New Delhi: The government may recommend a penalty of up to Rs 500 crore for violating provisions of the Digital India Bill. Under the proposed bill, the Centre is likely to appoint a government agency which will monitor and collect traffic data generated, transmitted, received or stored in any digital system. This is aimed to enhance the cyber security measures.
The government also aims to identify, analyse and prevent intrusion or spread of malware or virus. Meity has been working on the draft of the Digital India Bill to replace the existing IT Act.
The Digital India Bill may come with a provision of a penalty of up to Rs 500 crore on entities for breach of obligations. This quantum of penalty though will be decided by the proposed Digital India Authority that will handle the grievances. However, the authority may have to assess various factors, like the gravity, number of users affected and the duration for which an individual was affected, before taking a final decision on the penalty amount.
Disputes under the proposed Act may not come under the jurisdiction of civil courts. As a result, entities that are unsatisfied with the resolution provided by the Digital India Authority might have the option to challenge it before the Supreme Court. The proposed bill is likely to identify and define various kinds of damage a victim is likely to face in the digital world.
The Bill is likely to define doxing, cyber squatting, astroturfing, dog whistling, among other offences, and make them punishable. It might come up with norms to control development and deployment of emerging technologies in the wake of challenges being posed by development of artificial intelligence.
