Electronic forensic institutes and cyber labs in Mumbai

Mumbai: Institute of e-forensics Ltd has earmarked Rs 250 crore to set up electronic forensic institutes and cyber labs.

Christened National Institute of e-Forensics (NIEF), the training institutes will offer short and long-term courses in cyber and mobile forensic computing, Mr Sachin Pandey, CEO of NIEF, said at a press meet to launch the first NIEF here. Computer forensics entails gathering and examining data from a range of electronic media. This data or evidence can then be used in a court of law, employment tribunal or simply as a sample of evidence too. Institute of e-forensics is a sister concern of e-forensic firm Agape Inc. The company has already spent about Rs 50 crore for the Mumbai centre and a cyber lab for one of the state governments.

India requires about 20,000 e-forensic experts to tackle various cases of cyber crimes and online frauds, added Mr Pandey.

Students’ intake

In the Mumbai centre, the company intends to take onboard about 400 students in different batches in the next one year. “We are looking at making around Rs 4 crore in the first year,” he said. The courses are priced for a fee ranging from Rs 15,000-Rs 2.5 lakh.

The company will have four such institutes in Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata and Bangalore by March 2008.

Separately, Institute of e-forensic plans to set up cyber labs which will help in detection and prevention of cyber crimes.