A peek into the dark side of Metaverse

‘It’s not only important to protect people from becoming victims, but equally important to protect children from turning criminals, say cyber experts

Lakshmi Prasad | NT

Bengaluru: Bengaluru International Centre aired its podcast on the topic, “Knowing Your Rights in the Digital World.”

The speakers for the podcast were N S Nappinai and Padmini Ray Murray. The subject was cyber hygiene and safety measures for women and children. Cyber hygiene and safety measures should be a normalized approach to adapting to technology.

Punishing online crime has become imperative and online violence against women, children, and the marginalized is toxic and terrifying. N S Nappinai, an advocate at the Supreme Court India, author, and founder of Cyber Sathi, and Padmini Ray Murray discussed cyber hygiene and safety measures, and the journey leading to Cyber Sathi.

Padmini Ray Murray initially spoke on the continuum of violence online and offline and said, the impact is as much online if not more because the reach is wider. “Contrary to perception, harm online is worse than what you would see in terms of the physical domain”, she added.

“The idea that it’s different online is getting better nowadays with Meta coming on stage. Metaverse is an immersive reality. With rapes in Cyberspace and the act of hacking the evidence, we have to look deep to figure out the remedy than believing there are none. Hate speech on misogyny, beyond binary and children, are as physical as it can get. Virtual Crime isn’t a victimless crime”, Ray added.

An idealist turned lawyer, she said, “problems may be complex, but we need to look for simple solutions, and need enforcement, talking about big tech and regulatory mechanisms on cybercrime. Talking about her journey with Cyber Sathi, she informed that it is all about hope and the name was intentional for one to look at it as a good cyber friend.

She wanted people to know they do have remedies in law, even if the violence was online. Victims speaking out and being courageous is really imperative as she said “you then become the messiah for the others, so this is the journey I hope to take everybody along with me as a Cyber Sathi.”

Later on, speaking of AI, she said “we are one of strongest nations now; we have a voice, why don’ t we use it and why don’t we lead.” India is centrally minded and moving forward to ensure that there are global legal and model frameworks that are evolved which can be adapted and move forward from there.  

Talking about Metaverse and crimes, she informed that the first level of remedy can be self-regulatory mechanisms within the platform itself, which one can utilize for availing remedies against the miscreants.

To combat AI bias she said, “I think we also should start looking beyond the binary as just the marginalised group, beyond the soft targets, and ensure that everybody is protected equally on that.”