-The Hindu There has been no public debate on the level of watch citizens can be put through, and on what the red lines should be while using intrusive mechanisms The tussle between government agencies' need for a better, faster and real-time interception, surveillance and monitoring mechanism through the Central Monitoring System (CMS), on the one hand, and demands by privacy, civil rights and free speech activists, for ensuring higher privacy for...

-Reuters India has launched a wide-ranging surveillance programme that will give its security agencies and even income tax officials the ability to tap directly into e-mails and phone calls without oversight by courts or parliament, several sources said. The expanded surveillance in the world's most populous democracy, which the government says will help safeguard national security, has alarmed privacy advocates at a time when allegations of massive US digital snooping beyond American...

-The Hindustan Times The Centre, it seems, might again be required to go in a damage control mode and account for the loss of Rs. 45 crore worth of foodgrain in the past five years. The data was accessed by Hindustan Times through Right to Information. And as per our calculation, the grains, damaged mostly during handling and storage, could have fed at least 250,000 people per year. The government had earlier admitted...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Amid reports of US cyber intelligence units snooping on secret data worldwide, a PIL filed in the Supreme Court on Tuesday sought a direction to the Union government to take urgent steps to protect its official data stored on the internet and privacy of millions of Indians holding accounts on social networking sites. Petitioner Prof S N Singh said many government offices and officials use free...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: In a rare exception, the Central Information Commission (CIC) has asked National Technical Research Organization (NTRO) to disclose the annual appraisal report of an ex-employee. The technical intelligence agency is exempt from RTI except in cases of human rights violation and corruption. The applicant, Odisha-based Subhendushree Routroy, had sought his annual performance appraisal reports for 2008, 2009 and 2010. He was sacked from NTRO and he...