New angle emerges in Adnan murder case

Mumbai is in shock after the kidnapping and murder of 16 year old Adnan Patrawala allegedly by young men who befriended him through a social networking website.Three of the alleged killers are in custody and the Mumbai police is looking for two more suspects.Police sources had first said Adnan was kidnapped and murdered by three friends Sujit Nair, Ayush Bhat and Khimesh Ambavat, who he met on the social networking site Orkut about six months ago.However, others investigating the case now claim there is no Orkut connection and that Adnan became friends with the three at a gaming centre in the Mumbai suburb of Malad six months ago and the Orkut exchanges came later.Though, the Orkut angle hasn't been ruled out. The search is still on for a fourth suspect who was chatting to Adnan on Orkut under the name of Angel, most likely a fake ID.On Saturday evening when Adnan disappeared, he had received several messages from Angel suggesting they meet up. What the police are clear about is the sequence of events.Brainchild behind kidnappingPolice say the brainchild behind the kidnapping was the oldest of the group, 28-year old Sujit Nair, a former BPO employee who had been out of a job for nearly a year.Nair had planned to flee to Dubai on Monday after getting the ransom. But police claim that when the boys found out the news had been flashed across the media they got scared.Also they heard rumours that the investigations into the kidnapping may be handed over to the CBI. So on Sunday night they gave Adnan an alcoholic drink heavily laced with sleeping pills and strangled him inside his car.But the father of one of the accused 18-year old Ayush Bhat a college student says, his son has been framed. He says Ayush was home on Saturday when Adnan disappeared.''My son is cooperating with the police. The police had come to our residence on Sunday with two people called Adil and Aafreen and since then my son has been cooperating. I don't know why Ayush has been booked in the case,'' said Arun Bhat, father of the accused.The incident has once again put focus on the social networking sites and whether there is a need for greater safeguards on the Internet.

Net security: Adnan murder sparks debate

Mumbai teenager, Adnan Patrawala's shocking death sparked a debate among those addicted to the world of social networking websites. Orkut, the site where Adnan is said to have met his kidnappers, has already been in controversy for the darker side of net useage - porn, prostitution, soliciting and hate groups. At a Pune rave party many young software techies were caught in March. The police claim the rave networking was done through Orkut. But sites, Orkut, Facebbok and MySpace say they offer many options to filter out misuse. Like a report abuse option for online harassment - an option that few tend to use. ''I feel that Orkut filters are not that strong as it is just a social networking site and not a business site. Also people are not using the filters often enough,'' said Vijay Mukhi, Co-Chairman, E-Securities, NASSCOM.''It is very difficult to impose a ban as it is an international site governed by international regulations. People shoulld get more cautious about the use,'' Mukhi said.But there are ways of building in some checks. Sites like Facebook are stricter and less cluttered in comparison as a user can only browse through another user's profile once his friend request has been approved.''You know sometimes it becomes the fashion to add new friends. Like I have 900 friends and you say I have only 90 friends,'' said Saurav Ghosh, Net surfer.''It's the fashion to add new friends and you basically boast about it. But there is also a con to this, when you add new friends someone might have a fake thing, he might exploit you in some other way,'' Saurav said.But the fact is on all social networking sites taking on strangers aboard is the done thing. An online experiment conducted by security firm Sophos found over 40 per cent of Facebook users accept a ''friend request'' from a complete stranger.