Govt asks WhatsApp to explain breach, says Centre

The government of India has now asked the Whatsapp to explain the breach of privacy for the Indian users who were quickly targeted by the Israeli spyware earlier this year in 2018. It also revealed that attempts to malign the government for the reported breach were also completely misleading, and strict action would be going to be taken against those who were found to be guilty of violating the law.

The government of India, in a statement, revealed that India is committed to protecting the fundamental rights of the Indian citizens, which includes the right to privacy. It is even clarified that the government even operates strictly as per the provisions of law and even laid down some of the protocols. There are, as of now, some of the adequate safeguards to make sure that there are no innocent citizens that will be harassed or his privacy breached.

At least two of the activists on the snoop list have told the role of the government, which was also emphatically denied it.

The Israeli NSO, the cybersecurity company, also believed to have used the spyware, according to the report revealed, that the technology is not even designed or licensed for the use against the human rights activists and journalists, and is even licensed only to vetted and legitimate government agencies. As Facebook has also sued the NSO, accusing it of with the Whatsapp to spread the malware.

The IT and Union Law Minister Ravi Prasad revealed that also hit out at the opposition Congress, accusing it of snooping on the highly reputed individuals, at the instance of one family.

Mr. Prasad’s statement came after the Whatsapp has confirmed that there are various Indian users that have been targeted by the Israeli Spyware earlier this year in the hacking spree that includes the lawyers, activists, journalists, and senior government officials. The journalist’s activists are believed to have been spied on for the two weeks in the month of April. Whatsapp parent company Facebook has also sued the Israeli cyber security company NSO for alleging it used the Whatsapp servers to spread malware to 1400 across the 20 countries. Pegasus, spyware developed by the NSO, was used to break into the smartphones.