Companies
need to ensure Compliance with Indian Cyberlaw
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Companies
need to ensure compliance with various provisions of Indian Cyberlaw
in order to succeed effectively in e-commerce. These were the observations
of India’s leading expert on Cyberlaw Mr. Pavan Duggal at India
Internet World, 2001. Speaking on the subject, Cyberlaws for E-commerce,
Mr. Duggal stated that the new Indian Cyberlaw raises numerous issues
and non-compliance with the same due to the ignorance of law is
no excuse in the eyes of law.
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Elaborating
on the Information Technology Act, 2001, Mr. Duggal said that despite
the IT Act, 2000 having been passed more than one year ago, nothing
concrete has been achieved under the new Cyberlaw barring the registration
of a couple of cybercrime cases and appointment of certain statutory
authorities. The digital signature regime in the country is yet
to effectively take off.
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Mr.
Duggal highlighted various considerations that buyers and sellers
need to appraise themselves of before entering into an online transaction.
Mr. Duggal dwelt at length about the various cybercrimes and cyber
frauds that have begun to take place in the context of the online
environment in India. While Mr. Duggal emphasized the importance
of the IT Act, he added that the online consumers continued to be
a helpless law. There is no law in the country to protect consumers
of electronic transactions.
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Mr. Duggal
urged upon the Government to come up quickly with the prescribed
formats for the effective creation, preservation and retention of
electronic information under the IT Act. Mr. Duggal stressed upon
the fact that companies need to have a detailed IT Security policy
in compliance with the provisions of the new Cyberlaw so as to enable
companies to take complete benefit of the protections afforded by
the Information Technology Act.
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Mr.
Duggal hoped that with the coming of the Convergence Bill there
would be a harmonious construction between the IT Act and the Communication
Convergence Bill, 2001 so as to advance the causes of e-commerce
and to protect the interests of e-businesses, e-consumers and the
e-commerce industry as a whole.
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Mr. Duggal urged e-businesses to adopt a more pragmatic approach so as to ensure the success of the e-commerce revolution in India. |