Devangshu Datta: Cell surveillance

TECHNO BEAT

A senior HR person at a telecom service provider (TSP) once told me an entertaining story. A three-person panel from the TSP interviewed someone for an exec post.

The panel asked the interviewee to wait outside while it fixed on terms of employment, compensation and so on. Then they called him back in and hired him after a little to-and-fro on the terms.

Months later, the hire confessed that he had gained a critical edge in negotiations. He covertly left a live cellphone on in the interview room and eavesdropped on the panel's deliberations on a second cellphone while waiting outside and ostensibly having a casual chat with a friend.

It was a creative little "snoop" and there is a delicious irony in hoisting a TSP with its own petard, so to speak. But many corporations as well as law enforcement agencies have started to leverage cell technologies into performing more complex surveillance tasks.

Any cellphone network can locate a call to within the radius of the originating cell "" that is, a square km, at most, in an urban locale. But the Nextel-type network offers mobile locator services that track even switched-off phones continuously, to within a few feet. All it needs is an Global Positioning System (GPS)-enabled instrument that broadcasts constantly.

Truckers, public transport services, couriers, emergency rescue personnel, shipping agents and so on find detailed locational information absolutely invaluable. It adds hugely to operational efficiency.

But corporations have also started using mobile locator services to track skiving employees and people with itchy feet. If the phone logs too many hours in bars, or the "phone" visits the offices of a rival, the company knows it has a problem.

With devices such as the Blackberry that offers Net/e-mail access, the employer might also choose to monitor mobile surfing activity in the same way that many offices monitor network e-mails.

There are legal limitations about the manner in which such evidence may be obtained and used. But the fact that cellphone data can be easily accessed means that it will be, in a less-than-perfect world.

An employer who is paying the bill has pretty much a free hand when it comes to snooping. Cellphone surveillance leads to less goofing off, it reduces industrial espionage, curtails sexual harassment and so on.

In law enforcement cases, cellphone data can be backed up years at a time and used as evidence. In the past few years, there have been several high-profile cases where cellphone evidence has been crucial. Cronjegate was the beginning; the Delhi Police's case about match-fixing was built on cellphone records.

The Kanchi Shankaracharya's arrest on conspiracy charges is also largely based on cellphone conversations. The quashed Tada case against lecturer S A R Geelani was completely based on cellphone calls, and so are several ongoing Mumbai mob cases.

The statements of some politicians and members of the Gujarat administration about their actions and whereabouts during the riots have also been recently challenged through cellphone records by a newspaper doing a series of investigative reports.

The police routinely reviews cellphone data when a certain type of case comes up. So do divorce lawyers if they can get hold of it. Cellphone records can prove dreadfully embarrassing even when it isn't actual evidence of criminality.

It's been cited several times in divorce cases. Sooner, rather than later, the Bollywood rags one flips through at hair-dressing saloons will also start using cell records to track the activities of movie stars.

Can you ask an employer about its cell-surveillance policy? Yes, but you won't get a straight answer. Can you ask if your cell is being monitored by the police?

Raising the subject might lead to harassment. Can you access cell-data if you think your spouse is fooling around? Yes, if you're paying the bill. How long is such data available? Indefinitely.

The snooper we referred to above is still working for the TSP. He wasn't sacked after the company got to know about his eavesdropping. That just highlights the moral ambiguities. How long will it take for codes and policies to evolve around this technological space?