was comprehensively amended (w.e.f. 23rd October 2015) which brought in significant changes to the system as has been prevailing in India. (Check for details at Naavi’s the ADR Knowledge Center). The changes were aimed at reducing delays in the arbitration process, bringing in higher level of discipline among the Arbitrators, Reducing the Cost and also encourage the use of electronic documents in the conduct of ADR.

On January 13, 2017, the Department of Legal Affairs, Ministry of Law and Justice formally constituted a ten member High Level Committee under the chairmanship of retired Judge of Supreme Court, Justice B.N.Srikrishna.

The committee was to look into various factors to accelerate arbitration mechanism and strengthen the arbitration ecosystem in the country as well as examining specific issues and drawing up a roadmap required to make “India a robust centre for international and domestic arbitration”. In particular the committee was required to suggest measures for institutionalization of arbitration mechanism, national and international, in India so as to make India a hub of international commercial arbitration.

After considering views of existing arbitral institutions in March 2017, the Committee has now come up with its recommendations which were released by the Honourable Minister Ravi Shakar Prasad today.

 The detailed report is yet to be available for discussion. However, as per the press reports the following recommendations have been made by the committee.

• Setting up of an autonomous body, styled the Arbitration Promotion Council of India (APCI), which would recognize institutes providing accreditation to arbitrators, hold training workshops for advocates.
• Creation of a specialist Arbitration Bench to deal with commercial disputes. Judges hearing such matters should be provided with periodic refresher courses in arbitration law and practice.
• Creation of a specialist Arbitration Bar by encouraging the establishment of fora of young arbitration practitioners.
• Changes in various provisions of the 2015 Amendments in the Arbitration and Conciliation Act to make arbitration speedier and more efficacious.
• Declaring International Center for Alternate Dispute Resolution (ICADR) as an institute of National Importance and takeover of the institution by a statute.
• Creation of the post of an ‘International Law Adviser’ who shall advise the Government and coordinate dispute resolution strategy for the Government in disputes arising out of its international law obligations particularly arising out of bilateral investment treaties (BIT).
• Permission to foreign lawyers to represent clients in international arbitrations held in India and promoting India as a venue by easing restrictions related to immigration, tax etc.
• Promotion of ADR mechanisms including provisions of mediation facilities by arbitral institutions and considering a separate legislation governing mediation

The changes proposed are of far reaching effect and requires to be closely followed.

We shall await the availability of the detailed report to comment on specific parts of the recommendations in due course.

Naavi

All Articles

Amendments to ACA 2015 suggested by Srikrishna Panel on Arbitration
Srikrishna Panel: Donot make Arbitration the exclusive preserve of Lawyers and Judges
Two Major Failures of the SriKrishna Committee on Arbitration
Ten Commandments of the Justice Srikrishna Committee… and where the Committee has failed?
Justice Srikrishna Committee on Arbitration Submits its report

The so called “Aadhar Hacking Case” filed in Bangalore on Abhinav Shrivastava, has also revealed two important lessons for organizations such as UIDAI, NIC and Hospitals on the one hand and also the Police and the Adjudicator of Karnataka on the other hand. I hope these lessons will be learnt.

Techno Legal Vs Technical Information Security: 

Today’s reports  corroborate the views expressed yesterday in these columns (Refer :The Aadhar unauthorized access case in Bangalore.. Requires More Debate)in which a tentative modus operandi was indicated.

This is a vulnerability in the systems operated by the e-Hospital application owner and shows lack of due diligence under Section 79 of ITA 2000 and lack of “Reasonable Security Practice” by that organization under Section 43A.

The modus operandi as indicated by the accused in his demonstration indicate the vulnerabilities in the system which not only the e-Hospital app user (eg Hospital like NIMHANS), but also NIC and UIDAI who should have been aware of. It is this kind of threats and vulnerabilities that need to be identified in ITA 2008 compliance audits which these agencies are failing to conduct.

I consider that this incident has given a good example of how “Techno Legal Information Security Incident Management” is different from what people (Information Security professionals who use the Uni-dimensional Information Security approach) call as “Incident Management today”.

I hope that this is the first lesson we need to take note from this incident.

Human Rights Violations by Unwarranted Aggression by Police

Police however have not so far initiated any action on the organizations who contravened provisions of  Section 79 and Section 43A of the ITA 2000/8. UIDAI also has not made any complaint against NIC or the e-Hospital application user whose app was used by the Abhinav App.

Instead, both the UIDAI and Police are after the techie who created the app that enabled the release of the aadhar data of individuals on specific request by the mobile owners whose mobile is linked to the aadhar.

On August 4th itself TOI reported  that UIDAI chief AB Pandey said, “The UIDAI would like to inform and reassure the public that there is no breach of any Aadhaar data and compromise of individuals’ privacy and security in this case.”

In view of this admission the very basis of complaint by UIDAI can be declared as unfounded and wrong. They rushed to complain before understanding in full what had happened and the Police blindly acted. Ignorant media persons naturally went to town stating that there was a breach of Aadhar security etc.

All this sensationalism will influence the Supreme Court hearing on the Privacy issue. We know that it was one such indiscretion committed by some constables in Palghar who booked Section 66A case against two girls for their Face Book post/like that made the great Supreme Court ultimately coming down heavily on the Section 66A and scrapping it. A similar over reaction of the Judiciary cannot be ruled out because Bangalore Police is making a mountain out of the mole hill in this case.

Now that UIDAI says there is no breach, it is inappropriate for the Press to continue describing this incident as a “Hacking” incident and they should stop this representation. This is actually a “Security Breach” incident in the e-hospital platform which was exploited by a Techie to create an App which was used by about 50000 persons to check their demographic data as available in the Aadhar data base.

This incident was similar to an earlier case which the undersigned had brought out when a Hyderabad techie had created an application for booking of train tickets through IRCTC bypassing some server restrictions and Captcha. In that case the concerned person was informed by the undersigned and reminded by a TOI reporter that what he did in posting an IRCTC booking application for public download was wrong in law. Fortunately, he understood the error and removed his web post before anybody complained to IRCTC. This saved the career of an otherwise intelligent techie.

As per the original report on the Aadhar case, the Police had booked a complaint under Aadhar Act Sections 37 and 38, ITA 2008 Sections 65 and 66 as well as IPC Section 120B, 468 and 271. (P.S: Sections used has been corrected as indicated at the end of the article. IPC sections used are Sections 34, 120B, 468 and 471. Aadhar Act sections are not there.)

Now that the complainant (UIDAI) admits that there was no breach of Aadhar data, it is difficult to see the logic of how the Police can apply the Aadhar Act sections.

Section 120B of IPC is for “Conspiracy” which should include multiple persons acting together for common criminal intent. This also is absent in this case and hence this section is not applicable.

Section 271 of IPC is completely off the mark and I cannot understand why it was used. This section states as under:

Section 271 of IPC: Disobedience to quarantine rule.—Whoever knowingly disobeys any rule made and promulgated by the Government for putting any vessel into a state of quarantine, or for regulating the intercourse of vessels in a state of quarantine with the shore or with other vessels, or for regulating the intercourse between places where an infectious disease prevails and other places, shall be punished with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to six months, or with fine, or with both.

(Ed: 7th August: As per the copy of the FIR accessed just now, it appears that Section 271 is not added in the FIR. Instead Section 471 (IPC) is present. The error is due to the wrong reporting by a news paper and regretted)

Section 468 of IPC pertains to “Forgery” which also is difficult to be proved.

As regards Section 65 of ITA 2000, it is strange that this section continues to be mis-understood and misapplied in cases where  there is no requirement by law for information to be retained for a certain period of time.

The only section that is relevant to Abhinav Shrivastava, incident is Section 66 of ITA 2000 where one can allege that there was an “Un-Authorized Access”. This also can be disputed as to whether the unauthorized access was to a e-Hospital application or Aadhar server and whether there was a dishonest and fraudulent intention.

We also should not forget that in Karnataka, there is a decision of the Adjudicator of Karnataka that Section 43 (and therefore section 66) cannot be applied when the person who has committed the offence or the entity on whom the offence (Unauthorized access) has been committed is not an “Individual”.

Hence under this precedence, Section 66 also may fail in this particular case.

Thus it appears that the entire case is built on fancy interpretation of different sections all together made to appear as if it is a serious and heinous crime deserving a huge punishment.  In the process the Police have arrested the person in a good technical position and permanently damaged his career prospects.

Probably all the sections were added so that no bail could be granted to the person. Otherwise when people with thousands of crores frauds are roaming freely both inside and outside prisons in Karnataka, there was no justification that Abhinav should have been remanded to custody and could not have been interrogated without arrest or under house arrest.

If the Police had understood the problem properly and not swayed by the name of the complainant, they could have handled this with finesse without unnecessarily hurting the accused to the extent they have done.

Probably this calls for a review of the police action from the “violation of Human Rights” angle. Unfortunately all our Human Rights activists are only interested in protecting Terrorists and Naxalites and this techie will not be considered as a fit case for them to step in.

I am reasonably confident that some of the more informed persons in the Cyber Crime police station in Bangalore would have felt that the arrest might not be necessary in this case but some body must have persuaded the Police to make this a demonstration of what would happen if some body meddles with the UIDAI system.

“Consistency” is the hallmark of good Policing and unless this is maintained, public will not be able to trust the law enforcement system. I hope that Cyber Crime Police in Bangalore tries to maintain this consistency and stand up to pressures from vested interests.

I request the Police to revise their approach and let this techie out on Bail to mitigate part of the wrong they have already committed.

This is the second lesson we need to learn from this incident.

A Note to the Principal Secretary IT of Karnataka

At the same time, I would like to use this opportunity to remind the Principal Secretary IT, Government of Karnataka, who is also the “Adjudicator of Karnataka” that it is a standing precedence created by a past Adjudicator that Section 43 cannot be applied to anybody other than an “Individual” and hence section 66 also becomes a section that can be invoked only of the victim is an “Individual” and not UIDAI or NIC or a NIMHANS hospital.

The current Adjudicator has the responsibility to review this precedence and correct the past mistake. I request him to take this up suo-moto without waiting for any body to file a petition in this regard.

A Note to the Techies, OLA and other Start Ups

I have repeatedly highlighted the necessity of techies to be aware of the Cyber Law related risks that they may ignorantly transgress leading to a permanent loss of career as this incident would mean to Mr Abhinav Srivatsava. The responsibility lies on the educational institutions (like IIT Kharagpur in this case) and the Companies (like OLA in this case) to ensure that those who are trained to create Cyber products are aware of the ethical ways to use their skills.

Just as I have earlier stated that had TCS conducted a “HIPAA Awareness Training” for its employees who were involved in the EPIC case  could have saved the $940 million liability, if OLA had conducted an ITA 2008 awareness training for its key executives, they would have been able to retain Abhinav as their  key employee and avoid a shock to its entire work force which would have a very demoralizing impact on the organization.

Perhaps this incident in which OLA was not involved will however reduce its valuation of the because the company they acquired (Qarth Technologies Pvt Ltd) is now an “Accused” in a Cyber Crime. Other Start ups need to take note.

Naavi

P.S: The above article is based on the news paper report on the sections under which the arrest has been made. Also, it is possible that Police may have information that we donot know. These views may therefore be taken as a view based on available information in the public and stand corrected if required.

7th August 2017: 19.00 hrs: PS: I have just accessed the FIR copy and would like to make a correction in the sections used in the case. As against the earlier asianet report based on which the sections have been indicated in the above article, the FIR indicates the following sections now: Sections 65 and 66 of ITA 2000, Sections 34, 120B, 471 and 468 of IPC. The complaint has been made by UIDAI but the sections of aadhar act seems to have been removed. Some of the comments made in the articles therefore stand corrected.

The earlier report of the sections used was based on the following news report in asianetnews.

Naavi

“Data Theft”, “Hacking”, “Aadhar Data Breach” etc have been the terms used in describing the instance where a person by name Abhinav Srivatsava, who was working as an executive in Ola Cabs created a mobile app and enabled e-Kyc to the App users by linking it to the e-hospital platform created by NIC and used by the National Health portal.

On November 4th 2016, an article had been published in this site titled: Online Registration System for Indian Hospitals.. No Privacy Policy?

In this article, it was pointed out that the Online Registration System used by hospitals (50 plus hospitals are using such applications) enabled e-Kyc through Aadhar but did not care to post even a Privacy Policy.

Today this appears relevant in the context of the accusation of Abhinav Srivatsava that he had made an “Unauthorized use of the application”.

From the available records it seems that the accused seems to have created a mobile app which would go through one of these hospital management websites and fetch the demographic data of persons whose aadhar number is provided on the website.

The aadhar server (CIDR) is connected to only designated agencies who are called Aadhar Service provider(ASA) or KYC service provider (KSA) and any body else including the hospitals are either called the Aadhar User Agency (AUA) or KYC service user agency (KUA) who have to access the data through their contractual agreement with an ASA/KSA.

In the instant case, the e-KYC app of Abhinav seems to have accessed the hospital management system and filled up the aadhar number and captcha to trigger the OTP. If the OTP is provided, CIDR would dispense the details to the hospital website. If one completes the appointment request, the details of the name, Date of Birth, Gender, Address gets displayed in the appointment before confirmation. If it is not confirmed, the data may get discarded. However, before the cancellation, it should be possible to scan the web page and copy the demographic data.

Who ever designed this system should know that it is possible to write some scripts to enter the user inputs and extract the final data without any great “Hacking skills”.

While technically we can call this as “Unauthorized” use, the question that needs to be raised is where is the terms of usage of the page which says that such use is “Unauthorized”?.  Privacy Policy and Terms of Use of the Service are conspicuously absent and “Cyber Law Unaware” techies like Abhinav would not even understand that what they may be doing is punishable.

I therefore consider that to be fair, the managers of these websites should also be booked for “Lack of due diligence under Section 79 of ITA 2008” and “Lack of Reasonable Security Practice under Section 43A” (considering them as deemed body corporates) which should put civil and criminal charges on the e-hospital users.

UIDAI has also been negligent since it was not able to enforce security in its downstream users and remained blind to such possibilities. When we raised the issue of Bank of Maharashra UPI fraud, NPCI came up with the same defense that the fault was in the UPI interface of the Bank and not with NPCI.

Similarly here UIDAI is taking a stand as if it has no fault on its side and even filed complaint against the accused though the cause of action lies with the particular e-hospital application that was used by Abhinav’s App (which should be available from the code).

After the NPCI-Bank of Maharashtra event, if UIDAI people were intelligent enough, they should have foreseen the possibility of Abhinav App kind of possibilities and ensured that the user end security is tightened up. They didnot become wise after the NPCI event.

Also when Naavi.org type of websites place some critical articles like the November 4, 2016 article, they are meant to be read by authorities who are affected and corrective action initiated. We have seen that on several occassions in the past, Government agencies have not taken corrective action and later the dooms day prediction made by us have actually become true. This is not something that we are proud of. It is disheartening to note that the security managers who scout international websites for threat and vulnerability identification are unable to identify that threats and vulnerabilities are also pointed out by authors like the undersigned.

Now the Police in Bangalore who did not want to go against a more serious threat like Wipro Ricin threat, are working overtime to book this IITan techie with several offences under Aadhar Act and ITA 2008. They may technically succeed in proving “Unauthorized Access” but may still fail to prove “mens-rea”. It is doubtful that sections from the Aadhar Act and “Conspiracy” etc will stand scrutiny in a Court. Also if they launch proceedings against Abhinav without including the hospital system that was actually breached, it would amount to being selective in prosecution.

I hope all concerned would debate the root cause of this fraud and take action that would prevent future breach rather than trying to train all their guns against Abhinav only to hide the ignorance and inefficiency of the Government officials.

Naavi

Reference Articles:

Aadhaar data theft: Techie tells police he did it just for kicks, to make an extra buck

UIDAI says no breach of Aadhaar data through the app

What may have made hacker’s task easier

ALSO READ A TECHNICAL ANALYSIS HERE

The tragic news of an young person in Mumbai committing suicide following the game of Blue Whale Challenge is shocking to say the least.

When we learn that more than 130 persons have similarly committed suicide in Russia, we may take comfort that we have taken note of the danger of this “Game” early and possibly we can prevent any more deaths arising due to this menace.

For records “Blue Whale Challenge” is touted as a “Game” and people are enticed into downloading it through Chats on social media. It is not available for download in Google Play Store and hence it targets those people who are deep into Social Media chatting.

There is a view that victims may be chosen based on profiling of the victims from  their Face Book or other similar platforms.

The persons who download the game are given one task per day as a “Challenge” for 50 days culminating with the suicide. Every task need to be recorded as a video and sent to the game controller.

The Complete list of 50 tasks that the BlueWhale Challenge proposes as one task per day:

1. Carve with a razor “f57” on your hand, send a photo to the curator.
2. Wake up at 4.20 a.m. and watch psychedelic and scary videos that curator sends you.
3. Cut your arm with a razor along your veins, but not too deep, only 3 cuts, send a photo to the curator.
4. Draw a whale on a sheet of paper, send a photo to curator.
5. If you are ready to “become a whale”, carve “YES” on your leg. If not, cut yourself many times (punish yourself).
6. Task with a cipher.
7. Carve “f40” on your hand, send a photo to curator.
8. Type “#i_am_whale” in your VKontakte status.
9. You have to overcome your fear.
10. Wake up at 4:20 a.m. and go to a roof (the higher the better)
11. Carve a whale on your hand with a razor, send a photo to curator.
12. Watch psychedelic and horror videos all day.
13. Listen to music that “they” (curators) send you.
14. Cut your lip.
15. Poke your hand with a needle many times
16. Do something painful to yourself, make yourself sick.
17. Go to the highest roof you can find, stand on the edge for some time.
18. Go to a bridge, stand on the edge.
19. Climb up a crane or at least try to do it
20. The curator checks if you are trustworthy.
21. Have a talk “with a whale” (with another player like you or with a curator) in Skype.
22. Go to a roof and sit on the edge with your legs dangling.
23. Another task with a cipher.
24. Secret task.
25. Have a meeting with a “whale.”
26. The curator tells you the date of your death and you have to accept it.
27. Wake up at 4:20 a.m. and go to rails (visit any railroad that you can find).
28. Don’t talk to anyone all day.
29. Make a vow that “you’re a whale.”

30-49. Everyday you wake up at 4:20am, watch horror videos, listen to music that “they” send you, make 1 cut on your body per day, talk “to a whale.”

50. Jump off a high building. Take your life

It is clear that the game’s objective is to lead the target to his death. The series of steps and messaging creates a situation where the victim gets hypnotized and follows the suggestions scrupulously.

The person who has created the sick game, who has been arrested in Russia says that these people donot deserve to live and hence he is relieving the earth of “Useless lives”.

Obviously this creator himself is a psychologically deviant person. He is supposed to be a student of psychology, aged only 21 years and reported to have been a failure in his career.

Just as a dejected software professional turns into a malicious hacker, this person has turned himself into a psycho killer.

The victim is also perhaps a depressed individual who takes into online chatting in search of a friend to pour his feelings out.

The entire game is therefore not a typical cyber crime but a psychological problem of the society.

It cannot therefore be addressed as a Cyber Crime and remedy sought from the Cyber Crime police in Mumbai or elsewhere.

Blocking the Dark Web:

The remedy from the policing angle is how to block the “Dark Web” which if done, will protect people from not only this Blue Whale problem but many other Cyber Crimes.

For this purpose we need to create a separate Internet network like a “White Web” where only verified websites and servers are allowed to be accessed. Websites may be allowed to register themselves with the authorities for a “White Web Pass”. At the same time identified “Dark Web” needs to be blocked leaving a middle range of “Grey Web” as it is now.

The children may be allowed through their restricted device to access only the White Web, create some kind of alerts through the ISPs when notified devices access Grey web or try to access Dark web. This requires the ISPs to create a filter which the parents can activate for specific devices such as mobiles or laptops used by their minor children.

This solution will be opposed by the ISPs and many technology intoxicated persons who believe that it is their birth right to do whatever they want on the Internet.

Let’s therefore leave this for further debate on a different occasion and focus on what we can do even while the Blue Whale Challenge or any other game of this type is still accessible to vulnerable children.

Addressing the Psychological Issue

Since the creator was arrested some time in May, it appears that there were other “Administrators” who had taken over as “Mentors” and managing the victims such as the Mumbai boy. Hence mere arrest of one individual would not bring an end to the menace and we should be ready for more such games to hit the market as long as the sadist technologically savvy creators are out there in the wild.

These creators and the administrators are hard core psychos and we can do nothing to reform them. If they are caught, then they should be permanently put behind the bar or even eliminated with a death sentence.

In the meantime we can address what can we do to prevent our children from falling prey to this game.

The first task is to identify potential victims through our own social media profiling of children, supervision of their web activity, changes in behaviour etc. Part of this can be done by the parents and more can be done through whistlebowing by friends through the Schools.

The Schools should not only undertake awareness creation for Children and the Parents on the menace and try to mitigate the risk but also create a “Whistle blower” mechansim for friends to report any abnormal behaviour of their co-students and also create a “Internet Counsellor” to address the children’s problems.

Children are more cooperative with their schools and amenable to receiving suggestions from their teachers rather than from their parents. Hence the schools have a big role in ensuring that the Internet addiction risk of every kind is mitigated.

The Maharashtra CM has sought guidance from the Central Government on how to address the issue but it appears that the solution lies in the Maharashtra Government (and also other State Governments) to mandate the schools that all of them should mandatorily conduct

a) An awareness program for children within the next one week

b) An awareness program for parents within the next fortnight

c) Introduce a “Whistle Blower” scheme where students report to the authorities about any abnormal behaviour of other students.

d) Appoint a psychology expert as an “Internet Counsellor” to visit the school once in 15 days, to spend some time addressing the students and to meet any children who would like to seek guidance. He/She could also be the Ombudsman for the whistle blower program

e) Report to the compliance through the website of the School.

I hope some NGOs take up the responsibility to coordinate and guide the schools in this regard. The above set of requirements can be considered as “Compliance Requirement” for the school.

Caution: For those adventurers who will try to download the game and check what it is, I would like to caution that the program would come with a trojan which would steal data from your computer or mobile, would be impossible to un-install and could cause other problems related to identity theft including theft of Banking and other financial information related to the mobile owner.

Naavi

Refer:

Man behind Blue Whale suicide ‘game’ says he’s ‘cleansing society’

Beware! This Blue Whale online suicide challenge is scaring parents world over

The truth of ‘Blue Whale’ challenge: A game said to ‘brainwash’ teens into committing suicides

I recall my brief report of the Smart City Council’s program in Bangalore on 28th of July. The central theme of the program was “Surveillance”. However the focus was more on the technology implications rather than ethical or legal issues.

While discussing the issues of “Surveillance” through CCTV cameras the phenomenal increase in the need for storage capacities as well as the band width issues in moving the images collected from the CCTV cameras to the central processing station on a real time basis so as to be of use in real time decision making was also briefly discussed.

 At the same time, the futility of having a low resolution image which later turns out to be of no use in recognizing the persons whose images are captured particularly when the person has committed some crime was also highlighted. This is a problem which Police normally experience. (Other than in the cases where the Police report that the CCTV cameras intelligently stopped functioning exactly when the crime was about to be committed!).

The Smart City Council’s program stopped at creating a case for buying more high resolution cameras and enhancing bandwidth infrastructure and data storage facilities which are all good for the commercial development of the “Surveillance industry”. However, there was no attempt to discuss the possible use of “Appropriate Technology” that can improve the efficiency of the image collection system along with reducing the burden on the data transmission and storage infrastructure. Since there was no representation of a Citizen centric panel member in the discussion, this point did not come up for discussion.

I hope Smart City Council incorporates this discussion in their subsequent so called “Round Tables”, one of which is scheduled in Mumbai for August 4th.

In the meantime, I would like to discuss two specific use cases and solutions that need further discussion in the appropriate decision making fora.

They are

1. Use of Image enhancement Technologies to upgrade image quality
2. Use of smart strategies to get proper images useful for prevention of crimes in the ATM security scenario

This is not meant to be a technology paper and hence it may leave certain technical details uncovered.

Image Enhancement

The idea of using image enhancement technologies is to manage with a low resolution image at the time of capturing and transmission back into the control room but enhance its quality when required with the use of Video image enhancement software running on the back end systems.

The attempt is to use Video enhancement on real time basis so that where necessary quick decisons can be arrived at.

This may be even treated as a “Video Forensic” strategy to create a better video from which vehicle number plates are easily identified, face recognition is reliably achieved so that instructions can be transmitted to operational police or medical or other disaster management units to either rush to the trouble spots or try to intercept a criminal trying to get away.

Image enhancement technologies work on two levels. One is “Optical level” and the other is “Geometric level”.

In “Optical level Super Resolution Imaging Technique”, the limitations of the optical device arising due to the “Diffraction Properties” of light are sought to be corrected for getting an output which is more useful.

In the “Geometric Super Resolution Imaging Technique”, the pixalations are corrected by removing noise so that more details of the picture could get revealed.

Here is an example of a real time video enhancement that can be achieved through software which may use the combination of both the above techniques and apply it on multiple video frames to generate a more intelligible video than what the camera first generates.

The above is just an example of what can be done back in the Police Control room to make surveillance through CCTV cameras more effective when we are constrained to use low resolution cameras because the budgets donot permit. It will also not require huge enhancement of storage and data transmission capabilities.

Those interested can research more on the possibilities. If we can direct some of our research capabilities in IISc type of organizations, we can perhaps develop some of these software indigenously so that the cost of Smart City surveillance comes down significantly.

Smart ATM Security

The image enhancement techniques will work when the problem is really of the quality of image received. It cannot however address the other situations where the CCTV owner does not bother to check if the installed cameras are working or not.

Let’s leave out deliberate deletion of CCTV footage which I have already discussed in earlier articles as a Section 65 Offence and look at an instance where we can force the use of a device only if the CCTV footage is working.

I have proposed this strategy for the ATM security system where

a) Entry to the ATM is through a biometric lock which captures the finger print.

We May or may not  authenticate the person  in real time with the customer data base but store the data for some time for use when required.

b) Face recognition camera is fixed directly to the ATM so that any body who does not expose his face will not be able to carry out the transaction.

For this purpose, the ATM is operated with a lock which gets opened only when the face recognition camera transmits a proper image back to the server and a “Go Ahead” signal comes from the Bank’s server.

The above strategy (IPR with Naavi) is simple and inexpensive but no Bank has introduced it so far because they are either not “Smart” or because they donot want to spend that “Extra Rupee” for security.

When we are prepared to develop the so called “Smart Cities”, such simple “Smart Solutions” need to be tried out as a part of our “Smart City Policing” requirement.

At present I am not sure if Police are part of the initial planning of any Smart City. Most such projects are driven by the vendors and the politicians who look at how fat is the project cost. If the cost is lower, politician is often not interested. ( I can vouch for this from my personal experience in the past). Police are brought in only at a much later stage when the technical infrastructure is already firmed up and there is no scope for structural changes.

I wish a demand is made by the Police that they be made part of any planning to introduce high end technology into our Governance system because they are the people who have to carry the baton when things go wrong.

At the same time, in order to avoid some bad elements in the Police who are subservient to the political masters corrupting the system, there needs to be some checks and balances including taking the CCTV footage archive out of control of the operational people so that it cannot be manipulated on a selective basis.

These are matters of detailing which can be handled in Smart City Policing strategies when required.

In summary, I would like to state that Smart solutions using appropriate technologies are essential to ensure that available technologies are used efficiently while we do also strive to increase the technology boundaries itself with better cameras, more storage space etc.

I urge IISc to dedicate some research in this direction if they have not already done.

Naavi

For some time now I have been trying to reach out to Net4India for some of my services and I am finding that the Company seems to have gone silent on customer interactions.

I have observed technical glitches because of which repeated demands are being raised for renewal of domain names even after they have been renewed leading to double payments which we never know will be reversed.

It is possible that this is not a technical glitch but actually an attempt to defraud the customers.

If any domain name expires without being renewed because of the inefficiency or attempt to extract double payments on renewal, then Net4India will be liable for compensation arising out of loss of domain name and consequent denial of access.

As a Company responsible for such denial of access Net4India will be liable under Section 43 and 66 of ITA 2000/8 and its Directors and executives will be liable under Section 85.

I have personally tried to reach out to the Director and Senior officials of the Company but no one seems to respond. The Help desk number is not picked up the customer relations officer is not responding to e-mails.

Last but most significant is that the e-mail legal@net4.com remains unresponsive.

When the legal department does not respond to a charge of possible fraud, it means some thing is seriously wrong with the company.

Net4 India has a huge stake in customer records and thousands of Indian websites run on their domain name/E_mail services or hosted in their servers. Many of the Government websites are running on the server certificates issued by Net4india and probably even hosted on its servers.

Under such circumstances, if Net4India as a company goes down, there will be a serious Cyber Issue in the country.

I am placing this national Cyber Security concern in the public space so that if any person in Delhi has any personal contact with Net4India, they can try to get confirmation on my apprehension that the Company may be in the process of winding up its operations either in full or partly.

I also request TRAI and CERT-IN to look into the reasons why Net4India remains unresponsive and if the public interest is threatened.

Naavi