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Indian Government To Sniff Your E-mails

Techtree News Staff, Sep 22, 2008 1232 hrs IST

Patriot Act-esque move to weed out terrorists

Did you know that our security agencies have been watching all the Web traffic entering and leaving the country? For over two years, they've had hardware installed at our international gateways, sniffing traffic for signs of a terrorist attack, or any malicious intent towards the country. They've also decrypted the data on Blackberry networks so that the security agencies can sniff out the data passed over Blackberry devices and track them.

It's no mystery that terror networks have been using e-mail to spread their nastiness, but shouldn't someone have told us we were being watched?

It's now been discovered that terrorists have been using our internal networks, such their e-mail can't be monitored using the sniffer hardware at the international gateways. To counter this move, the security agencies now plan to use e-mail sniffers at every ISP, and apparently, this move is already well under way with five major ISPs on board. So the government could, if it wishes, read the contents of your e-mail at any time. Worse, so could your ISP.

Corporate houses have been using these tools to monitor the traffic entering and leaving their servers, but they're usually up-front about it, and are justified in that they need to know what you're doing with the company's time and hardware. However, what we do in the privacy of our homes should be our business. Guess it's time to see what our privacy laws say about this.

Source: DNA

USER COMMENTS

DONT WORRY, THE AMERICAN FBI AND THE CIA HAVE BEEN DOING IT TO ASIAN COUNTRIES SINCE THE LAST 10 YRS. NO-ONE WILL FEEL A THING. AMERICANS HAVE A SUPERSECRET AGENCY CALLED NSA. THEY USE A SUPERCOMPUTER TO DO ALL THIS. EVEN CERN HAS BEEN ACCUSED FOR DOING THIS......

by CONSPIRACY THEO, KOLKATA, on Sep 22, 2008 09:00 PM, Report abuse Reply

Do you watch more english movies/books??!!! heheheheheeeeeeeeeeeeeee. R u jason bourne???

by Prasad, Hyderabad, on Sep 23, 2008 05:22 AM, Report abuse

Too much of Dan Brown! hehe

by Ashish, Lucknow, on Sep 26, 2008 11:09 PM, Report abuse

Its bull shit. Rather than searching internet,e-mails,orkut,mobile phone - sms's,,,etc., (time waste encryption,monitoring... in this country of 150CR ppl. Intelligence will be lagging years i bet monitoring. Even if they give project to microsoft/google)Why dont they just search whole India & issue a SSN and keep the people in Green,Orange & Red etc., groups The one with Green is safe, Red is Worst. Red ppl to be watched closely,,etc etc., ideas r in my mind. But who cares the man with gr8 ideas. They want money 2 be wasted. There are many enthusiastic youth ppl in every street in the country. Why dont they hire as secret agents by giving power?? Population is our wealth. No one uses it here in india. There is no job for talented here & so still we r not beating world(But we r still fighting ourselves by casts,regional feelings) Just grow up & be away frm all feelings which will make this country worse

by Prasad, Hyderabad, on Sep 22, 2008 01:01 PM, Report abuse Reply

Who'll decide that you are in the Green group?

by Christopher, Ahmedabad, on Sep 22, 2008 02:16 PM, Report abuse

I Agree to christopher.. It almost seems impossible to identify who is a legit indian and who is not. I am myself not sure about the definition of a legal indian. I think there are refugees living in india from other countries since ages now. And its impossible to identify such people. What do we do with them? .. Should we make them citizens. Or send them back. There are various humanitarian, practical and social conditions that do not let us segregate people into bands. And of course there is the vote bank politics. ... :-) ...

by Anant Bhushan, Roorkee, on Sep 24, 2008 06:07 AM, Report abuse

Those of us, who believe in human rights and a democratic revolution of non-violence, believe as Mahatma Gandhi did... if you are relying on the power of truth, there can be no secrets, so we do not have anything to fear nor hide. So let them do all of their dirty work, the truth will prevail and the the human spirit of freedom will, in the end, be victorious

by Rev. Robert Mil, Oakland Ca USA, on Sep 22, 2008 08:25 PM, Report abuse Reply

Also remember the words of Cardinal Richlieu- 'Give me 5 words written by an honest man and I will find enough evidence to hang him'. You also have nothing to hide when you go to the toilet, or are making love. Are you ok with having surveilance cameras on you in the bedroom or toilet?

by Rex, Bangalore, on Sep 23, 2008 01:32 PM, Report abuse

Is it not moronic to expect them to tell us they're "sniffing" our email? Hey terrorists we're looking at what you're saying. Sheesh.

by Shreya, Bangalore, on Sep 23, 2008 11:06 AM, Report abuse Reply

Its not exactly possible to monitor a person since we'll never know who sent the mail until we investigate. He could go to a browsing center or his friend's place to use the net & send the mail. They could instead search for keywords in the mails using programs. This way, the mails aren't viewed by any personnel unless there is a suspicion.

by Deepak T, Chennai, on Sep 22, 2008 06:00 PM, Report abuse Reply

I dont think that the government has either the time or the resources to monitor each and every mail coming in or going out. So they are going to be only trying to track down mails from people who are under suspicion. If that is the case i think they could still do it. With a warrant i suppose. With the topic getting highlighted in the recent context. I think there is no harm in setting up the infrastructure to track any and all information so that they can be used in cases where needed as soon as possible. Privacy laws... Do we have any??? ... :-) ....

by Anant Bhushan, Roorkee, on Sep 22, 2008 01:32 PM, Report abuse Reply

how are wanton acts of terror by Jehadis taking place inspite of monitoring ?? I know its a very difficult task to track emails, specially when there are n number of unprotected wifi networks all over the country. Still the monitoring is very ineffective.

by Wilderness, Pune, on Sep 22, 2008 01:24 PM, Report abuse Reply