Indian Government inspired by Orwell
The powers that be in Mumbai must have recently been gifted copies of 1984. According to this article, the Mumbai police has made it a mandate for all cyber cafes operating in the city to install KeyLoggers. As soon as I read this, several alarm bells started ringing in my head. Primary question being WHY? Their answer is that it will be done to keep tabs on terrorist activities being carried out. They aim to snoop in on communication between various terrorist groups.
BUT.. Will this work?
Hmm… a noble cause indeed… But wait, now that the terrorists know about this, will they be dumb enough to use the Cyber Cafes for their activities? There are so many other ways: data cards, GPRS, DSL, Dial Ups, neighboring cities? Ok, even if these are also monitored in some way, at the very least the terrorists now know that the cyber cafes are not safe.
SO, who gets screwed?
So, what next? They will not use it, but who will? The normal people who are not terrorists. Imagine this: All the user names and passwords for your various email, social networking, and messenger accounts get stored onto a central police server. All your credit card details, net banking credentials, important accounts get stored onto a central police server (that is if you are either dumb enough or unlucky enough to ever type in such information when using a cyber cafe computer in the first place).
So, what you may say. Well, imagine someone breaking into that database. Or imagine one of the many police officials that may have access to such data feels tempted. We are looking at Identity fraud, Credit Card fraud, Financial fraud. Such a repository is a gold mine for all kinds of people with nefarious intents.
I think storing this kind of data has got to be against the law somehow. We just need someone to figure it out. This has to be stopped to prevent terrorism, we will have cameras installed in our homes soon.
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September 25th, 2007 at 11:27 am
Hi. I guess you really think good habitually . Good for people! I agree that such laws are made and implemented actually on normal people since after knowing once the terrorist are no fools to work on ill acitivities in Cyber Cafes. I find this delcaration of law disgusting. It seems like revealing a plan to catch the thief to the thief itself??!! Also, this is purely a (maybe unintentional) move to probe into the privacy of people.Is it not similar to the scenarios where credit card companies buy and sell databases and create a nuisance calling us everyday? It is so disturbing.Similarly, our bank accounts and other personal information is in jeopardy.Keep up the good writing! - Rohit Tripati
September 25th, 2007 at 11:28 am
You are the best
September 25th, 2007 at 11:51 am
@Rohit: thanks Rohit.
Yes, it is disturbing… the privacy issue is exactly the major concern. The biggest concern: I am not comfortable trusting all my important data to the police.