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India To Have Automatic Communications Monitoring
angry tapir writes "India plans to set up a centralized system to monitor communications on mobile phones, landlines and the Internet in the country, a minister has told the Rajya Sabha, the upper house of Parliament. Indian laws allow the interception and monitoring of communications under certain conditions, including to counter terrorism. A pilot of the new Centralized Monitoring System (CMS) is to be started by June next year, subject to clearances by other government agencies."
Your call may be monitored for quality control purposes.
I feel bad for whoever has to read the transcripts from all those tech support calls.
At least we know that there will be a system like this. In many countries it is suspected, there's a "wink and a nod", someone says there's such a system, etc, but there's no proof. In India, there will be no doubt.
Looking at space, radio, science and computing from a 'down-under' amateur enthusiast perspective.
For a country of 1 billion people where even the remotest of villages are obsessed with mobile phones, it is highly unrealistic to expect complete mobile monitoring. The money probably is much better spent in other more deserving development efforts. Add to that 26 official languages and thousands of regional dialects for which speech to text hasn't been properly researched yet, it is completely unresonable.
Also, finding loopholes in such a huge system, I think wouldn't present a problem. A simple word substitution would do the trick?
Plus the lack of privacy would probably mean the corruption in the government _will_ work against the idea. (Maybe high level politicos can wriggle out of it, but the rest?)
So they want to spend the money and effort to roll this out while people are pissing and shitting on the streets in holes, and showering with buckets?!
Kind of interesting seeing India go into spheres of protectionism like China`s firewall... early stages Sounds like a major blow to the Indian outsourcing industry. What major company would want any government organization intercepting their business. Back doors implemented by the government are never good for the consumer or general Indian population.
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"...monitorizes..."
Is that you, H.W.?
Why do you leave the third obvious country out of your list?
One that builds nuclear weapons.
One that wastes money on the race into outer space, while being in the deepest debt in the history of mankind.
One that is nationalistic to a fault.
One that sends spies to India and China.
One that kills fetuses and adults all around the middle east.
One that monitors private internet and phone communication inside and outside its territory.
Things to keep in mind:
* When it costs a trillion dollars, they will squash it.
* you will know your call is being monitored because the lights will dim
* you will know when something you said/did requires deeper look because the lights will go out and your call or internet will become choppy or drop
* you will know when you said something suspicious but they don't know why, and you will wake up in The Village.
* you will know your neighbour is trouble because your lights will dim often.
Great. Another American high horse. Because democracy in the US of A is the gold standard by which the free world should measure itself.
- The US builds and holds more nuclear weapons than the rest of the world combined
- US military spending accounts for 60% of the total world military spending, outpacing all other industrialized nations by more than double on a per-capita basis.
- An American calling another nation nationalistic is beyond pot calling the kettle black.
- The CIA and NSA have hundreds of stations on every other continent, and that's just what's published.
- Killing fetuses? Sorry, I got nothing on this one.
The only difference between the USA and China is that Americans *think* they are free, and no people are more hopelessly enslaved, as those who truly believes he is free. How often do you think "honor killings" actually happen? Its a crime there, called murder. The murder rate in the USA is far higher in per capita terms than in India or China.
I hate printers.
The Research & Analysis wing in India has always had significant electronic intelligence hardware and has always been looking for more funding & more engineers to work for them. I know in some sense that they are indeed working their things to let me live my life in some sort of passive ignorance. The thing that pisses me off about this is the day and time they decided to announce this.
I haven't touched yesterday's copy of my paper (the hindu), because it is very likely that the mass hysteria about the last year's terror attacks in Mumbai will overcome any real news that they have to say. I feel sad for the victims of the attack, but in the fight between the government and the terrorists (well, militants for the 90s people), the rights that really being eaten away are mine.
So, pushing this legislature yesterday was an act of emotional blackmail on an entire country. To do this while they're still feeling vulnerable and to ensure that anyone opposing it will get vilified in the press.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur