When Abraham Mathias, ex vice-chairman of the State Minorities Commission, received an anonymous email that slandered his reputation on both professional and personal fronts, from alert.christians@live.com, a USA-based server, he had little inkling that the hate mail would have originated from a community member in his neighbourhood.

The email was sent three years ago, and a detailed investigation by the Cyber Cell of Mumbai Police pointed the finger at his community member Joseph Dias, who lives close to Mathias’ residence in Santacruz (East) and is the general secretary of the Catholic Secular Forum (CSF).