Even my phone is tapped. This is a serious situation: Mamata lashes out at centre over Whatsapp snooping
Kolkata/UNI: West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has come down heavily on the "invasion of privacy" after the WhatsApp snoopgate broke triggering a worldwide commotion.
"What sort of freedom do the people of this country enjoy if they don’t have the freedom to speak without conversations being tapped and recorded ? " she asked.
Speaking after presiding over a Chhath Pujo function here yesterday, she said, " Anyone’s WhatsApp communications could be tracked through the NSO Group, an Israel-based organisation that was using spyware for this purpose. "
“Neither land phones nor mobile phones nor WhatsApp is safe now. Spying is going on at random by various agencies. Even your phones are tapped. My phones are tapped. So what can be done? Will we not speak without being tracked down like this?” she asked.
"This is a very serious situation, and I will request the Prime Minister to intervene and take care of this very unwelcome turn of events. "
"It is a fact that Israel’s NSO Group has supplied all this information of individual persons to the Government, she said, adding, "WhatsApp had given info to CERT-IN, a Government agency in May about the breach of privacy. I know that the Government is using Israel’s NSO Group to watch activities of politicians, media, judges & other important personalities. "
"It is wrong, you cannot capture privacy. It is in total contravention of the rights of an individual. This must stop,” she observed.
Earlier, the Modi government asked WhatsApp to explain the snooping scandal after the Facebook-owned messaging app confirmed that Indian human rights activists and journalists were among those snooped by the Israeli spyware in a hacking spree.
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