In India, the government has proposed new rules that may drastically change the rights of privacy for internet users, and it is already being met with great opposition. The Information Technology Act is being changed by a committee that is drafting new rules to Section 67C which will require intermediary companies like Gmail, WhatsApp and Amazon to retain information on users. That information will be stored for the purpose of law enforcement agencies to access it, but it is rather vague at this point as to just what information they will be required to store, and for how long. Currently there are no other countries that have such a law, and in fact in 2014 the European Court of Justice struck down an attempt by the European Union to place a similar law into place. Another very obvious problem with this is the amount of storage retention these companies would have to provide, and that involves both technology and expense. It also would mean that India would be requiring this information to be stored from other countries citizens, and this has privacy advocates around the globe gearing up for a major fight over the new rule.
I think it is amazing to witness a nation that is the world’s most populous democracy engage in such legislation, as it clearly would be a violation of privacy of individuals. Should this information be collected and stored, who knows who else may have access to it? Many of these companies that would be required to comply with the new rule are not Indian, and that may mean that they will only comply in limited ways, or not at all. Does India actually have such a problem with crime that would warrant such a rule? If so it would seem to me that most criminal activity would not be getting transmitted over the internet, but on the streets and in unknown areas. Recently in the US when the FBI made a demand of Apple to access information relative to a terrorist crime it refused. Apple felt the appropriate position is to protect the privacy of users and it stuck to it. I totally agree with this, even if it did slow down the investigation. We cannot create a world where everyone and everything is being monitored, watched, and recorded. People are entitled to privacy, and as it is now even the privacy we currently have seems to be challenged on a regular basis. All of us constantly have to change passwords, update profiles, and even shred our mail to avoid the constant intrusion of hackers and people with bad intentions who violate our privacy. To add government into the mix with a rule such as this one only would open up more opportunities for people to be exposed and potentially damaged by data retention of this magnitude. It is ethically sound that advocates who are working to protect our privacy are able to do so, and we should work to support those individuals and organizations with great effort. Privacy is a right of all people that must be preserved and protected.
1 Comment
Cammron Keehley
5/23/2017 08:36:29 pm
Hey Luigi,
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