More than 3,500 people were arrested in relation to cybercrimes in 2021 when over 14,000 cases were registered under this category, Rajeev Chandrasekhar, minister of state for electronics, and information technology, informed the Lok Sabha on Wednesday.

Giving a comprehensive picture of cybercrime against women and children, and financial frauds, he told the lower house that as per the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 6,229, 10,395 and 14,007 cases were registered under the category ‘fraud for cybercrime’ in 2019, 2020 and 2021, respectively.

Further, 2,332 and 3,503 persons were arrested in relation to the said category in 2020 and 2021, respectively, Chandrasekhar said in a written response to a question in the Lok Sabha at the start of the winter session of Parliament.

The number of complaints reported under the online financial fraud category of the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal from January 2021 to November 30, 2022, is 884,863, he said.

Cybercrimes against children rose to 1,376 in 2021from 1,102 in 2020.

The government has time to time blocked websites containing child sexual abuse material (CSAM), based on lists from the Interpol received through the CBI, Chandrasekhar said.

“The government has issued an order to internet service providers (ISPs), directing them to implement Internet Watch Foundation, UK, or Project Arachnid, Canada, list of CSAM websites/web pages on a dynamic basis and block access to such web pages or websites,” he said.

A memorandum of understanding has been signed between India’s National Crime Records Bureau and the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) of the United States of America for sharing of Tipline reports on online child explicit material and child sexual exploitation contents.

NCMEC’s CyberTipline is a centralised reporting system for online exploitation of children in the US.

The Tiplines, as received from NCMEC, are shared online with states and union territories through the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal for further action.

In 2018, the government had directed ISPs to block 827 websites that hosted pornographic content, following an order by the Uttarakhand High Court.

As far as cybercrimes against women go, cases of cyber blackmailing and threatening went up from 113 in 2018 to 200 in 2021. Cases of publishing obscene sexual materials went up from 862 in 2018 to 1,896 in 2021. Cases of cyber stalking and cyber bullying of women went up from 738 in 2018 to 1,172 in 2021. Cases of defamation and morphing went up from 62 to 276 during the same period while cases of fake profiles went up from 207 to 225.

Other forms of cybercrimes went up from 4,048 to 6,961 during the same period.