According to a report by the Financial Times (FT), Indian PM Narendra Modi’s government is allegedly spying on its citizens by purchasing advanced surveillance tools from Israeli tech firms such as Cognyte and Septier.
Modi Spying on Indians
The FT report stated that thousands of personal data flow via the subsea cable landing stations, where advanced technology is deployed to search, copy, and send that data to Indian security services on demand, using artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics.
Such authorised interception monitoring devices are part of what one industry insider calls the “backdoor” that allows Modi’s government to spy on its 1.4 billion citizens as part of the country’s growing surveillance regime.
The report stated that the growth of India’s communications sector has created an active industry of firms trying to provide robust surveillance systems, including Indian suppliers, such as Vehere, and lesser-known Israeli groups such as Cognyte or Septier.
India's government allegedly spying on citizens using surveillance tools from Israeli tech companies. A report by Financial Times has alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government is spying on its citizens by buying powerful surveillance tools from Israeli tech companies… pic.twitter.com/dk6ctggwpb
— World Times (@WorldTimesWT) August 30, 2023
Israeli company Septier has reportedly sold its technology for legal data interception to many telecom companies, including Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio, Vodafone Idea, and Singapore’s Singtel.
In Septier’s promotional video, it claims that its technology harvests the “voice, messaging services, web surfing, and email correspondence” of targets.
Cognyte, another Israeli company, provides surveillance devices in India. In 2021, Meta claimed that Cognyte was one of many companies whose services were being used to track journalists and politicians in different countries but did not mention India.
An unnamed official who works in the sector claimed that Israeli firms’ surveillance products have proven to be more popular than foreign competitors, “Israelis are more open [to doing business] compared to Europeans and Americans.”
According to people, who worked on submarine cable projects all over the world, quoted in the FT report, “India is unusual in that it openly requires telecom companies to install surveillance equipment at subsea cable landing stations and data centres that are approved by the government as a condition of operation.”
Surveillance Rules
In India, security and law enforcement organisations must get permission from the Home Secretary on a case-by-case basis to access data via monitoring devices — but they do not have to go through the courts, the report stated.
As per the reports, civil rights advocates believe these laws are insufficient and lack judicial monitoring, with the legislative framework based on the 1885 Telegraph Act enacted during the colonial era.
According to the Indian Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), the central government issued 7,500 to 9,000 orders for phone interception every month in 2011. This approach was called “rubber-stamping exercises” by Udbhav Tiwari, Mozilla Foundation’s head of global product policy.
Pranesh Prakash of the Bengaluru-based Centre for Internet and Society informed FT that to seek approval from the Home Secretary is nothing more than a “procedural safeguard” that “doesn’t make clear” the distinction between targeted and mass surveillance.
Pegasus Scandal in India
In 2021, media outlets claimed that Pegasus spyware had been used to spy on politicians, journalists, and activists in 10 countries. According to reports, at least 40 journalists, cabinet ministers, and constitutional officials in India were possibly under surveillance.
The reports are based on a database of around 50,000 phone numbers acquired by the Paris-based non-profit Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International, which they claim are numbers of interest to NSO, the Israel-based firm that created Pegasus.
Pegasus is spyware that allows for remote smartphone surveillance, secretly unlocks the contents of a target’s phone, and turns it into a listening device.
Following news that hundreds of Indians might potentially be the targets of spying by Israeli-made malware, the opposition Congress party in India has accused PM Modi of “treason” and jeopardising national security.