Assam is third in cybercrime; latest NCRB data make startling revelation

GUWAHATI: Yet again, Assam hits headline for a wrong reason. This time around, it's for cybercrime rate. An otherwise backward State is third at the national cybercrime rating with a cybercrime rate of 6.5 per one lakh population. This rate is much above the national cybercrime rate of 3.3 per one lakh population.

According to the latest NCRB (National Crime Record Bureau) data for the year 2019, the cybercrime rate of Assam comes after only two other States – Karnataka with a cybercrime rate of 18.2 per one lakh population and Telengana with a cybercrime rate of 7.2 per one lakh population.

Cybercrime is basically a case of identity theft, i.e. fraudulent practice of using another person's name and personal information in order to obtain credit, loans, etc.

When it comes to percentage share of cybercrimes, Assam's percentage is 5. This is also quite a high percentage when the State's population is taken into consideration. On this count, Assam has been ranked at fifth – only after Karnataka with a percentage share of 27, followed by Maharashtra with a percentage share of 11.2, UP with a percentage share of 25.6 and Telengana with a percentage share of 6.

Cybercrime rate is quite negligible in other States in the Northeast where Assam tops the list. While Meghalaya has a cybercrime rate of 2.8 per one lakh population, Mizoram has a cybercrime rate of 0.7 per one lakh population, both Arunachal Pradesh and Tripura have a cybercrime rate of 0.5, Sikkim has a cybercrime rate of 0.3 and both Manipur and Nagaland have a cybercrime rate of 0.1.

However, barring Assam and Meghalaya the percentage share of all the other six States in the Northeast is zero. The cybercrime percentage State share of Meghalaya is 0.2.