Coordination among agencies stressed to make cyber society safer

All stakeholders at a dialogue have agreed on the need to develop coordination among relevant agencies to ensure personal safety on the internet.

As concerns were expressed over the misuse of the internet, policy makers highlighted various initiatives.
 
bdnews24.com organised the ‘Dialogue on Safer Internet’ at the Radisson Blu Water Garden Hotel in Dhaka on Saturday.
 
The panellists at the discussion included State Minister for Post and Telecommunications Tarana Halim, State Minister for Information and Communication Technology Zunaid Ahmed Palak, RAB Director General Benazir Ahmed and BTRC’s System and Services Division Director General Brigadier General Emdad ul Bari.
 

Computer science teacher and researcher Dr Nova Ahmed and Unicef’s communication, advocacy and partnership chief Shima Islam also joined the session as discussants.

Apart from emphasising developing coordination between the law-enforcing agencies and the regulators to create an up-to-date ‘deterrent’, the panel discussants underscored the need for “exchange of services” among the agencies.

They stated that Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission’s (BTRC) should be able to resolve people’s complaints quickly.

bdnews24.com Editor-in-Chief Toufique Imrose Khalidi, who moderated the event, had brought up the issue of personal safety on the internet at the beginning of the dialogue.

He referred to different incidents of cyber crimes and sought the panellists’ opinion on them.

People from different walks of life, who also took part at the dialogue as audience, asked the participants questions, gave their views and shared their experiences as victims of cyber crimes.

BTRC’s Emdad ul Bari admitted to their inadequacy in tackling such crimes.
 
“Sometimes it’s impossible to track a cyber criminal. No one can do that alone.”
 
“No agency on its own, be it RAB or police or BTRC, is capable of creating an effective deterrent against cyber crimes,” he said.
 

Bari called for creating social awareness on this issue. “No agency in any developed country either has been able to this alone. We need to increase awareness and efficiency.”

He continued, “The most important thing is that we need to coordinate more. I think all agencies do not need to become capable in everything. We only need to be more reactive and proactive.”

He said proactive measures would provide safeguard and reactive ones would include solution and investigation.

“Everyone will require these. RAB and police will need these for investigation and identifying (the criminals).
 
“As for intelligence agencies, they will need these for monitoring, surveillance and solving (a crime). I want to stress on this point,” Bari said.
 
He said the BTRC would be able to do better monitoring once the Internet Safety Solutions (ISS) was put in place. “Then the BTRC will also be able to provide digital or network forensic services to others.”
 
“Everything will be possible if we create a coordinating body. An apex coordination body is needed to oversee what RAB can receive from others based on their system or BTRC can provide or obtain depending on its system.”
 
State Minister for Post and Telecommunications Tarana Halim backed Bari’s views at the dialogue.
 
She underlined the need for increasing the BTRC’s efficiency. “I will request BTRC to prove its regulatory power quickly, efficiently and effectively to the people.”
 
“So that they (people) understand that they (BTRC) are receiving the complaints and acting on them. (People) need to see regulatory power.”

Responding to her call, Emdad ul Bari said, “Those who are from the (telecoms) industry, they know how closely the regulator works with everyone.

“Anyone can lodge a complaint with us on our portal or by telephone or e-mail.”

As the two participants stressed on inter-agency coordination, State Minister for Information and Communication Technology Zunaid Ahmed Palak showed a way to make it a reality.

“Everyone is saying that coordination is needed. I want to take this opportunity to start coordinating. We’ll hold an Internet Fair from Sep 5 to Sep 11.

“We’ve launched a mobile internet application named Cloud Source. Will make the RAB DG an admin in it. Cloud Source will be the internet access platform for 160 million people of Bangladesh,” Palak said.

“We will take quick action whenever anyone with his or her photo shares any information via SMS. We’ll all use Cloud Source.”

Tarana Halim said information technology helped Bangladesh make huge strides. “Bangladesh now receives awards in IT. Information technology has both good and bad sides to it. Let’s discourage all from using it for negative purposes.”

She said all information must be verified before any comment is made. “Because these can spark large-scale militant activities and many cases of character assassinations.”