The BJP today charged Congress with indulging in "cyber crime" over the issue of "theft" of its online identity and demanded a reply to the legal notice issued to the party more than a week ago.

"The Bharatiya Janata Party suspects that the Congress party has covertly negotiated with a cyber squatter and used his site bjp.com to first spread malicious content affecting the BJP.

"In the recent past they have used this squatter's site (bjp.com) to redirect it to the AICC. The identity of the owner of this site has been kept masked all the while. These are not steps taken unknowingly. This matter relates to what is known as cyber crime," BJP spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman said here.

Cybersquatting (also known as domain squatting) is registering, trafficking in, or using a domain name with bad faith intent to profit from the goodwill of a trademark belonging to someone else.

Claiming that she had adequate proof of the allegations made two days ago that Congress was indulging in "petty, pickpocket-like theft" of its online identity, Sitharaman said, "Barely few hours after we went public with this online identity theft, the website was inaccessible.

"We tracked an answering machine linked with this site and it kept leading us to a website 'namecheap.com. Strangely, on Monday the website bjp.com was back on the internet but had information unrelated to the party's activities".

Sitaraman had earlier said the bjp.com website's owner details were provided as Bharat Journals and Publications and some telephone numbers in the US had been provided. When contacted, the US phones were connected to answering machines, with nobody responding to the calls.

She today also attacked the Congress for trashing BJP's allegations as "frivolous" and questioned the rival party's claim that it was yet to receive a legal notice.

"The India Post website is testimony to the fact that the legal notice was delivered to the Congress party. It is strange they claim they have not received it. And, if they have not received it, then how can they call the allegation frivolous," the BJP spokesperson said.

She demanded a "studied response" from the Congress to the legal notice sent nine days ago and said the party would consider approaching the police based on the reply.