Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre (I4C)

Prelims – Current events of national and international importance.

Mains (GS III) – Basics of cyber security, money-laundering and its prevention.

Why in news?

Recently, Union Ministry of Finance issued notification to include Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) under the Section 66 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

• Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre (I4C) acts as a nodal point to curb cybercrime in the country.
• Established on – 2020.
• Nodal ministry – Ministry of Home Affairs.
• Aim – To provide a framework and eco-system for Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs) for dealing with Cybercrime in a coordinated and comprehensive manner.
• Functions – It works to strengthen efforts against cybercrimes committed against women and children.
• It facilitates easy filing of cybercrime-related complaints and helps identify cybercrime trends and patterns.
• It also acts as an early warning system for law enforcement agencies to enable proactive cybercrime prevention and detection.
• It promotes public awareness about preventing cybercrimes.
• It assists States/UTs in building the capacity of police officers, public prosecutors, and judicial officers related to cyber-crime.
• States/UTs are primarily responsible for the prevention, detection, investigation, and prosecution of crimes, including cybercrime and digital arrest scams, through their law enforcement agencies (LEAs)

Cybercrimes fall in State subjects as per the 7^th Schedule of the Constitution of India.

• Data Sharing by Enforcement Directorate (ED) – The Finance Ministry has included the I4C in the list of agencies with which the Enforcement Directorate is permitted to share information under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
• Reason – The measure comes amid growing instances of cyber frauds, Digital arrest and most cyber frauds are trans-national in nature.
• I4C will be the 27^th entity authorized for getting data from ED under Section 66 of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.

Section 66 of PMLA empowers the head of the ED to share information to initiate action aginst violation of various laws.

• Other entities authorized for such data sharing include SEBI, RBI, CCI, SFIO, GST Council and others.
• Significance – The data from the Enforcement Directorate and other law enforcement agencies could help I4C to strengthen the country’s fight against cyber-enabled financial crimes.

The ‘Citizen Financial Cyber Fraud Reporting and Management System’, under I4C, launched in 2021 to enable immediate reporting of financial frauds and prevent the siphoning off of funds by fraudsters.

Reference

The Business Line| ED to share data with I4C