S 114A Akta Keterangan Bertentangan Dengan Natural Justice

Pindaan terbaru terhadap Akta Keterangan 1950 dengan memasukkan seksyen 114A merupakan sesuatu yang bertentangan dengan prinsip Natural Justice yang diakui dan diamalkan di seluruh dunia. Seksyen tersebut menjadi bebanan yang besar terhadap pengguna internet.

Sebelum ini beban pembuktian (burden of proof) terhadap sesuatu tuduhan adalah terletak keatas pihak pendakwaan. Ianya selari dengan prinsip Natural Justice iaitu "In criminal cases, as every man is presumed to be innocent until the contrary is proved, the burden of proof rests on the prosecutor."

Atau dalam bahasa mudahnya ialah, dalam kes jenayah seseorang itu adalah dianggap tidak bersalah sehingga dibuktikan sebaliknya. Dan beban pembuktian adalah terletak di atas bahu pihak pendakwaan.

Malah dalam Islam sendiri telah menggariskan satu kaedah feqah sebagai panduan yang jelas mengenai beban pembuktian berdasarkan hadis Rasulullah SAW:

البينة على المدعى واليمين على من أنكر

Mengemukakan keterangan adalah menjadi kewajipan yang mendakwa dan bersumpah adalah menjadi tanggungjawab yang mengingkarinya. (Hadis riwayat Imam al-Baihaqi dengan sanad yang sahih)

Mengikut Prof. Dr Abd Karim Zaidan di dalam kitabnya نظام القضاء في الشريعة الإسلامية  bahwa: jika yang kena dakwa itu membantah atau menafikan apa yang didakwa oleh pendakwa itu maka barulah hakim meminta orang yang mendakwa mengemukakan keterangannya bagi membuktikan apa yang didakwanya itu.

Maka disini adalah jelas sekali dalam Islam menetapkan bahawa pihak yang mendakwa berkewajipan untuk mengemukakan keterangan ataupun bukti bagi membuktikan dakwaan mereka. Selepas bukti atau keterangan dikemukakan oleh pihak pendakwaan, barulah hakim akan meminta keterangan atau sumpah daripada orang yang kena dakwa.

Namun pindaan dengan memasukkan seksyen 114A Akta Keterangan tersebut adalah menjadi sebaliknya yang meletakkan beban pembuktian keatas orang yang kena dakwa untuk membuktikan bahawa bukan dia yang melakukan kesalahan tersebut.

Memang tidak dinafikan bahawa pihak berkuasa menghadapi kesukaran untuk menangkap dan mendakwa pesalah siber ini di Mahkamah. Namun kesukaran tersebut bukanlah sesuatu yang boleh menjustifikasikan tindakan kaedah natural justice. Sekiranya pihak berkuasa sedar keadaan begini, maka mereka seharusnya meningkatkan lagi peralatan, melantik pakar-pakar professional dalam bidang tersebut bagi membolehkan tangkapan dan pendakwaan dibuat terhadap pesalah siber.

Saya yakin dan percaya, pindaan ini akan membuatkan ramai orang yang tidak bersalah dan tidak tahu apa-apa akan ditangkap dan dituduh dibawah seksyen ini. Tentunya akan menjadi kesukaran kepada tertuduh untuk membuat pembelaan kerana beban pembuktian adalah terletak ke atas mereka.  Sedangkan satu hadis nabi dari Ibn Abbas r.a bahawa Rasulullah saw telah bersabda:

لَوْ يُعْطَى النَّاسُ بِدَعْوَاهُمْ لاَدَّعَى قَوْمٌ دِمَاءَ قَوْمٍ وَأَمْوَالَهُمْ وَلَكِنَّ الْيَمِيْنَ عَلَى الْمُدَّعَى عَلَيْهِ. (رواه البخارى ومسلم)

Kalau diberi kepada manusia berdasarkan dakwaan mereka semata-mata, maka akan mendakwalah sesuatu kaum akan darah dan harta kaum yang lain, akan tetapi sumpah adalah diwajibkan ke atas yang kena dakwa.

Pindaan ini mungkin akan memudahkan pihak berkuasa untuk mengambil tindakan terhadap pesalah siber namun ia akan menyababkan ketidakadilan berlaku dan menganiaya orang yang tidak bersalah. 

Evidence (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2012 : Grave repercussions for internet users

24 April 2012 | Express Yourself | Posted by Foong Cheng Leong

Dissecting the presumption of fact relating to publication in the controversial new Bill.

The Evidence (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 2012 was one of the bills rushed and passed by the Parliament recently. Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Seri Mohamed Nazri Aziz, when winding up the Evidence (Amendment) Bill 2012, said the use of pseudonyms or anonymity by any party to do cyber crimes had made it difficult for the action to be taken against them. Hence, the Evidence Act 1950 must be amended to address the issue of Internet anonymity.

The amendments introduced s. 114A into the Evidence Act 1950 to provide for the presumption of fact in publication in order to facilitate the identification and proving of the identity of an anonymous person involved in publication through the internet. In simple words, s. 114A introduces 3 circumstances where an Internet user is deemed to be a publisher of a content unless proven otherwise by him or her.

Men in masks, beware of s.114A.

Although it is stated that the amendment is to cover anonymous persons on the internet, the effect of the amendment is quite wide. You see, we, especially social media network users, generally do not use our real names on the Internet. We use nicknames and pseudonyms. Our home addresses do not appear on our account. We sometimes use fictional characters or even digitalized images of ourselves as our profile picture. All these are done to protect our own privacy. So, if none of my personal details appear on my account, does this mean I am anonymous? If someone’s identity cannot be directly ascertained from his account, I would think that he would be anonymous.

The new s. 114A(1) states that “A person whose name, photograph or pseudonym appears on any publication depicting himself as the owner, host , administrator, editor or sub-editor, or who in any manner facilitates to publish or re-publish the publication is presumed to have published or re-published the contents of the publication unless the contrary is proved”. In simple words, if your name, photograph or pseudonym appears on any publication depicting yourself as the aforesaid persons, you are deemed to have published the content. So, for example, if someone creates a blog with your name, you are deemed to have published the articles there unless you prove otherwise. If you have a blog and someone posts a comment, you are deemed to have published it. If you have a Facebook page and an user posts something on your wall, you are deemed to have published it!

Subsection (2) provides a graver consequence. If a posting originates from your account with a network service provider, you are deemed to be the publisher unless the contrary is proved. In simple terms, if a posting originates from your TM Unifi account, you are deemed to be the publisher. In the following scenarios, you are deemed to be the publisher unless you prove the contrary:-

(1) You have a home network with a few house mates sharing one internet account. You are deemed to be the publisher even though one of your house mates posts something offensive online.

(2) You have wireless network at home but you did not secure your network. You are deemed to be the publisher even though someone “piggybacks” your network to post something offensive.

(3) You have a party at home and allows your friends to access your PC or wireless network. You are deemed to be the publisher even though it was a friend who posted something offensive.

(4) Someone use your phone or tablet to post something offensive. You are deemed to be the publisher.

As for subsection (3), you are presumed to have published a content if you have custody or control of any computer which the publication originates from. Here, you are deemed to be the publisher so long your computer was the device that had posted the content. So if someone “tweetjacks” you or naughtily updates your Facebook with something offensive, you are deemed to be the publisher unless you prove otherwise.

Admittedly, the amendments certainly saves a lot of the investigator’s time. It is very difficult to trace someone on the Internet. It will make prosecution for, among others, defamation, offences under the Communication and Multimedia Act 1998 and Computer Crimes Act 1997 and, election offences much easier. But it is not impossible to trace someone. There are many cases where perpetrators are caught and charged.

I do not see the logic to deem someone to be a publisher. If an investigator is unable to trace the anonymous internet user, then why should the innocent Internet user take the rap? The onus of proof should always be on the prosecuting side. In the English case of Applause Store Productions Limited & Anor v Grant Raphael [2008] EWHC 1781 (QB), the claimants were awarded £22,000 in damages against Raphael, an old school friend, who had created a false personal profile of the claimants on Facebook. The claimants convinced the Court that Raphael was the person who created the fake profile even though he claimed that he had a party at his house and someone in that party created the account.

In summary, the new amendments force an innocent party to show that he is not the publisher. Victims of stolen identity or hacking would have a lot more problems to fix. Since computers can be easily manipulated and identity theft is quite rampant, it is dangerous to put the onus on internet users. An internet user will need to give an alibi that it wasn’t him. He needs to prove that he has no access to the computer at that time of publication and he needs to produce call witnesses to support his alibi.

Clearly, it is against our very fundamental principal of “innocent until proven guilty”. With general election looming, I fear this amendment will be used oppressively. Fortunately, the amendment is not in force yet. I strongly hope that the government will relook into this amendment.

Dipetik dari web Loyar Buruk