[Continued from the Previous Article]
From the very beginning, Naavi was interested in developing a “Compliance Culture in India” and in December 2000, for the first time in India, in a CII conference in Hotel Connemara, Naavi declared that “CyLawCom is the corporate mantra for the Digital era” which also became the title of one of the later books of Naavi.
Naavi then expanded his Cyber Law Course with course on Techno Legal Information Security and a certification of CyLawCom professionals. This was a precursor to the modern day “Certification Courses” in Information Security and Data Protection and Naavi was again a pioneer in introducing such courses.
Apart from the Cyber Law Awareness building through the website, series of lectures at all levels from High School students to professionals, evangelizing the Compliance culture, Naavi took up training of Chennai Police and conducted a series of courses in the Ashok Nagar Police Training College. Trainings on Cyber Ethics at Standard Chartered banks and many colleges in Chennai and Courses on Cyber crimes in many organizations including CBI in Delhi etc followed.
During these early days of Cyber Law in India, Naavi was also active on fighting against obscenity on the Internet. In one of the cases in the Mumbai High Court, an article of Naavi.com was published as a material for reference in a case related to Cyber Cafes. He carried out many campaigns as a Netizen activist advocating strict compliance of law by intermediaries so that the Netizens are protected from frauds.
In 2005, Naavi had undertaken the “Cyber Laws Awareness Movement” in Karnataka, conducting a series of courses in several Law Colleges in Karnataka running to 60-70 hours of teaching. First Cyber Law Course was also also conducted in the Chennai in Dr Ambedkar Law College and later in Madras University.
The impact of such intense awareness building was noticeable with some of the students of those days having become experts in Cyber law today. One of the attendees of the Police Training in Chennai was Mr S Balu who went on to head the Chennai Cyber Crime police station with credit.
Naturally Naavi was frequently sought after for advise whenever there was a cyber crime reported to the Cyber Crime police. It was one such case which led to the first case in India to be convicted under ITA 2000, (2004) namely the case of Suhas Katti. (Copy of the judgement in case of Suhaskatti available here. Part 1: Part2).
This case was unique because it was the first case where a Section 65B certificate was accepted as evidence and it was produced by Naavi. It was only in 2012 later that the Supreme Court in the case of P K Basheer and P V Anvar, that the Judiciary recognized the requirements of Section 65B (IEA) certification.
Naavi was all along spreading the need for such certificate in every forum including the National Police Academy in Hyderabad though the intervening Afasan Guru judgement had created a doubt about the mandatory nature of Section 65B certification. Despite the contradictory judgement of the Supreme Court in the Afsam Guru case Naavi was committed to his views on Section 65B and always reiterated the mandatory nature and the nature of certification which even today stands as the gold standard though many legal luminaries are yet to fully accept Naavi’s interpretation of Section 65B.
This commitment on Section 65B certification and its advocacy through Cyber Evidence Archival Center (CEAC) is one of the hallmarks of the Naavi’s foray into Cyber Laws.
….Coninued
Naavi
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