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INTRODUCTION : CYBER LAW

It is used to describe the legal issues related to use of Communications Technology, particularly Cyberspace i.e, the Internet It is an intersection of many fields, including intellectual property, privacy, freedom of expression, and jurisdiction It is an attempt to integrate the challenges presented by human activity on the internet with legacy system of laws applicable to the physical world
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Jurisdiction and Sovereignty

The internet does not tend to make geographical and jurisdictional boundaries clear, but internet users remain in physical jurisdictions and are subject to laws independent of their presence on the internet A single transaction, may involve the laws of at least 3 jurisdictions:
The laws of the state/ nations in which the user resides The laws of the state / nation that apply where the server hosting the transaction is located and\ The laws of the state / nation which apply to the person or business with whom the transaction takes place
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JURISDICTION
It is an aspect of state sovereignty and it refers to judicial, legislative and administrative competence The laws of an nation may have extra territorial impact extending the jurisdiction beyond the sovereign and territorial limits of that nation There is no uniform, international jurisdictional law of universal application, and such questions are generally a matter of conflict of laws, particularly private international law
An example would be where the contents of the web site are legal in one country and illegal in another In the absence of jurisdictional code, legal practitioners are generally left with a conflict of law issue
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SOVEREIGNTY
Another major problem of cyber law lies in whether to treat the internet as if it were physical space or to act as if the internet is a world unto itself Those who feel that government should leave the internet community to self regulate

Net neutrality
Every packet of data sent and received by every user on the internet passes through routers and transmission infrastructure owned by a collection of private and public entities, including telecommunications companies, universities and governments, suggesting that the internet is not as independent as other would like to believe
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Free speech in cyberspace

In comparison to traditional print based media, the accessibility and relative anonymity of cyber space has torn down traditional barriers between an individual and his or her ability to publish Any person with an internet connection has the potential to reach an audience of millions with little to no distribution costs
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Governance
The unique structure of the internet has raised several judicial concerns While grounded in physical computers and other electronic devices, the Internet is independent of any geographic location While real individuals connect tot the internet and interact with others, it is possible for them to withhold personal information and make their real identities anonymous If there are laws that could govern the internet, then it appears that such laws would be fundamentally different from laws that geographic nations use today
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MODES OF REGULATION
Law
Areas like gambling, child pornography and fraud are regulated in very similar ways online as offline

Architecture
West Coast Code : these mechanisms concern the parameters of how information can and cannot be transmitted across the internet Everything from internet filtering software, to encryption programs, to the very basic architecture of TCP/IP protocol, falls within this category of regulation

Norms
Certain activities or kinds of conduct online may not be specifically prohibited by the code architecture of the internet, or expressly prohibited by applicable law, nevertheless these activities or conduct will be invisibly regulated by the inherent standards of the community

Markets
Economic market will have limited influence over non commercial portions of the internet, the internet also creates a virtual marketplace for information and such information effects everything from the comparative valuation of services to the traditional valuation of stocks

CONCLUSION
Increase in commercial activity, and as a forum for advertisement, has brought the laws of supply and demand in cyberspace

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