What Are the Causes of Stress in High School?

High school is a time of change, excitement and physical, intellectual and emotional growth, and these factors contribute to a great deal of stress. High school can be an emotional roller coaster with wonderful highs and dramatic lows. Recognizing the causes of high school stress can help students learn to manage symptoms and minimize the roller coaster effect. In addition, learning to manage stress in adolescence might benefit high school students into adulthood.

Dating and Relationships

• Dating is a major part of high school life for many students. Dating and being in a relationship can mean feeling an emotional bond with someone, receiving and giving affection and attending social events. However, relationship also are a major cause of stress for adolescents. Sexual relationships can become even more stressful because of the increased emotional bond, pressure to do something an adolescent is uncomfortable with, concerns regarding pregnancy or sexual transmitted diseases and infidelity within the relationship.

Peer Pressure & Bullying

• High school students are significantly susceptible to peer pressure and bullying. Adolescents might be pressured to have sex, drink or use drugs, give less importance to studies or myriad other inappropriate or dangerous activities. This can be conflicting for students who know right from wrong and might not choose inappropriate behavior without feeling pressured. Students also might be victims of bullying by insulting, teasing, playing pranks or threatening other students. Perpetrators of bullying also experience stress as they might be pressured into bullying themselves or experiencing emotional problems that lead to the bullying behavior.

Social Networking/Texting

• Many high school students seem to be physically attached to their mobile phones and devices. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy found that 39 percent of teens had sent sexually suggestive text messages, and 48 percent had received them. In addition, 40 percent of teens reported having a sexually suggestive message shown to them, and 20 percent showed such messages to someone else. This leads to stress from the embarrassment about personal information or sexually suggestive pictures being spread to others. The constant use of technology could also be stressful because of the constant use of these tools.

Grades

• Students might feel stress because of the pressure to keep grades high or to raise low grades. Under-performing students might struggle to pass or to raise their grade-point average to be accepted into college, remain on or qualify for an athletic team or meet their parents' expectations. Higher-achieving students might feel stress to maintain a high GPA or receive college scholarships.

Worries About the Future

• High school is a time of transition. High school students are encouraged to choose a career goal, choose academic tracts that correlate to their academic goals for college or trade school, as well as choosing which college or trade school they plan to attend. Students might feel pressured to choose careers or colleges that their parents have suggested or to be close to their friends. There are financial concerns as well. College scholarships are competitive, and prices for secondary education continue to rise faster than the rate of inflation.

Self-Esteem

• Self-esteem is a source of stress for many adolescents. Teens often worry about what clothes to wear, how to wear their hair and in which activities to participate. This is a time of development when adolescents are struggling to find out who they are as a person, and they often look to their peers and the media to help shape their personal appearance, interests and activities. Body image is a significant source of stress. Child.net states that teens often feel pressured to be skinny so they can fit in.

Angry Management

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Brain Damaging Habbits

BRAIN DAMAGING HABITS

1. No Breakfast

People who do not take breakfast are going to have a lower blood sugar level. This leads to an insufficient supply of nutrients to the brain causing brain degeneration.

2 . Overeating=2 0
It causes hardening of the brain arteries, leading to a decrease in mental power.

3. Smoking
It causes multiple brain shrinkage and may lead to Alzheimer disease.

4. High Sugar consumption
Too much sugar will interrupt the absorption of proteins and nutrients causing malnutrition and may interfere with brain development.

5. Air Pollution
The brain is the largest oxygen consumer in our 20 body. Inhaling polluted air decreases the supply of oxygen to the brain, bringing about a decrease in brain efficiency.

6 . Sleep Deprivation
Sleep allows our brain to rest.. Long term deprivation from sleep will accelerate the death of brain cells..

7. Head covered while sleeping
Sleeping with the head covered increases the concentration of carbon dioxide and decrease concentration of oxygen that may lead to brain damaging effects.

8. Working your brain during illness
Working hard or studying with sickness may lead to a decrease in effectiveness of the brain as well as damage the brain.

9. Lacking in stimulating thoughts
Thinking is the best way to train our brain, lacking in brain stimulation thoughts may cause brain shrinkage.

10. Talking Rarely
Intellectual conversations will promote the efficiency of the brain

Mobile Phone Codes

Nokia Codes

*#3370# Deactivate Enhanced Full Rate Codec (EFR) .

*#4720# Activate Half Rate Codec - Your phone uses a lower quality sound but you should gain approx 30% more Talk Time.

*#4720# With this Nokia code you can deactivate the Half Rate Codec.

*#0000# Displays your phones software version, 1st Line : Software Version, 2nd Line : Software Release Date, 3rd Line : Compression Type .

*#9999# Phones software version if *#0000# does not work.

*#06# For checking the International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI Number) .

*#pw+1234567890+1# Provider Lock Status. (use the "*" button to obtain the "p,w" and "+" symbols).

• #pw+1234567890+2# Network Lock Status. (use the "*" button to obtain the "p,w" and "+" symbols) .
• #pw+1234567890+3# Country Lock Status. (use the "*" button to obtain the "p,w" and "+" symbols).
• #pw+1234567890+4# SIM Card Lock Status. (use the "*" button to obtain the "p,w" and "+" symbols) .
• *#147# This lets you know who called you last (Only vodofone).
• *#1471# Last call (Only vodofone) .
• *#21# This phone code allows you to check the number that "All Calls" are diverted to.
• *#2640# Displays phone security code in use .
• *#30# Lets you see the private number.
• *#43# Allows you to check the "Call Waiting" status of your cell phone.
• *#61# Allows you to check the number that "On No Reply" calls are diverted to .
• *#62# Allows you to check the number that "Divert If Unreachable (no service)" calls are diverted to .
• *#67# Allows you to check the number that "On Busy Calls" are diverted to
• *#67705646# Phone code that removes operator logo on 3310 & 3330
• *#73# Reset phone timers and game scores.
• *#746025625# Displays the SIM Clock status, if your phone supports this power saving feature "SIM Clock Stop Allowed", it means you will get the best standby time possible .
• *#7760# Manufactures code.
• *#7780# Restore factory settings.
• *#8110# Software version for the nokia 8110.
• *#92702689# Displays - 1.Serial Number, 2.Date Made, 3.Purchase Date, 4.Date of last repair (0000 for no repairs), 5.Transfer User Data. To exit this mode you need to switch your phone off then on again.
• *#94870345123456789# Deactivate the PWM-Mem.
• **21*number# Turn on "All Calls" diverting to the phone number entered.
• **61*number# Turn on "No Reply" diverting to the phone number entered .
• **67*number# Turn on "On Busy" diverting to the phone number entered .
• 12345 This is the default security code .
• press and hold # Lets you switch between lines.

SAMSUNG Source Code

• *#06# Show IMEI
• *#9999# Show mobile Software Version
• *#0837# Show mobile Software Version (instructions)
• *#0001# Show Serial Parameters
• *#9125# Activates the smiley when charging
• *#0523# LCD Contrast

• *#9998*228# Battery status (capacity, voltage, temperature)
• *#9998*246# Program status
• *#9998*289# Change Alarm Buzzer Frequency
• *#9998*324# Debug Screens
• *#9998*364# Watchdog
• *#9998*377# EEPROM Error Stack - Use side keys to select values
• *#9998*427# Trace Watchdog
• *#9998*523# Change LCD contrast
• *#9998*544# Jig detect
• *#9998*636# Memory status
• *#9998*746# SIM File Size
• *#9998*778# SIM Service Table
• *#9998*785# RTK (Run Time Kernel) errors - if ok then phn is reset, info is put in memory error
• *#9998*786# Run, Last UP, Last DOWN
• *#9998*837# Mobile Software Version
• *#9998*842# Test Vibrator - Flash the screenlight during 10 sec and vibration activated
• *#9998*862# Vocoder Reg - Normal, Earphone or Carkit
• *#9998*872# Diag
• *#9998*947# Reset On Fatal Error
• *#9998*999# Last/Chk
• *#9998*9266# Yann debug screen (Debug Screens?)
• *#9998*9999# Software version
• *0001*s*f*t# Changes serial parameters (s=?, f=0.1, t=0.1)
• *0002*?# unknown Samsung's comand
• *0003*?# unknown Samsung's comand

For Mobile phones SGH (R210, T100, A300...)
if Samsung code is in format *#9998*xxx#
try write in this *#0xxx#

SGH-600
SGH-2100

• *2767*3855# Full EEPROM Reset (THIS CODE REMMOVES SP-LOCK! but also changes IMEI to 447967-89-400044-0
• *2767*2878# Custom EEPROM Reset

Samsung mobile phone codes: Samsung E700

• *2767*688# remove USER CODE and SIMLOCK

Samsung mobile phone codes: Samsung V200

Unlocking:
Power on the mobile phone without SIM card and type these codes:

• *2767*63342# and press green button
• *2767*3855# and press green button
• *2767*2878# and press green button
• *2767*927# and press green button
• *2767*7822573738# press button

Phone will be unlocked, but all trims are reseted !!!
Mobile phone must be fully charged

Samsung mobile phone codes: Samsung S500
Unlocking

• *2767*MVT# (*2767*688#) E2P MVT Reset
• *#SIMLOCK# (*#7465625#)

Cyber Crimes

The term ‘cyber crime’ is a misnomer. This term has nowhere been defined in any statute /Act passed or enacted by the Indian Parliament. The concept of cyber crime is not radically different from the concept of conventional crime. Both include conduct whether act or omission, which cause breach of rules of law and counterbalanced by the sanction of the state.

Before evaluating the concept of cyber crime it is obvious that the concept of conventional crime be discussed and the points of similarity and deviance between both these forms may be discussed.

CONVENTIONAL CRIME-

Crime is a social and economic phenomenon and is as old as the human society. Crime is a legal concept and has the sanction of the law. Crime or an offence is “a legal wrong that can be followed by criminal proceedings which may result into punishment.”(1) The hallmark of criminality is that, it is breach of the criminal law. Per Lord Atkin “the criminal quality of an act cannot be discovered by reference to any standard but one: is the act prohibited with penal consequences”. (2)

A crime may be said to be any conduct accompanied by act or omission prohibited by law and consequential breach of which is visited by penal consequences.

CYBER CRIME

Cyber crime is the latest and perhaps the most complicated problem in the cyber world. “Cyber crime may be said to be those species, of which, genus is the conventional crime, and where either the computer is an object or subject of the conduct constituting crime” (13). “Any criminal activity that uses a computer either as an instrumentality, target or a means for perpetuating further crimes comes within the ambit of cyber crime”(12)

A generalized definition of cyber crime may be “ unlawful acts wherein the computer is either a tool or target or both”(3) The computer may be used as a tool in the following kinds of activity- financial crimes, sale of illegal articles, pornography, online gambling, intellectual property crime, e-mail spoofing, forgery, cyber defamation, cyber stalking. The computer may however be target for unlawful acts in the following cases- unauthorized access to computer/ computer system/ computer networks, theft of information contained in the electronic form, e-mail bombing, data didling, salami attacks, logic bombs, Trojan attacks, internet time thefts, web jacking, theft of computer system, physically damaging the computer system.

DISTINCTION BETWEEN CONVENTIONAL AND CYBER CRIME-

There is apparently no distinction between cyber and conventional crime. However on a deep introspection we may say that there exists a fine line of demarcation between the conventional and cyber crime, which is appreciable. The demarcation lies in the involvement of the medium in cases of cyber crime. The sine qua non for cyber crime is that there should be an involvement, at any stage, of the virtual cyber medium.

REASONS FOR CYBER CRIME:
Hart in his work “ The Concept of Law” has said ‘human beings are vulnerable so rule of law is required to protect them’. Applying this to the cyberspace we may say that computers are vulnerable so rule of law is required to protect and safeguard them against cyber crime. The reasons for the vulnerability of computers may be said to be:

Capacity to store data in comparatively small space-

The computer has unique characteristic of storing data in a very small space. This affords to remove or derive information either through physical or virtual medium makes it much more easier.

Easy to access-
The problem encountered in guarding a computer system from unauthorised access is that there is every possibility of breach not due to human error but due to the complex technology. By secretly implanted logic bomb, key loggers that can steal access codes, advanced voice recorders; retina imagers etc. that can fool biometric systems and bypass firewalls can be utilized to get past many a security system.

3.Complex-

The computers work on operating systems and these operating systems in turn are composed of millions of codes. Human mind is fallible and it is not possible that there might not be a lapse at any stage. The cyber criminals take advantage of these lacunas and penetrate into the computer system.

4.Negligence-

Negligence is very closely connected with human conduct. It is therefore very probable that while protecting the computer system there might be any negligence, which in turn provides a cyber criminal to gain access and control over the computer system.

5. Loss of evidence-

Loss of evidence is a very common & obvious problem as all the data are routinely destroyed. Further collection of data outside the territorial extent also paralyses this system of crime investigation.

CYBER CRIMINALS:

The cyber criminals constitute of various groups/ category. This division may be justified on the basis of the object that they have in their mind. The following are the category of cyber criminals-

1. Children and adolescents between the age group of 6 – 18 years –

The simple reason for this type of delinquent behaviour pattern in children is seen mostly due to the inquisitiveness to know and explore the things. Other cognate reason may be to prove themselves to be outstanding amongst other children in their group. Further the reasons may be psychological even. E.g. the Bal Bharati (Delhi) case was the outcome of harassment of the delinquent by his friends.

2. Organised hackers-

These kinds of hackers are mostly organised together to fulfil certain objective. The reason may be to fulfil their political bias, fundamentalism, etc. The Pakistanis are said to be one of the best quality hackers in the world. They mainly target the Indian government sites with the purpose to fulfil their political objectives. Further the NASA as well as the Microsoft sites is always under attack by the hackers.

3. Professional hackers / crackers –

Their work is motivated by the colour of money. These kinds of hackers are mostly employed to hack the site of the rivals and get credible, reliable and valuable information. Further they are ven employed to crack the system of the employer basically as a measure to make it safer by detecting the loopholes.

4. Discontented employees-

This group include those people who have been either sacked by their employer or are dissatisfied with their employer. To avenge they normally hack the system of their employee.

MODE AND MANNER OF COMMITING CYBER CRIME:

Unauthorized access to computer systems or networks / Hacking-
This kind of offence is normally referred as hacking in the generic sense. However the framers of the information technology act 2000 have no where used this term so to avoid any confusion we would not interchangeably use the word hacking for ‘unauthorized access’ as the latter has wide connotation.

Theft of information contained in electronic form-
This includes information stored in computer hard disks, removable storage media etc. Theft may be either by appropriating the data physically or by tampering them through the virtual medium.

Email bombing-
This kind of activity refers to sending large numbers of mail to the victim, which may be an individual or a company or even mail servers there by ultimately resulting into crashing.

Data diddling-
This kind of an attack involves altering raw data just before a computer processes it and then changing it back after the processing is completed. The electricity board faced similar problem of data diddling while the department was being computerised.

Salami attacks-
This kind of crime is normally prevalent in the financial institutions or for the purpose of committing financial crimes. An important feature of this type of offence is that the alteration is so small that it would normally go unnoticed. E.g. the Ziegler case wherein a logic bomb was introduced in the bank’s system, which deducted 10 cents from every account and deposited it in a particular account.

Denial of Service attack-
The computer of the victim is flooded with more requests than it can handle which cause it to crash. Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack is also a type of denial of service attack, in which the offenders are wide in number and widespread. E.g. Amazon, Yahoo.

7. Virus / worm attacks-

Viruses are programs that attach themselves to a computer or a file and then circulate themselves to other files and to other computers on a network. They usually affect the data on a computer, either by altering or deleting it. Worms, unlike viruses do not need the host to attach themselves to. They merely make functional copies of themselves and do this repeatedly till they eat up all the available space on a computer's memory. E.g. love bug virus, which affected at least 5 % of the computers of the globe. The losses were accounted to be $ 10 million. The world's most famous worm was the Internet worm let loose on the Internet by Robert Morris sometime in 1988. Almost brought development of Internet to a complete halt.

8. Logic bombs-

These are event dependent programs. This implies that these programs are created to do something only when a certain event (known as a trigger event) occurs. E.g. even some viruses may be termed logic bombs because they lie dormant all through the year and become active only on a particular date (like the Chernobyl virus).

Trojan attacks-
This term has its origin in the word ‘Trojan horse’. In software field this means an unauthorized programme, which passively gains control over another’s system by representing itself as an authorised programme. The most common form of installing a Trojan is through e-mail. E.g. a Trojan was installed in the computer of a lady film director in the U.S. while chatting. The cyber criminal through the web cam installed in the computer obtained her nude photographs. He further harassed this lady.

Internet time thefts-
Normally in these kinds of thefts the Internet surfing hours of the victim are used up by another person. This is done by gaining access to the login ID and the password. E.g. Colonel Bajwa’s case- the Internet hours were used up by any other person. This was perhaps one of the first reported cases related to cyber crime in India. However this case made the police infamous as to their lack of understanding of the nature of cyber crime.

11. Web jacking-

This term is derived from the term hi jacking. In these kinds of offences the hacker gains access and control over the web site of another. He may even mutilate or change the information on the site. This may be done for fulfilling political objectives or for money. E.g. recently the site of MIT (Ministry of Information Technology) was hacked by the Pakistani hackers and some obscene matter was placed therein. Further the site of Bombay crime branch was also web jacked. Another case of web jacking is that of the ‘gold fish’ case. In this case the site was hacked and the information pertaining to gold fish was changed. Further a ransom of US $ 1 million was demanded as ransom. Thus web jacking is a process where by control over the site of another is made backed by some consideration for it.

CLASSIFICATION:
The subject of cyber crime may be broadly classified under the following three groups. They are-

1. Against Individuals

a. their person &
b. their property of an individual


2. Against Organization

a. Government
c. Firm, Company, Group of Individuals.

3. Against Society at large

The following are the crimes, which can be committed against the followings group

Against Individuals: –


i. Harassment via e-mails.
ii. Cyber-stalking.
iii. Dissemination of obscene material.
iv. Defamation.
v. Unauthorized control/access over computer system.
vi. Indecent exposure
vii. Email spoofing
viii. Cheating & Fraud



Against Individual Property: -


i. Computer vandalism.
ii. Transmitting virus.
iii. Netrespass
iv. Unauthorized control/access over computer system.
v. Intellectual Property crimes
vi. Internet time thefts



Against Organization: -

i. Unauthorized control/access over computer system
ii. Possession of unauthorized information.
iii. Cyber terrorism against the government organization.
iv. Distribution of pirated software etc.



Against Society at large: -


i. Pornography (basically child pornography).
ii. Polluting the youth through indecent exposure.
iii. Trafficking
iv. Financial crimes
v.Sale of illegal articles
vi.Online gambling
vii. Forgery

The above mentioned offences may discussed in brief as follows:

1. Harassment via e-mails-

Harassment through e-mails is not a new concept. It is very similar to harassing through letters. Recently I had received a mail from a lady wherein she complained about the same. Her former boy friend was sending her mails constantly sometimes emotionally blackmailing her and also threatening her. This is a very common type of harassment via e-mails.

2. Cyber-stalking-

The Oxford dictionary defines stalking as "pursuing stealthily". Cyber stalking involves following a person's movements across the Internet by posting messages (sometimes threatening) on the bulletin boards frequented by the victim, entering the chat-rooms frequented by the victim, constantly bombarding the victim with emails etc.

3. Dissemination of obscene material/ Indecent exposure/ Pornography (basically child pornography) / Polluting through indecent exposure-

Pornography on the net may take various forms. It may include the hosting of web site containing these prohibited materials. Use of computers for producing these obscene materials. Downloading through the Internet, obscene materials. These obscene matters may cause harm to the mind of the adolescent and tend to deprave or corrupt their mind. Two known cases of pornography are the Delhi Bal Bharati case and the Bombay case wherein two Swiss couple used to force the slum children for obscene photographs. The Mumbai police later arrested them.

4. Defamation

It is an act of imputing any person with intent to lower the person in the estimation of the right-thinking members of society generally or to cause him to be shunned or avoided or to expose him to hatred, contempt or ridicule. Cyber defamation is not different from conventional defamation except the involvement of a virtual medium. E.g. the mail account of Rohit was hacked and some mails were sent from his account to some of his batch mates regarding his affair with a girl with intent to defame him.

4. Unauthorized control/access over computer system-

This activity is commonly referred to as hacking. The Indian law has however given a different connotation to the term hacking, so we will not use the term "unauthorized access" interchangeably with the term "hacking" to prevent confusion as the term used in the Act of 2000 is much wider than hacking.

5. E mail spoofing-

A spoofed e-mail may be said to be one, which misrepresents its origin. It shows it's origin to be different from which actually it originates. Recently spoofed mails were sent on the name of Mr. Na.Vijayashankar (naavi.org), which contained virus.

Rajesh Manyar, a graduate student at Purdue University in Indiana, was arrested for threatening to detonate a nuclear device in the college campus. The alleged e- mail was sent from the account of another student to the vice president for student services. However the mail was traced to be sent from the account of Rajesh Manyar.(15)

6. Computer vandalism-

Vandalism means deliberately destroying or damaging property of another. Thus computer vandalism may include within its purview any kind of physical harm done to the computer of any person. These acts may take the form of the theft of a computer, some part of a computer or a peripheral attached to the computer or by physically damaging a computer or its peripherals.

7. Transmitting virus/worms-

This topic has been adequately dealt herein above.

8. Intellectual Property crimes / Distribution of pirated software-

Intellectual property consists of a bundle of rights. Any unlawful act by which the owner is deprived completely or partially of his rights is an offence. The common form of IPR violation may be said to be software piracy, copyright infringement, trademark and service mark violation, theft of computer source code, etc.

The Hyderabad Court has in a land mark judgement has convicted three people and sentenced them to six months imprisonment and fine of 50,000 each for unauthorized copying and sell of pirated software. (16)

9. Cyber terrorism against the government organization

At this juncture a necessity may be felt that what is the need to distinguish between cyber terrorism and cyber crime. Both are criminal acts. However there is a compelling need to distinguish between both these crimes. A cyber crime is generally a domestic issue, which may have international consequences, however cyber terrorism is a global concern, which has domestic as well as international consequences. The common form of these terrorist attacks on the Internet is by distributed denial of service attacks, hate websites and hate emails, attacks on sensitive computer networks, etc. Technology savvy terrorists are using 512-bit encryption, which is next to impossible to decrypt. The recent example may be cited of – Osama Bin Laden, the LTTE, attack on America’s army deployment system during Iraq war.

Cyber terrorism may be defined to be “ the premeditated use of disruptive activities, or the threat thereof, in cyber space, with the intention to further social, ideological, religious, political or similar objectives, or to intimidate any person in furtherance of such objectives” (4)

Another definition may be attempted to cover within its ambit every act of cyber terrorism.

A terrorist means a person who indulges in wanton killing of persons or in violence or in disruption of services or means of communications essential to the community or in damaging property with the view to –

(1) putting the public or any section of the public in fear; or

(2) affecting adversely the harmony between different religious, racial, language or regional groups or castes or communities; or

(3) coercing or overawing the government established by law; or

(4) endangering the sovereignty and integrity of the nation

and a cyber terrorist is the person who uses the computer system as a means or ends to achieve the above objectives. Every act done in pursuance thereof is an act of cyber terrorism.

10.Trafficking

Trafficking may assume different forms. It may be trafficking in drugs, human beings, arms weapons etc. These forms of trafficking are going unchecked because they are carried on under pseudonyms. A racket was busted in Chennai where drugs were being sold under the pseudonym of honey.

Fraud & Cheating
Online fraud and cheating is one of the most lucrative businesses that are growing today in the cyber space. It may assume different forms. Some of the cases of online fraud and cheating that have come to light are those pertaining to credit card crimes, contractual crimes, offering jobs, etc.

Recently the Court of Metropolitan Magistrate Delhi (17) found guilty a 24-year-old engineer working in a call centre, of fraudulently gaining the details of Campa's credit card and bought a television and a cordless phone from Sony website. Metropolitan magistrate Gulshan Kumar convicted Azim for cheating under IPC, but did not send him to jail. Instead, Azim was asked to furnish a personal bond of Rs 20,000, and was released on a year's probation.

STATUTORY PROVISONS:

The Indian parliament considered it necessary to give effect to the resolution by which the General Assembly adopted Model Law on Electronic Commerce adopted by the United Nations Commission on Trade Law. As a consequence of which the Information Technology Act 2000 was passed and enforced on 17th May 2000.the preamble of this Act states its objective to legalise e-commerce and further amend the Indian Penal Code 1860, the Indian Evidence Act 1872, the Banker’s Book Evidence Act1891 and the Reserve Bank of India Act 1934. The basic purpose to incorporate the changes in these Acts is to make them compatible with the Act of 2000. So that they may regulate and control the affairs of the cyber world in an effective manner.

The Information Technology Act deals with the various cyber crimes in chapters IX & XI. The important sections are Ss. 43,65,66,67. Section 43 in particular deals with the unauthorised access, unauthorised downloading, virus attacks or any contaminant, causes damage, disruption, denial of access, interference with the service availed by a person. This section provide for a fine up to Rs. 1 Crore by way of remedy. Section 65 deals with ‘tampering with computer source documents’ and provides for imprisonment up to 3 years or fine, which may extend up to 2 years or both. Section 66 deals with ‘hacking with computer system’ and provides for imprisonment up to 3 years or fine, which may extend up to 2 years or both. Further section 67 deals with publication of obscene material and provides for imprisonment up to a term of 10 years and also with fine up to Rs. 2 lakhs. (14)

ANALYSIS OF THE STATUTORY PROVISONS:

The Information Technology Act 2000 was undoubtedly a welcome step at a time when there was no legislation on this specialised field. The Act has however during its application has proved to be inadequate to a certain extent. The various loopholes in the Act are-

1. The hurry in which the legislation was passed, without sufficient public debate, did not really serve the desired purpose (6)-

Experts are of the opinion that one of the reasons for the inadequacy of the legislation has been the hurry in which it was passed by the parliament and it is also a fact that sufficient time was not given for public debate.

2. “Cyberlaws, in their very preamble and aim, state that they are targeted at aiding e-commerce, and are not meant to regulate cybercrime”(6) –

Mr. Pavan Duggal holds the opinion that the main intention of the legislators has been to provide for a law to regulate the e-commerce and with that aim the I.T.Act 2000 was passed, which also is one of the reasons for its inadequacy to deal with cases of cyber crime.

At this point I would like to express my respectful dissent with Mr. Duggal. I feel that the above statement by Mr. Duggal is not fundamentally correct. The reason being that the preamble does state that the Act aims at legalising e-commerce. However it does not stop here. It further amends the I.P.C., Evidence Act, Banker’s Book Evidence and RBI Act also. The Act also aims to deal with all matters connected therewith or incidental thereto. It is a cardinal rule of interpretation that “text should be read as a whole to gather the meaning”. It seems that the above statement has been made in total disregard of this rule of interpretation. The preamble, if read as a whole, makes it very clear that the Act equally aims at legalising e-commerce and to curb any offences arising there from.

3.Cyber torts-

The recent cases including Cyber stalking cyber harassment, cyber nuisance, and cyber defamation have shown that the I.T.Act 2000 has not dealt with those offences. Further it is also contended that in future new forms of cyber crime will emerge which even need to be taken care of. Therefore India should sign the cyber crime convention. However the I.T.Act 2000 read with the Penal Code is capable of dealing with these felonies.

4.Cyber crime in the Act is neither comprehensive nor exhaustive-

Mr. Duggal believes that we need dedicated legislation on cyber crime that can supplement the Indian Penal Code. The contemporary view is held by Mr. Prathamesh Popat who has stated- "The IT Act, 2000 is not comprehensive enough and doesn't even define the term 'cyber crime". (8) Mr. Duggal has further commented, “India, as a nation, has to cope with an urgent need to regulate and punish those committing cyber crimes, but with no specific provisions to do so. Supporters of the Indian Penal Code School vehemently argue that IPC has stood the test of time and that it is not necessary to incorporate any special laws on cyber crime. This is because it is debated by them that the IPC alone is sufficient for all kinds of crime. However, in practical terms, the argument does not have appropriate backing. It has to be distinctly understood that cyber crime and cyberspace are completely new whelms, where numerous new possibilities and opportunities emerge by the day in the form of new kinds of crimes.”(6)

I feel that a new legislation on cyber crime is totally unwarranted. The reason is that the new legislation not come alone but will bring with it the same confusion, the same dissatisfaction and the same desire to supplant it by further new legislation. Mr. Duggal has stated above the need to supplement IPC by a new legislation. If that is the issue then the present legislation along with the Penal Code when read harmoniously and co- jointly is sufficient to deal with the present problems of cyber crime. Further there are other legislations to deal with the intellectual property crimes on the cyber space such as the Patents Act, Copy Right Act, Trade Marks Act.

5.Ambiguity in the definitions-

The definition of hacking provided in section 66 of the Act is very wide and capable of misapplication. There is every possibility of this section being misapplied and in fact the Delhi court has misapplied it. The infamous go2nextjob has made it very clear that what may be the fate of a person who is booked under section 66 or the constant threat under which the netizens are till s. 66 exists in its present form.

Further section 67 is also vague to certain extent. It is difficult to define the term lascivious information or obscene pornographic informa­tion. Further our inability to deal with the cases of cyber pornography has been proved by the Bal Bharati case.

6. Uniform law-

Mr. Vinod Kumar (9) holds the opinion that the need of the hour is a worldwide uniform cyber law to combat cyber crime. Cyber crime is a global phenomenon and therefore the initiative to fight it should come from the same level. E.g. the author of the love bug virus was appreciated by his countrymen.

7.Lack of awareness-

One important reason that the Act of 2000 is not achieving complete success is the lack of awareness among the s about their rights. Further most of the cases are going unreported. If the people are vigilant about their rights the law definitely protects their right. E.g. the Delhi high court in October 2002 prevented a person from selling Microsoft pirated software over an auction site. Achievement was also made in the case before the court of metropolitan magistrate Delhi wherein a person was convicted for online cheating by buying Sony products using a stolen credit card. (17)

8. Jurisdiction issues-

Jurisdiction is also one of the debatable issues in the cases of cyber crime due to the very universal nature of cyber space. With the ever-growing arms of cyber space the territorial concept seems to vanish. New methods of dispute resolution should give way to the conventional methods. The Act of 2000 is very silent on these issues.

9. Extra territorial application-

Though S.75 provides for extra-territorial operations of this law, but they could be meaningful only when backed with provisions recognizing orders and warrants for Information issued by competent authorities outside their jurisdiction and measure for cooperation for exchange of material and evidence of computer crimes between law enforcement agencies.

10. Raising a cyber army-

By using the word ‘cyber army’ by no means I want to convey the idea of virtual army, rather I am laying emphasis on the need for a well equipped task force to deal with the new trends of hi tech crime. The government has taken a leap in this direction by constituting cyber crime cells in all metropolitan and other important cities. Further the establishment of the Cyber Crime Investigation Cell (CCIC) of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) 11) is definitely a welcome step in this direction. There are man cases in which the C.B.I has achieved success. The present position of cases of cyber crime (17) is –

Case 1: When a woman at an MNC started receiving obscene calls, CBI found her colleague had posted her personal details on Mumbaidating.com.

Status: Probe on

Case 2: CBI arrested a man from UP, Mohammed Feroz, who placed ads offering jobs in Germany. He talked to applicants via e-mail and asked them to deposit money in his bank account in Delhi.

Status: Chargesheet not filed

Case 3: The official web-site of the Central Board of Direct Taxes was hacked last year. As Pakistan-based hackers were responsible, authorities there were informed through Interpol.

Status: Pak not cooperating.

11. Cyber savvy bench-

Cyber savvy judges are the need of the day. Judiciary plays a vital role in shaping the enactment according to the order of the day. One such stage, which needs appreciation, is the P.I.L., which the Kerela High Court has accepted through an email. The role of the judges in today’s word may be gathered by the statement- judges carve ‘law is’ to ‘law ought to be’. Mr T.K.Vishwanathan, member secretary, Law Commission , has highlighted the requirements for introducing e-courts in India. In his article published in The Hindu he has stated “if there is one area of Governance where IT can make a huge difference to Indian public is in the Judicial System”.

12. Dynamic form of cyber crime-

Speaking on the dynamic nature of cyber crime FBI Director Louis Freeh has said, "In short, even though we have markedly improved our capabilities to fight cyber intrusions the problem is growing even faster and we are falling further behind.” The (de)creativity of human mind cannot be checked by any law. Thus the only way out is the liberal construction while applying the statutory provisions to cyber crime cases.

13. Hesitation to report offences-

As stated above one of the fatal drawbacks of the Act has been the cases going unreported. One obvious reason is the non-cooperative police force. This was proved by the Delhi time theft case. "The police are a powerful force today which can play an instrumental role in preventing cybercrime. At the same time, it can also end up wielding the rod and harassing innocent s, preventing them from going about their normal cyber business."(10) This attitude of the administration is also revelled by incident that took place at Merrut and Belgam. (for the facts of these incidents refer to naavi.com). For complete realisation of the provisions of this Act a cooperative police force is require.

PREVENTION OF CYBER CRIME:

Prevention is always better than cure. It is always better to take certain precaution while operating the net. A should make them his part of cyber life. Saileshkumar Zarkar, technical advisor and network security consultant to the Mumbai Police Cyber crime Cell, advocates the 5P mantra for online security: Precaution, Prevention, Protection, Preservation and Perseverance. A netizen should keep in mind the following things-

1.to prevent cyber stalking avoid disclosing any information pertaining to oneself. This is as good as disclosing your identity to strangers in public place.

2.always avoid sending any photograph online particularly to strangers and chat friends as there have been incidents of misuse of the photographs.

3.always use latest and up date anti virus software to guard against virus attacks.

4.always keep back up volumes so that one may not suffer data loss in case of virus contamination

5.never send your credit card number to any site that is not secured, to guard against frauds.

6.always keep a watch on the sites that your children are accessing to prevent any kind of harassment or depravation in children.

7.it is better to use a security programme that gives control over the cookies and send information back to the site as leaving the cookies unguarded might prove fatal.

8.web site owners should watch traffic and check any irregularity on the site. Putting host-based intrusion detection devices on servers may do this.

9.use of firewalls may be beneficial.

10. web servers running public sites must be physically separate protected from internal corporate network.

Adjudication of a Cyber Crime - On the directions of the Bombay High Court the Central Government has by a notification dated 25.03.03 has decided that the Secretary to the Information Technology Department in each state by designation would be appointed as the AO for each state.

CONCLUSION:

Capacity of human mind is unfathomable. It is not possible to eliminate cyber crime from the cyber space. It is quite possible to check them. History is the witness that no legislation has succeeded in totally eliminating crime from the globe. The only possible step is to make people aware of their rights and duties (to report crime as a collective duty towards the society) and further making the application of the laws more stringent to check crime. Undoubtedly the Act is a historical step in the cyber world. Further I all together do not deny that there is a need to bring changes in the Information Technology Act to make it more effective to combat cyber crime. I would conclude with a word of caution for the pro-legislation school that it should be kept in mind that the provisions of the cyber law are not made so stringent that it may retard the growth of the industry and prove to be counter-productive.

REFERENCES:

1. Granville Williams

2. Proprietary Articles Trade Association v. A.G.for Canada (1932)

3. Nagpal R. – What is Cyber Crime?

4. Nagpal R- Defining Cyber Terrorism

5. Duggal Pawan – The Internet: Legal Dimensions

6. Duggal Pawan - Is this Treaty a Treat?

7. Duggal Pawan - Cybercrime

8. Kapoor G.V. - Byte by Byte

9. Kumar Vinod – Winning the Battle against Cyber Crime

10. Mehta Dewang- Role of Police In Tackling Internet Crimes


11. For the sake of convenience the readers are requested to read sections 43, 65, 66,67 of the Information Technology Act.

12. Sify News 14.03.03

13. Deccan Herald 16.03.03

14. Hindustan Times 03.03.03

Practical Guide to Alternative Data Streams in NTFS

Alternative Data Stream support was added to NTFS (Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows XP) to help support Macintosh Hierarchical File System (HFS) which uses resource forks to store icons and other information for a file. While this is the intended use (as well as a few Windows internal functions) there or other uses for Alternative Data Streams that should concern system administrators and security professionals. Using Alternative Data Streams a user can easily hide files that can go undetected unless closely inspection. This tutorial will give basic information on how to manipulate and detect Alternative Data Streams.

(Note about conventions: Alternative Data Streams are also sometimes referred to as Alternate Data Streams or ADS. Since Alternative Data Streams is so long, an ADS can be confused with Active Directory Services I will simple call this feature AltDS for short.)

Creating an AltDS

Making an AltDS is fairly simple. I will use command line examples, feel free to follow along. We could hide some data in an AltDS behind an already existing file, but for this example we will create a new base file to hide behind:


C:>echo Just a plan text file>sample.txt

C:>type sample.txt
Just a plan text file

C:>


Next we will use a colon as the operator to tell our commands to create or use an AltDS:


C:>echo You can't see me>sample.txt:secret.txt


Unfortunately, the use of the colon operator is a bit hit or miss in its' implementation and some times does not work as we might expect as seen below:


C:>type sample.txt:secret.txt
The filename, directory name, or volume label syntax is incorrect.

Since the "type" command does not understand the colon operator we will have to use notepad to read the file:


C:>notepad sample.txt:secret.txt


If all worked well, you should not see a notepad window with the text "You can't see me" in it. Also notice that while the amount of total hard drive space free went down the file size of sample.txt did not increase:


C:>dir sample.txt
Volume in drive C has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 40CC-B506

Directory of C:

09/27/2004 01:58 PM 23 sample.txt
1 File(s) 23 bytes
0 Dir(s) 12,658,040,832 bytes free

C:>


You can make an AltDS in not only files, but also directories, here is a quick example:


C:>md stuff

C:>cd stuff

C:stuff>echo Hide stuff in stuff>:hide.txt

C:stuff>dir
Volume in drive C has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 40CC-B506

Directory of C:stuff

09/28/2004 10:19 AM

.
09/28/2004 10:19 AM ..
0 File(s) 0 bytes
2 Dir(s) 12,253,208,576 bytes free

C:stuff>notepad :hide.txt


Hopefully you now see a notepad window with hide.txt's contents. If all one could do with AltDS was hide text files it would not be that impressive, but there's much more that can be done with this useful NTFS feature.

Hiding and running an executable.

As it turns out, using AltDS to hide executables is not much harder than it is to hide text files. AltDS makes for a great way for malware to hide itself on a system. Here's an example of how and executable can be hidden behind another file:

First we make our file to hide behind:


C:WINDOWS>echo Test>test.txt


Next we put an EXE behind is, I'm just using notepad.exe because it's convenient:


C:WINDOWS>type notepad.exe>test.txt:note.exe


Next we confirm the contents of the text file when some one tries to open it.


C:WINDOWS>type test.txt
Test


Now we will confirm the file size, notice that adding notepad.exe as a steam did not increase the size of test.txt.


C:WINDOWS>dir test.txt
Volume in drive C has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 007E-2E3C

Directory of C:WINDOWS

09/19/2004 08:37 AM 6 test.txt
1 File(s) 6 bytes
0 Dir(s) 19,734,708,224 bytes free


Now we will attempt to run our hidden exe. Notice the "." in front of the file name, this is necessary because the "start" command needs to know the correct path to the file (at least if you are using XP).


C:WINDOWS>start .test.txt:note.exe

C:WINDOWS>


If all worked well there should now be a notepad window up on your system. You should be able to hide just about any other EXE file this way if you wish.

Batch Programming Basics

The Basic's of Batch file programming. Explains you what batch file programming is and hot to create batch files.

• The Basics of Batch File Programming

Batch file programming is nothing but a batch of DOS ( Disk Operating System ) commands, hence the name Batch. If you code a lot and know many languages you are sure to notice that Operating System ( OS )specific langauges ( languages that work only on a particular operating system, eg: Visual Basic Scripting works only in Windows ) give you amazing control over the system. This is why Batch is so powerfull, it gives you absolute control over DOS. Batch isnt reccomended at all because it is OS specific, but it is fun and easy to learn. This tutorial will not only teach you Batch file programming but also how to fend for yourself and learn more commands that tutorials dont teach you.

The first command you should know is ECHO. All ECHO does is simply print something onto the screen. It's like "printf" in C or "PRINT" in Basic. Anyway, this is how we use it.

ECHO Hello World!

All right, now save the above line as a .bat file and double click it. This should be the output -

C:WINDOWSDesktop>ECHO Hello World!
Hello World!

Hmmm, notice that it shows the command before executing it. But we're coders right? We dont want our code to look so untidy so just add an @ sign before ECHO and execute it. Woohoo! much better. The @ sign tells DOS to hide from the user whatever commands it is executing. Now, what if I want to write to a file? This is how I do it -

@ECHO Hello World > hello.txt

Simple huh? Remember, ">" to create or overwrite a file and ">>" to append ( write at the end ) of a file that already exists. Guess why this program wont work as desired to -

@ECHO Hello World > hello.txt
@ECHO Hello World Again > hello.txt

Looking at it, you will see that the program is supposed to write two lines one after another but it wont work because in the first line it will create a file called hello.txt and write the words "Hello World" to it, and in the second line it just over-writes the earlier text. So actually what it is doing is that it creates a file and writes to it and then over-writes what it had earlier written, to change this we just add a ">". The additional ">" will make DOS append to the file. So here's the improved form of the program -

@ECHO Hello World > hello.txt
@ECHO Hello World Again >> hello.txt

Save the above code as a .bat file and execute it, it will work without a hitch. The next thing we should learn is the GOTO statement. GOTO is just the same as it is in BASIC or for that fact any programming langauge but the only difference is between the labels.

This is a label in C or BASIC - label:

This is a label in batch - :label

In C or BASIC, the ":" comes after the label and in Batch it comes before the label. Bear this in mind as you proceed. Here's an example of the GOTO statement -

:labelone
@ECHO LoL
GOTO labelone

If you execute this code, you will see that it is an unlimited loop; it will keep printing to the screen till the end of time if you dont interupt it Smile The GOTO statement is very usefull when it comes to building big Batch programs. Now, we will learn the IF and EXIST commands. The IF command is usually used for checking if a file exists, like this -

@IF EXIST C:WINDOWSEXPLORER.EXE ECHO It exists

Observe that I have not used inverted commas ( " ) as I would in BASIC or C. The EXIST command is only found in Batch and not in any other language. The EXIST command can also be used to check if a file does not exist, like this -

@IF NOT EXIST C:WINDOWSEXPLORER.EXE ECHO It does not exist

Remember, Batch is not a language like C or BASIC or Pascal, it cannot do mathematical functions. In Batch, all you can do is control DOS. In the above example notice that there is no THEN command as there would be in most languages.
Sick and tired off using the @ sign before each and every command ? Let's do some research, go to the DOS prompt and type in ECHO /? and press enter. Interesting, in this way, when you hear of a new DOS command you dont know about, just type in "command /?" and you can get help on it. Now back to ECHO. According to the help we received by typing in ECHO /? you must have concluded if you type in ECHO OFF you no longer need to type an @ sign before every command.
Wait! just add an @ before ECHO OFF so that it does not display the message - ECHO is off.

The next command we are going to learn about is the CLS command. It stands for CLear Screen. If you know BASIC, you will have no problem understanding this command. All it does is clear the screen. Here's an example -

@ECHO OFF
CLS
ECHO This is DOS

This command need's no further explanation but type in CLS /? to get more help on the command.

The next command we are going to learn is CD. It stands for Current Directory. It displays the current directory in which you are if you just type in "CD" but if you type in"CD C:WindowsDesktop" it will take you to the Desktop. Here's an example -

@ECHO OFF
CD C:WindowsDesktop
ECHO Testing.. > test.txt
ECHO Testing...>>test.txt

This will change the directory to the Desktop and create a file there called test.txt and write to it. If we had not used the CD command, this is how the program would have looked.

@ECHO OFF
ECHO Testing.. > C:WindowsDesktoptest.txt
ECHO Testing...>> C:WindowsDesktoptest.txt

See the difference? Anyway that's all for the The Basics of Batch File Programming. Remember, each an every DOS command can be used in Batch.