PALLAVI PASRICHA
[ 2 Nov, 2006 2127hrs ISTTIMES NEWS NETWORK ]

The favourite hangout joints of GenX a few years ago, cyber cafes have fallen from grace now. Is this the end of the cyber cafe culture?

A few years ago, they used to be choc-a-bloc with youngsters who wanted to chat, surf and, if possible, live in the cyber cafes. Today, at the mere mention of the name, any youngster worth his laptop grimaces and says, "How tacky!" Cyber cafes have indeed fallen on bad days and figures are a proof of that. So, while the number of internet users have seen a steady increase from 33 million in March this year to 37 million in September, only 39 per cent of them are using cyber cafes.

RITWIK DONDE

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ TUESDAY, OCTOBER 31, 2006 12:00:32 AM]
 
MUMBAI: When cyber cafés began mushrooming across Indian cities they were considered a window to the world, a source of knowledge and information. Parents and teachers were a happy lot, expecting the youth to make full use of the new technology.

But, having coming under constant security scanner and being touted as shady joints promoting vices, the industry seems to be in the doldrums, with a majority of small players exiting the business.

The Economic Times, TIMES NEWS NETWORK

K YATISH RAJAWAT AND RITWIK DONDE

MUMBAI: The Mumbai police’s decision to regulate internet cafes as public amusement places through a gazette notification has boiled over into a national issue. Nasscom, along with other national bodies, is trying to get the IT Act amended to regulate the cafes. The objective is to prevent state government and state police from coming up with their own norms to regulate the cafes.

The move to put in place a centralised legislation gained momentum after ET first reported (in issue dated September 22, ’06) the Mumbai Police’s initiative to regulate the cyber cafes in the city.

K YATISH RAJAWAT AND RITWIK DONDE in Ecomomic Times report

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2006 03:24:28 AM]

MUMBAI: This time round, they don’t want to be left limping in the chase. The 7/11 blasts have spooked the Mumbai police into tightening the noose around cyber crime. With terrorists using internet-based communication to manage their sleeper cells and plan operations, the Mumbai police wants to monitor the city’s cyber cafes.

The police wants to licence all internet cafes in the city, classifying them under the public amusement category. Each internet cafe owner will have to shell out a licensing fee of Rs 500 per computer for registration.

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2006 03:01:30 AM]

NEW DELHI: There is some good news for those who were looking for the convenience of booking railway tickets online, but did not have a credit card or a net banking facility to make that transaction on the net.

Internet company Sify has announced its tie up with Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) to make online railway ticketing service available at over 3,400 iWay cybercafes across 154 cities, on cash payments. As the first step, a pilot project at 10 iWays in Delhi has been kicked-off on Thursday.

Afternoon Daily, Mumbai STAFF REPORTER made a survey of various Mumbai city cyber cafes & is happy to note a wide compliance of the recent Mumbai police order on maintaining the registers although not everybody visiting a cyber café wants to share personal information to use the facility.

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Cyber cafes in the city have started keeping logbooks and recording all the details of the visitors who visit them. The Mumbai police had issued a notification on August 15, for a 15-day trail, asking cyber cafes to maintain such a logbook in addition to asking for photo identity cards of visitors before allowing them to use the cyber cafe. Another similar notification was issued on August 31, and cyber café owners put these up at their cafes. In it, Police Commissioner A. N. Roy had said that anti-social elements may take advantage of cyber cafes in Mumbai and there are chances of breach of peace and disturbance of public tranquillity, and there was grave danger to human lives as well as loss to the public property. On the condition of anonymity, a cyber café owner at Churchgate said, “Many of our visitors have understood the issue and are cooperating with us. In the initial stage some hesitated, but later they also started cooperating. As far as identifying any person who is involved in criminal activity, it should be very simple for us as their population in society is only one per cent and they should be able to be identified by their face only!” He added, “This order has brought our businesses down by about 15-20 per cent as some visitors argue and then go in search of other cafes where they might be allowed to use the facilities without identity cards. The police’s notification has become unaffordable for us as we have to keep one employee just to fill up the logbook. But this order is not followed by all cyber cafes in Mumbai as they do not want to lose their customers by inconveniencing them with personal details.” Khalique Batliwala of Cyberzone in Flora Fountain said, “After implementation of this rule you can be sure that terrorists will opt for something else, they will never use the same method for their plans. But as far as the checking is concerned, we have been doing this from earlier also, and in the initial stages visitors were not happy. But now that they understand why we have to do this, they started cooperating with us.” He further said, “As the Internet has become an important part of our lives, we get a lot of regular visitors and are familiar with them, but whenever we find anyone suspicious then we ask for identity cards or deny them entry.” Deputy Commissioner of Police R. N. Tadvi (Operations), said, “After the order most cyber café owners have started maintaining logbooks and are also allowing only those to enter who have valid identity cards. We are getting a good response from the cyber café owners as they understand our situation. As far as continuation of this order is concerned, until or unless the dust of security threats doesn’t settle down, this order will continue.”

TIMES NEWS NETWORK[ TUESDAY, AUGUST 01, 2006 12:00:15 AM]

PUNE: The gaming market in India, although nascent, is set to witness action as Microsoft readies to launch its Xbox 360 video gaming and entertainment system. It is set to be launched in the festive season preceding Dassera and Diwali.

In a marketing move taken from the automotive sector, Microsoft has already raised Rs 5 crore through its pre-launch orders. Pre-booking, which opened across the country on June 9, saw Microsoft achieve its target of 10,000 orders, with people paying a deposit of Rs 5,000 each.

The Statseman, Kolkotta reports about the Asansol station, for the first time in the history of Eastern Railways, will have a cyber cafe with 2 mpbs Internet broadband and audio-video conferencing

 BHOPAL: "Mumbai blasts were to avenge the desecration of Meena Tai's statue." The source of this claim, sent via e-mail to a local Hindi daily turned out to be a 22-year-old errant youth, who meant this as a prank and had no connection with 7/11.

Bhopal SP Anant Singh received a call from the daily in the early hours of Wednesday, informing him of the contents of the e-mail which claimed responsibility for Mumbai blasts.

Cops trip on cafe raids - Indian Express UP police haul up 25 youngsters in raids, charge them with obscenity, photograph them… attract charges of harassment AMAN SHARMA LUCKNOW, JANUARY 31 In a typically half-baked operation that showed no lessons had been learnt from similar raids in the past, Lucknow Police were left offering explanations today over their raids on two cyber cafes in Krishna Nagar area in which 25 youngsters, including 10 girls, were hauled up on obscenity charges. The youngsters were mostly from well-to-do families and as their parents landed up at the station demanding an explanation, police were forced to release them by 9 tonight. Most claimed they had been filing resumes or checking their mails when they were apprehended and their photos taken. Under fire over BSP legislator Raju Pal’s murder, the state police hardly needs a scandal of the kind that followed the Aligarh and Agra cyber cafe raids, which had drawn allegations of harassment from arrested youngsters and the NHRC’s attention. Incidentally, today too the media was called in to record the raids despite objections being raised the last time over the way photos of the youths had been displayed all over newspapers and TV. Today’s raids began around 2.45 pm, led by Circle Officer, Alambagh, Shachi Ghildiyal, an IPS officer under training. Ghildiyal says police received complaints from residents of the LDA Colony in Krishna Nagar of ‘‘immoral activities being carried on in internet cafe in the colony’’. ‘‘We sent some of our men to pose as customers and found the information correct. We conducted a raid at Lucknow Internet Cafe and found the adjoining Yash Internet Cafe was also indulging in the same. For Rs 10 per hour, they had virtually given an open licence to sex to these couples inside the cabins,’’ alleged Ghildiyal. The FIR accuses the youths of watching porn websites and sitting in objectionable positions inside the cabins. The owners of the two cafes were arrested and 16 computers were seized. Denying allegations of harassment, Ghildiyal said: ‘‘Besides watching porn websites, couples also had sex inside the small cabins of these cafes. The cabins have high walls and can be bolted from inside. Also the entire first floor of these cafes was only meant for couples, with single girls or boys not allowed there. We found condoms strewn all over an empty plot near the cafes.’’ Ghildiyal admitted that they had ascertained that at least one girl was just typing in her resume, but added the rest of the raid was genuine and that those raising a hue and cry were the same couples who had been found in objectionable positions . ‘‘We called their parents and so they are levelling harassment charges out of embarrassment,’’ she said. ‘‘I was typing my resume, which I had to submit to Lucknow Public School, when police walked in and said I was watching porn. They called up the media, who clicked our photos as if we were criminals. No policeman listened to our pleas,’’ said one of the girls. One of the girls said police made two boys stand outside the cabin in which she was working and the media took photographs. ‘‘It was so humiliating. The policemen had no clue as to what Internet is,’’ she cried.