Odisha police to launch cyber awareness week

BHUBANESWAR: The Odisha police are planning to launch a cyber awareness week in all 30 districts to caution people against the modus operandi of the cyber crooks and prevent occurrence of online frauds.
"We will engage all stakeholders, including students, teachers, banks and different other organisations during the proposed awareness week. In the wake of evolving challenges in cyber crimes, community awareness is vital to pre-empt such offences,” additional director general of police Santosh Upadhyay said on the sidelines of a training programme, organised by the UNICEF for the Odisha police personnel in Bhubaneswar on Friday.
At least 200 police personnel, who had undergone such a cyber training programme in June in the first phase, resumed their training in the second phase on Friday. The cops of different police stations will learn skills to probe cyber crimes. “We often noticed that the general police stations hesitated accepting cyber related complaints as they lacked the expertise to probe such technical cases. The existing four cyber police stations at Cuttack, Sambalpur, Rourkela and Berhampur cannot cater to the needs of people from across the state. So we are grooming and training at least one or two officers of most police stations in districts so that they easily probe cyber offences,” Upadhyay said.
Crime Branch’s inspector general Arun Bothra said efforts are being made to modernise the cyber forensic infrastructure in the state. Bothra said a cyber forensic laboratory and training centre is being constructed in Bhubaneswar with modern equipment to probe cyber crimes. Crime Branch is also implementing cyber crime prevention against women and children (CCPWC) in the state, he said. “We appreciate the crucial support of the Unicef in formulating the training programme for our personnel. The third and final phase training programme will be held soon,” Bothra said.
Cyber crime cases, including online banking frauds, e-lottery scams, child pornography and offences related to social media increases in last six years. While only 120 cyber crime cases were registered in Odisha in 2013, the figure touched 867 in 2018. At least 241 cases were already registered in first three months of 2019.