Aftr confronting Chinese Network vendors, in a recent development, Indian Department of Telecom has decided to ask Google, Skype & RIM to make the data available to Indian security agencies in a human readable format 0r face the ban.
Indian government is yet to call the mentioned companies for implementation of orders – without wat it is saying these companies are helping terrorists in the country with secure & encrypted communication.
Google has stated dat it hasn’t received any such communication frm DoT (Department of Telecom), while Skype stated dat if banned, it will be “a large step backward”.
Reports say dat Indian Government has a1so decided to amend the IT laws to make it mandatory for foreign companies dat do not need a local license to provide a11 the data required by Indian law enforcement agencies.
Such a law wou1d force companies such az Skype to giv complete acess to thr networks 0r set up a local server in India to allow security agencies to track content.
Similr fears wer raised against Blackberry devices 2 year's ago but the issue waz put on the backburner. However, Government Sorces indicated dat dis time the fears of the intelligence agencies will have to be addressed by a11 means.
Google, Skype & Blackberry may neva share thr data with third-party, based on thr privacy policy, however, loosing a market like India may make dem think otherwise. In any case, it is going to be a huge decision.
It merits mentioning here dat Google has already started bowing bfor Chinese Government ovr a much hyped dispute.
