Cyber Delinquency in India: A Critical Analysis of Emerging Trends, Legal Challenges and Policy Reforms

Cyber Delinquency poses a significant challenge in India’s rapidly expanding digital ecosystem, particularly empasizing on juveniles who have a greater tendency to deviate and start doing unlawful act. The dependence on technology has led to new and evolving crimes especially done by youth such as circulating morphed videos or photos, online harassment, using artifical intelligence or deepfake technology. It can harm the victim in mental as well as psychological was, affecting the family and loved ones of both the victim and accused. In India there are various legal framework such as Bharatiya Saksha Sanhita 2023, Information Technology Act 2000, Juvenile Justice act. The domain of cybercrime is vast of which cyber delinquency is a part. Cyber Delinquency poses challenges such as investigative and prosecution challenges while proposing evidence based policy reform focusing on data prevention, digital literacy, child-centric cyber governance focussing on rehabilitation and addressing juvenile cyber offending in India