36% jump in monitoring of emails in September

The monitoring of emails by various security agencies saw a 36 per cent jump in September, while tapping of telephones during the month came marginally down.

According to an official note, the number of emails being screened rose to 1,601 as on September 30 from 1,174 at the end of August—an increase of 36.4 per cent. The note said 10,490 phones across the country were monitored by various security agencies.

The number of phones tapped in August stood at 10,648. A high-level committee which confirmed the snooping orders issued by the Union home secretary for telephones saw 1,915 fresh requests being made from the Intelligence Bureau, 11 from the Enforcement Directorate and 492 from the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence.

Interception under the Indian Telegraph Act is requested by various intelligence agencies, police forces and the Army, which is later confirmed by a committee comprising Cabinet Secretary Ajit Seth, Telecom Secretary R Chandrashekhar and Law Secretary B A Agarwal.

The panel, which met here recently and confirmed the orders passed by the home secretary, cleared a fresh request for monitoring 876 emails by the Intelligence Bureau and the Army's Signal Intelligence.