The information Technology Act is an outcome of the resolution dated 30th
January 1997 of the General Assembly of the United Nations, which adopted
the Model Law on Electronic Commerce, adopted the Model Law on ElectronicCommerce on International Trade Law. This resolution recommended, inter
alia, that all states give favourable consideration to the said Model Law while
revising enacting new law, so that uniformity may be observed in the laws, of
the various cyber-nations, applicable to alternatives to paper based methods of
communication and storage of information.
The Department of Electronics (DoE) in July 1998 drafted the bill. However, it
could only be introduced in the House on December 16, 1999 (after a gap of
almost one and a half years) when the new IT Ministry was formed. It
underwent substantial alteration, with the Commerce Ministry making
suggestions related to e-commerce and matters pertaining to World Trade
Organization (WTO) obligations. The Ministry of Law and Company Affairs then
vetted this joint draft.
After its introduction in the House, the bill was referred to the 42-member
Parliamentary Standing Committee following demands from the Members. The
Standing Committee made several suggestions to be incorporated into the bill.
However, only those suggestions that were approved by the Ministry of
Information Technology were incorporated. One of the suggestions that was
highly debated upon was that a cyber café owner must maintain a register to
record the names and addresses of all people visiting his café and also a list of
the websites that they surfed. This suggestion was made as an attempt to curb
cyber crime and to facilitate speedy locating of a cyber criminal. However, at
the same time it was ridiculed, as it would invade upon a net surfer's privacy
and would not be economically viable. Finally, this suggestion was dropped by
the IT Ministry in its final draft.
The Union Cabinet approved the bill on May 13, 2000 and on May 17, 2000,
both the houses of the Indian Parliament passed the Information Technology
Bill. The Bill received the assent of the President on 9th June 2000 and came to
be known as the Information Technology Act, 2000. The Act came into force on
17th October 2000.
With the passage of time, as technology developed further and new methods of
committing crime using Internet & computers surfaced, the need was felt to
amend the IT Act, 2000 to insert new kinds of cyber offences and plug in other
loopholes that posed hurdles in the effective enforcement of the IT Act, 2000.
This led to the passage of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008
which was made effective from 27 October 2009. The IT (Amendment) Act,
2008 has brought marked changes in the IT Act, 2000 on several counts.