The country's cyber crime management system is still flimsy due to lack of necessary manpower, infrastructure and expertise, although the incidents of such crimes are mounting along with gradual increase in people's dependency on various digital platforms.
A few number of cyber crime incidents are reported, and a meagre portion of the reported crimes are investigated and prosecuted. But the real number of such crimes is assumed manifold in the country, according to the authorities concerned.
The country has only one cyber tribunal functional, where cases have been piling up during the last seven years.
The government has set up cyber tribunals in seven more divisional cities, as the number of cyber crimes and cases has increased across the country. But required judges and staff members have not been appointed for those until now.
According to the Cyber Tribunal (Bangladesh) in Dhaka, a total of 260 cases were disposed of in the last seven and half years since its inception on July 28, 2013 with three cases.
The number of cases surged gradually in the following years with 33 lawsuits in 2014, 152 in 2015, 233 in 2016, 568 in 2017, 676 in 2018, and 721 in 2019.
As many as 630 cases were filed until December 2020. Among those, the accused were discharged in 125 cases, and acquitted in 114 lawsuits as the prosecution failed to prove charges against them.
The country's lone cyber tribunal could punish the accused only in 21 cases - 20 of which were filed under Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act and one in Digital Security Act (DSA).
Experts said there are many incidents of cyber crimes in the country that cannot be prosecuted and investigated due to lack of ample resources.
According to the city cyber crime division of Dhaka Metropolitan Police (DMP), it has received around 17,000 complaints of cyber crime incidents through facebook messenger, email and hello city apps in last four years.
There are other police cyber crime divisions in DMP, Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and Detective Branch (DB) as well. They are working mostly in the big cities, including Dhaka, where they have also received many more complaints.
Syed Nasrullah, senior assistant commissioner of City Cyber Security and Crime Division at DMP, said these complaints are not only from Dhaka city.
"We get complaints of cyber crime incidents from all over the country, but we can't resolve all of them from Dhaka," he opined.
According to police and cyber crime tribunal, most of the complaints were on uploading indecent pictures of women on facebook and other internet platforms, hurting people's religious sentiments, offensive remarks about noted people, and various kinds of online cheating with people.
Md. Junaid Alam Sarkar, Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police Intelligence - Cyber and Special Crimes Division of DB, said they cover mostly the prime cases related to cyber crimes.
He also said DSA and Pornography Control Act cover all cyber crimes.
According to police headquarters, they are training officers and setting up cyber cells for all police stations across the country.
The training has been delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. But, now it will resume, and all police stations will get trained officers to deal with cyber crimes, an official concerned said.
Cyber and legal experts said digital or online crimes are gradually causing havoc in the society with various negative impacts on families and youths particularly.
They noted that most of the cyber-criminals go unpunished, as the investigating officers (IOs) and the prosecution cannot establish charges against the accused due to lack of required skill, training and efficiency in handling such cases, and sometimes due to negligence as well.
Cyber Security and Digital Forensic expert Tanvir Hassan Zoha told the Financial Express that he studied some of the cases related to cyber crimes, and found that those have not yet been resolved after many years due to not filing final case report.
Mr Zoha, an assistant professor of cyber security and digital forensic at Bangladesh University of Business and Technology (BUBT), said a survey conducted by his students found that many hacking and financial crime-related cases, filed in 2011-12, are yet to be resolved.
"Dates are deferred repeatedly, IOs are being changed again and again, but the cases are not resolved."
He opined that skilled digital forensic investigators in resolving and proving cyber crimes are very few in the country.
There is no visible progress in the Bangladesh Bank heist, whereas perpetrators in the same case in the Philippines are already in prison.
"This shows our competency in handling cyber crimes."
DSA 2020 needs to be duly implemented, and all the stakeholders concerned, including private ones, need to work together to fight cyber crimes, he opined.
Mr Zoha added that majority of the country's population is already accustomed with digital lifestyle, but the law-enforcing agencies and the judiciary have not improved as much.
The total number of mobile phone subscribers in Bangladesh reached 170.1 million and internet users 111.8 million at the end of last December.
The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) data showed that about 102.3 million users use internet through mobile operators, while 9.5 million users use through ISP (internet service providers) and PSTN (public switched telephone network) operators.
The country's ISPs are now planning to set up monitoring cells in divisional headquarters to detect and avert cyber crimes and their potential threats in virtual space, as the number of their subscribers are growing rapidly and expanding across the country.
Internet Service Providers Association of Bangladesh (ISPAB) has taken the initiative, mainly to protect their networks across the country and help the government fight cyber crimes.
ISPAB President Aminul Hakim said the cells will work to protect their networks from potential crimes, and help the law-enforcing agencies if any crime is committed.
"We think that ISPAB and the law-enforcing agencies need to work together to fight cyber crimes," he added.
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