THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Cyberdome of the state police has completed the first phase of the development of ‘Grapnel’, a cyber tool that’s being designed to help the police monitor the darknet, which is a part of the internet that cannot be accessed using normal search engines. Cyberdome sources said the required infrastructure for the Grapnel platform has been set up and data crawling from darknet sites will start soon. The tool has been developed in-house by the Cyberdome team and the project is being funded by Kailash Satyarthi Children’s Foundation (KSCF). The KSCF had already provided several tools to the Cyberdome to counter the online circulation of child sexual abuse materials.
The Grapnel works by collecting data from websites, chat rooms and other sources. The data is monitored and indexed and then subjected to analysis using artificial intelligence. Sunder Krishnan, director of KSCF, said they were trying to enhance the infrastructure and capabilities of the police to fight the menace of circulation of child abuse materials.
Krishnan said the child abuse materials are mostly circulated via peer-to-peer groups, social media platforms and darknet sites, where the commercial dealings are done with the help of cryptocurrencies. “About 45% of the offence is committed by P2P groups. This is followed by social media platforms such as Telegram and then darknet sites,” he said.
Krishnan said countering circulation of child abuse materials should be done in three steps: creating awareness and deterrence, detection and reporting, and support and response. The KSCF will also provide help in setting up counselling centres for the victims in the state. “They ought to be given mental health assistance, legal aid, etc,” said Krishnan.KSCF has been partnering Cyberdome in its fight against circulation of child abuse materials and after their association, the police facility has detected 472 such cases.