The government is mulling of a crackdown on the circulation of misinformation online from abroad, warned Liberation War Affairs Minister AKM Mozammel Haque on Wednesday.
"The authorities concerned are working hard to help stop such acts," he said after a meeting of the cabinet committee on law and order.
“Such cyber criminals can’t always be controlled as they all live overseas. We will keenly look into how they can be identified and how steps can be taken against them,” the minister said.
The government, he said, will also investigate media reports on money laundering.
This comes amid the presence of the controversial Digital Security Act (DSA), which critics term a tool to silence dissent.
Over 1700 cases have been filed under the act in the last four years since its enactment. Rights groups are alleging that the law enforcers and the ruling party men are using the controversial DSA against cross-section of people.
Ain O Salish Kendra (ASK) has collected data on 353 DSA cases. According to the data collated by the ASK, police and people from the ruling party and its associate bodies filed 165 or 47 per cent of those cases. A total of 36 per cent of the cases under DSA were filed on allegations of defaming and spreading propaganda against the government, the prime minister, the law enforcement agencies, the ruling party and the party's leaders and workers.
