All computers now under govt. watch

The Ministry of Home Affairs on Thursday issued an order authorising 10 Central agencies to intercept, monitor, and decrypt “any information generated, transmitted, received or stored in any computer.”

The agencies are the Intelligence Bureau, Narcotics Control Bureau, Enforcement Directorate, Central Board of Direct Taxes, Directorate of Revenue Intelligence, Central Bureau of Investigation; National Investigation Agency, Cabinet Secretariat (R&AW), Directorate of Signal Intelligence (For service areas of Jammu & Kashmir, North-East and Assam only) and Commissioner of Police, Delhi.

According to the order, the subscriber or service provider or any person in charge of the computer resource will be bound to extend all facilities and technical assistance to the agencies and failing to do will invite seven-year imprisonment and fine.

The MHA gave the authorisation under 69 (1) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 which says that the Central government can direct any agency after it is satisfied that it is necessary or expedient to do so in the “interest of the sovereignty or integrity of India, defence of India, security of the state, friendly relations with foreign states or public order or for preventing incitement to the commission of any cognizable offence relating to above or for investigation of any offence.”

Source: All computers now under govt. watch

What the actual f***!?
Like seriously, we are turning in to f***ing China. WTF is wrong with the govt.

Comments in the article
Common people would not worry about this as
Affecting the liberty of them as long as they are not doing any criminal activity.Criminals would worry and would try to vote against BJP
Or would go unknown countries.
T. 80

These people are the most foolish people in the entire world. No wonder a law like this gets passed. Politicians are basically a reflection of the society.
But anwyay IT department is a joke compared to US. US with it's NSA/CIA program couldnt do it roperly, do you really think India could pull mass surveilance of computers? I doubt that.

I doubt any agency in India can break encryption. No wonder the govt. is actually against higher forms of encryption.

Glad it isn't as bad as the recent law in Australia.

Link -Australia passes ‘dangerous’ anti-encryption law after bipartisan compromise

Desmond David said:
I doubt any agency in India can break encryption. No wonder the govt. is actually against higher forms of encryption.

this

We can trust cops, they are the guardians of justice /sarcasm

Though I am not overly concerned, I still feel we need to start using VPNs just to be safe.

Desmond David said:
Though I am not overly concerned, I still feel we need to start using VPNs just to be safe.

Won't the Govt ask the agencies to inquire VPN providers to provide the customers data in the name of Nation security?
*www.quora.com/What-type-of-data-do-VPN-providers-collect-during-their-users-VPN-session

I am more afraid of how much latency it will introduce while accessing sites. BSNL network already had trouble accessing http sites.

B

Giving these powers to Intelligence agencies "can be" justified but to revenue agencies? Abki baar door se namaskar modi ji.

Home Ministry order goes much beyond mere telephone tapping: 1) Content streams are much richer, pervasive and personal. 2) Phrasing of, “intercept” in the rules includes traffic diversion. May permit code injections and malware attacks.

Wonder what ramifications will this announcement have on Banking & Healthcare industry, where customer's data is of utmost importance and the leakage/theft will have severe consequences.

What if someone bribes an official who has access ? Anyone can then have access to this legally. If a Pak spy bribed an official, give him a valid reason to monitor an ISRO scientist and of course take benefit of it. The abused official cannot be even prosecuted. What he is doing is perfectly legal. All he has to give is a convincing lie.

W

VPNs are located in foreign countries outside the jurisdiction of Indian agencies,only by having "sufficient diplomatic & technological leverage"(read major powers like US) can one get anything out of these VPNs.

Govt already has access to all the data in banking sector,it afterall owns 70% of the banking sector.

India is not China,there are multiple parties & elections plus an independent judiciary.Only thing to worry about this is all those people making sarcastic comments/jokes on major political figures are now more prone to arrest.

B

whitestar_999 said:
VPNs are located in foreign countries outside the jurisdiction of Indian agencies,only by having "sufficient diplomatic & technological leverage"(read major powers like US) can one get anything out of these VPNs.

Govt already has access to all the data in banking sector,it afterall owns 70% of the banking sector.

India is not China,there are multiple parties & elections plus an independent judiciary.Only thing to worry about this is all those people making sarcastic comments/jokes on major political figures are now more prone to arrest.

Bilkul sahi baat+people use voip's and email providers like protonmail to do their stuff and unfortunately there's nothing that our legal system can do even if its a high profile case.

There was a news I read yesterday. Cyber cell successfully arrested a financial criminal who was communicating through WhatsApp calls. Don't think VPNs are safe.

W

^^No vpn is going to help you if you post with your real name/pic/details on sites & as for whatsapp it is only secure regarding interception of traffic in between which is encrypted. If you forward something to someone else & delete it on your phone it can still be traced to you if the other person did not delete the forwarded msg,same thing with calls. All whatsapp sender/receiver need to delete securely without which it is pointless.

No VPN, no brute force encryption methods can save anybody from the tech we are using right now.
Anything, everything can be accessed by the centre anytime.
In the interests of the security of our country I think this is justified.

After 2008, in 2009 this National Security Act was introduced by the then UPA and NDA accepted to it.

So anybody who does quote anything against the present regime or its interests are deemed to be the enemies of the state.

B

bssunilreddy said:
No VPN, no brute force encryption methods can save anybody from the tech we are using right now.
Anything, everything can be accessed by the centre anytime.
In the interests of the security of our country I think this is justified.

After 2008, in 2009 this National Security Act was introduced by the then UPA and NDA accepted to it.

So anybody who does quote anything against the present regime or its interests are deemed to be the enemies of the state.

I agree with the security parts completely but giving access to revenue departments is complete bull.

B

meetdilip said:
There was a news I read yesterday. Cyber cell successfully arrested a financial criminal who was communicating through WhatsApp calls. Don't think VPNs are safe.

WA and VPN's? Sorry did not get the connection here.

So Government literally blow the opportunity to became the cheapest server hub like Netherlands,Germany ,France etc. We already have the cheapest labor and if Govt provide half of the funding for servers we can offer the same servers for 20-30 EUR compared to hetzner(39 EUR). But with this rules who'll buy the servers?

billubakra said:
Sorry did not get the connection here.

It is a popular belief that WhatsApp calls cannot be traced. Same myth goes with safety of a lot of services.

W

Cyberghost said:
So Government literally blow the opportunity to became the cheapest server hub like Netherlands,Germany ,France etc. We already have the cheapest labor and if Govt provide half of the funding for servers we can offer the same servers for 20-30 EUR compared to hetzner(39 EUR). But with this rules who'll buy the servers?

India doesn't even have the bandwidth & redundancy to compete with server hubs in US/EU.

meetdilip said:
It is a popular belief that WhatsApp calls cannot be traced. Same myth goes with safety of a lot of services.

Any officer from any intelligence knows that whatsapp end to end encryption is just a myth because already it's source code is with the govt agencies. Even the local state police have them.

billubakra said:
I agree with the security parts completely but giving access to revenue departments is complete bull.

Last month an MP and a state cabinet minister from ruling Andhra Pradesh govt got their businesses raided by IT, EC & RI. It turned out that each of them has created suit case companies and transferred 10,000 crores each to accounts abroad.
Also presently the agencies got issued a look out notice from the court to all airports that they might jump from here.

PS: Half of the money which they both amassed are from loans from several nationalised banks across the country.

The centre is of the opinion that this fiasco might turn out into another Vijay Mallya affair and also informed the interpol before hand.

Now tell me how come the centre knew about the transactions they made or were making. Through this surveillance techniques only.

We the comman man aka aam aadmi is now where threated by such National Security Acts because we know very well that we are the hardworking Janata and innocent. It's those guys who does such unscrupulous activities who are always afraid or feel threatened by such surveillance by the central agencies or even the local state ones for that matter.

W

bssunilreddy said:
Any officer from any intelligence knows that whatsapp end to end encryption is just a myth because already it's source code is with the govt agencies. Even the local state police have them.

This is completely incorrect,the day Indian govt has access to source code of software like whatsapp will be the day Pakistan will stop claiming Kashmir. As for end-to-end encryption that also works & till today there is no credible proof of it being bypassed. As for "how centre knew" then always remember that no matter how smart a machine is it is still controlled by a human only,no matter how secure a system is its access is still with some person only.Cases like these are solved by good old "human intelligence".

bssunilreddy said:
Any officer from any intelligence knows that whatsapp end to end encryption is just a myth because already it's source code is with the govt agencies. Even the local state police have them.

whatsapp is a billion dollar IP. Do you really think common police has their source code ? Companies spend billions to keep their sourcecode as private as possible.

W

aFoxWhoIsNice said:
but India has a very advanced surveillance system

Compared to bangladesh & pakistan,maybe.Compared to USA & China,no way.

A

whitestar_999 said:
Compared to bangladesh & pakistan,maybe.Compared to USA & China,no way.

Yes but it's up their with the surveillance game in general. USA is more of sneaky surveillance, China is very up front about it.

I'd say China's surveillance is worse than US because they have recently implemented a social point system. People with "bad" behaviour will have lower points which will result in less likelihood in getting loans or government benefits. Plus with surveillance, they will always know when you criticize politicians or whether you parked in a no-parking zone.

Desmond David said:
I'd say China's surveillance is worse than US because they have recently implemented a social point system. People with "bad" behaviour will have lower points which will result in less likelihood in getting loans or government benefits. Plus with surveillance, they will always know when you criticize politicians or whether you parked in a no-parking zone.

Wow, thats some black mirror shit.

B

bssunilreddy said:
Any officer from any intelligence knows that whatsapp end to end encryption is just a myth because already it's source code is with the govt agencies. Even the local state police have them.

Nope, no country has a backdoor besides US and it's counterparts. Russia and China can have them whenever they want though.

bssunilreddy said:
Last month an MP and a state cabinet minister from ruling Andhra Pradesh govt got their businesses raided by IT, EC & RI. It turned out that each of them has created suit case companies and transferred 10,000 crores each to accounts abroad.
Also presently the agencies got issued a look out notice from the court to all airports that they might jump from here.

PS: Half of the money which they both amassed are from loans from several nationalised banks across the country.

The centre is of the opinion that this fiasco might turn out into another Vijay Mallya affair and also informed the interpol before hand.

Now tell me how come the centre knew about the transactions they made or were making. Through this surveillance techniques only.

We the comman man aka aam aadmi is now where threated by such National Security Acts because we know very well that we are the hardworking Janata and innocent. It's those guys who does such unscrupulous activities who are always afraid or feel threatened by such surveillance by the central agencies or even the local state ones for that matter.

Centre came to know about those companies and money because of 2019 elections. That has nothing to do with surveillance. Cmmon man it's all how they cook their books and stuff. Even if they start surveillance, these people will work on PC's and Laptops which will never be connected to the Internet. How in the world will they sneak in then? Ok CIA, FSB, MI5, Mossad etc. can do it but will our agencies do it? Not until that are pressurised by people in the Centre. And they will target their opponents and people whom they don't like.

Personally I don't care if they start surveillance. I am not a terrorist or something. But like someone mentioned above, who will watch the people watching us? Sex and Money can make people do wonders.

billubakra said:
I am not a terrorist or something

bssunilreddy said:
We the comman man aka aam aadmi is now where threated by such National Security Acts because we know very well that we are the hardworking Janata and innocent.

I think we need to dispel this notion that the common man is not affected by mass surveillance. I already gave an example of how it is in China, we are not too far off especially since the government is getting more authoritarian, they will use surveillance to keep tabs on people who don't align with their views or to systematically target or harass certain demographics. It's foolish to think you are safe when the government can watch all your activity.

B

Desmond David said:
I think we need to dispel this notion that the common man is not affected by mass surveillance. I already gave an example of how it is in China, we are not too far off especially since the government is getting more authoritarian, they will use surveillance to keep tabs on people who don't align with their views or to systematically target or harass certain demographics. It's foolish to think you are safe when the government can watch all your activity.

They are already doing it with uidai. You piss them off, bam they disable or delete or whatever is the right word here your card and boom you cannot access you bank account, your sim is down etc. etc. + I read somewhere that if you have a say SBI bank account in Goa and you withdraw money from say Kashmir branch, they will know about it. So, we are already under kinda surveillance. What will they get atleast from my pc? Songs, Movies, Games, Photos? Well they can take it and shove it up in their acche din.

W

billubakra said:
Well they can take it and shove it up in their acche din.

*geek.digit.in/community/attachments/upload_2018-11-17_21-6-55-png.17762/

B

whitestar_999 said:
*geek.digit.in/community/attachments/upload_2018-11-17_21-6-55-png.17762/

15 lakh kab ayenge?

Look at FM's face LOL

Nerevarine said:
whatsapp is a billion dollar IP. Do you really think common police has their source code ? Companies spend billions to keep their sourcecode as private as possible.

in 2015, 2 techies were caught at bihar-nepal border and 1 techie at mumbai airport. All three were well settled NRIs working in US but came back to join the fight in Syria against the US, Russia and their allies. I read in the Janes Weekly that US provided the intel inputs regarding them.
In July,7th, 2018 15 people were arrested in Mumbai for forming a Whatsapp group propogating enemity against Mr.Modi.

aFoxWhoIsNice said:
True pretty mental.

I can't comment on encryption cracking, but India has a very advanced surveillance system, I've spoken to one of the people supplying such tech, and obviously I can't confirm this with proof without doxxing myself, but if you take my words for it, believe me it's crazy.

The tech is supplied by IBM, took 3 years to built it for us by them. Came operational on October,15th,2015 onwards. Its an AI.
And for those who can think that they can send us Indians back to the stone age by hitting it obviously will be shattered because it implements DNA(Distributed Network Architecture)
Otherwise known as Arrangement of networked computers in which several processors (the CPUs) are located on scattered machines, but are capable of working both independently and jointly as required.
Dont ask me about its name boys...Please...(Its Classified)
Jai Hind...
Long Live Great Hindustan...

aFoxWhoIsNice said:
Is this supposed to be a sarcastic jab at me?

Truth is always sour. But one has to accept the ground reality of todays world as its a cruel world nowadays. Its not a sracastic jab at all.
All this nonsense about privacy and intrusion, if allowed shall render our society to into utter chaos if not controlled.
Take for example, Did any incident happen after 2008 for us? No right! Why it did not?

W

^^Careful,ISI agents might abduct you for your such "detailed knowledge" :lol:

whitestar_999 said:
^^Careful,ISI agents might abduct you for your such "detailed knowledge"

Okay Thanks.

Julian said:
LIM is already in complete force and effect as seen by myself when building India's biggest ISP's data centre. They made us build them a room with individual cabins with terminals. Also a rack for LIM.

Cops already can do pretty much anything to an individual before his lawyer gets involved, so no great shakes there, but with the new laws they can legally seize equipment very easily, in case it makes it to court.

And i dunno what left leaning and the Hindu has to do with this, it's open news; and the FM himself went on to blame the UPA govt for these laws! If anything it's right wing supporters that are so blinded by what they think is "patriotism" that they ignore/condone such blatant assaults on Liberty and democracy.

This is from another forum.

W

Read this:
Govt’s right for once. It’s been prying into our lives for years

Let us turn to the commotion over the government’s directive giving sweeping powers to 10 agencies to intercept personal communications of Indians. The fact is that this is how it has always been.

I can vouch that this is true. This is no different from what has been happening in the past and under previous governments. What is false is that this represents ‘streamlining’ (whatever that means in such a lawless environment as ours). No official and no minister can be held to account by citizens for violations of our privacy.

Right wing or left wing,aka bjp or congress,they all do it.Only difference is that congress did it secretly so not much noise in "liberal media" but bjp dared to do it openly & hence so much noise.

P.S.the author of above article is Aakar Patel,director of Amnesty India & a known bjp basher,just in case somebody accuses him of being "anti-liberal". :lol:

B

bssunilreddy said:
Truth is always sour. But one has to accept the ground reality of todays world as its a cruel world nowadays. Its not a sracastic jab at all.
All this nonsense about privacy and intrusion, if allowed shall render our society to into utter chaos if not controlled.
Take for example, Did any incident happen after 2008 for us? No right! Why it did not?

Do you want me to list all the incidents happening in Kashmir? Remember our great soldiers who martyr there so that we can live. Maybe it didn't happen for you or for anyone else but go ask the family of the one's who's fighting there. Those BC's took eyes of our soldier like few months back. Where was the government's intelligence then? I am sure they must have been watching naughty america. They can take away my privacy if they can guarantee no terrorist attacks anywhere in India not just in few big cities.

billubakra said:
Do you want me to list all the incidents happening in Kashmir? Remember our great soldiers who martyr there so that we can live. Maybe it didn't happen for you or for anyone else but go ask the family of the one's who's fighting there. Those BC's took eyes of our soldier like few months back. Where was the government's intelligence then? I am sure they must have been watching naughty america. They can take away my privacy if they can guarantee no terrorist attacks anywhere in India not just in few big cities.

Until the elections in porkistan they were quiet and after that they wanted to kiss us, make love to us.
Because they suspect what we are capable of?

All of a sudden why show such love and affection?

billubakra said:
Do you want me to list all the incidents happening in Kashmir? Remember our great soldiers who martyr there so that we can live. Maybe it didn't happen for you or for anyone else but go ask the family of the one's who's fighting there. Those BC's took eyes of our soldier like few months back. Where was the government's intelligence then? I am sure they must have been watching naughty america. They can take away my privacy if they can guarantee no terrorist attacks anywhere in India not just in few big cities.

We cannot stop murders, rapes, dacoity etc from happening right.
Likewise it's an isolated incident.

Sure if we can stop any crime before it is about to happen why not then.

B

bssunilreddy said:
Until the elections in porkistan they were quiet and after that they wanted to kiss us, make love to us.
Because they suspect what we are capable of?

All of a sudden why show such love and affection?

DAFAQ reply is that brother? Fck that ****, my point is why isn't our government keeping us safe with all the data that they have as you have mentioned?

B

bssunilreddy said:
We cannot stop murders, rapes, dacoity etc from happening right.
Likewise it's an isolated incident.

Sure if we can stop any crime before it is about to happen why not then.

Isolated? You need to read news especially about these incidents in J&K. Few happened in Punjab also. I am sorry but I spot a bhakt here.

billubakra said:
DAFAQ reply is that brother? Fck that randistan, my point is why isn't our government keeping us safe with all the data that they have as you have mentioned?

A single soldier got martyd right I mean KIA it's called.
Did you thought of those thousands who we lost during our 70 years?

All their sacrifices are not forgotten or lost at all. We shall and will make those responsible pay for their sins against our motherland.

With all the Intel we are gathering we are able to keep the large populace from harm let alone Kashmir.

Please don't compare a single life vs lakhs we were lost.
But life is life I agree.

When the lone gunman who survived in Mumbai shootings was handed death by hanging, all those pro- porkistan and some Ahole student organisations(kanhayya Kumar) in Delhi protested.

Should we give him clemency then to that bastard.

How many innocent civilians and best police officers died in that shootings? Tell me.

Compared to that massacre or carnage, we are safe now right.

Tell me.

billubakra said:
Isolated? You need to read news especially about these incidents in J&K. Few happened in Punjab also. I am sorry but I spot a bhakt here.

The incident in Punjab and Kashmir are cross border firings and shellings.

Who cleanced Punjab from khalistan terrorists?
Who is primarily responsible for the so called situation in Kashmir?

The present situation is comparably better than before right?

They tried and are trying to corrupt our youth and use them against us.

In order to cleanse the corruption of minds, 1st we need security, then jobs, to prosper.

How in hell will anybody do that when we cannot give a commitment, tell me.

Then who is responsible for this situation.

B

^^^^
I smell a bhakt, I rest my case.

W

OK,enough off topic.
Serial PIL-filer challenges 'snoop' law in apex court - Times of India

Serial PIL advocate M L Sharma, undeterred by 50,000 cost imposed on him this month, moved the Supreme Court on Monday challenging the validity of the government's 'surveillance' notification and alleged that it violated citizens' right to privacy.

B

whitestar_999 said:
OK,enough off topic.
Serial PIL-filer challenges 'snoop' law in apex court - Times of India

Unfortunately he will be fined again and the surveillance will keep on going.
Also just a matter of time before we see an Indian version of Edward Snowden.

billubakra said:
^^^^
I smell a bhakt, I rest my case.

I am an Indian pakka Hindustani bhakt.

uh please lets not get personal... attack the issue, not the person (please avoid statements with a "you")

the scary thing is not that they can intercept or whatever, that has been happening for ages, as many have pointed out
reading this update as a symptom of the govt being scared that common people may actually have access to strong encryption and channels for communicating in secret
so the change is the introduction of a punishment for not co operating with officials to help them access the data

still, have to read the whole thing properly, so just my initial reaction (news landed in the middle of mag issue closing)

Okay, went through it. Here is the source.
There is little information in it. At face value, no agencies have been given any new powers beyond what they already had. The order was passed to ensure that the due processes were followed for monitoring, decryption and interception, and that only authorised agencies do so. There is no introduction of additional punishment also. Essentially, nothing changes for the end user.
Much ado about nothing.

Why ‘I Have Nothing to Hide’ Is the Wrong Way to Think About Surveillance : technology

Desmond said this in his first post of this thread. It is a serious issue. If anyone is thinking that if they didn't do any crime then they have nothing to hide and support such rules must go through that link. I am also not saying our govt has implemented those Extreme rules now but people at higher positions are always trying for this, to protect themselves, not common citizen.

This magazine gives info on monthly basis regarding everything:Defence & Security Intelligence & Analysis | Jane's 360
I regularly read this.
billubakra I am not any bhakt.

TheSloth said:
Why ‘I Have Nothing to Hide’ Is the Wrong Way to Think About Surveillance : technology

Desmond said this in his first post of this thread. It is a serious issue. If anyone is thinking that if they didn't do any crime then they have nothing to hide and support such rules must go through that link. I am also not saying our govt has implemented those Extreme rules now but people at higher positions are always trying for this, to protect themselves, not common citizen.

This is spot on, thanks for sharing. Will forward to people that need to be educated on this.

TheSloth said:
Why ‘I Have Nothing to Hide’ Is the Wrong Way to Think About Surveillance : technology

That's some really scary stuff.

The failure of "I have nothing to hide" is that mostly those people will say this who either believe that the govt. is operating in good faith or people who are just apathetic to the whole thing. The govt. is not run by saints but by people who crave money, power and influence and they will use every tool at their disposal to do so, including mass surveillance.

Okay, was discussing this with someone
Apparently, the bit where they say no new powers have been introduced, ("This notification does not confer any new powers") that's a bare faced lie
The IT act allowed interception of only information or data that was transmitted and received, this allows for monitoring of data that has been generated or stored as well
Cross checked with the original act, and not sure if it checks out according to the definitions

new notification link for reference

W

Page 5 24(2)(v) "accessing stored information from computer resources for the purpose of"

To be frank this isn't even debatable,it is simply illogical to assume that such an act can even be made in the first place if it doesn't even have provisions for accessing "stored data".