Cyber Cops recover 40GB of Data : Notice to Google Play for - Sevamitra Mobile app @Data-Snatcher

A day after serving notices to the director of IT Grids, which is facing allegations of stealing data of the people of Andhra Pradesh, the Cyberabad police has recovered about 40 GB of deleted data from the hard disks which were seized from the company.

Teams of Cyberabad police are also planning to go to Andhra Pradesh to apprehend director of the company D. Ashok if he fails to surrender.

The police also served notices on Google Play, through which Sevamitra mobile application was hosted and downloaded by the members of the Telugu Desam.

“On Monday, notices have been served on Google Play, through which the android application is downloaded,” said a senior police official.

While only a detailed analysis of the software code of the Sevamitra app of the Telugu Desam, that requires access to the server, can ascertain if the infotech company IT Grids had used government data or not, a preliminary analysis of the code by independent data analysts established that the company had used a lot of data that was impossible to collect unless a Census-level operation was conducted.

In the app, a party worker, who is termed a sevamitra, is assigned a polling booth and he or she is supposed to collect details of voters belonging to it. Personal information such as caste and political preferences are also included.

Details including benefits of government schemes accessed, Aadhaar card number, voter ID number and bank account data were synced. The list came with colour photographs, addresses and mobile numbers.

He said the app had data taken from cattle census and farm ponds surveys, loans availed by individuals to welfare schemes availed. “A detailed analysis of the code for which we need access to servers will definitely ascertain the facts,” he said on a report.

“From the code, it is very clear they were collecting a lot of information which even probably is not done even during a census. You need a base dataset to do this with volunteers, otherwise it really difficult to do,” said independent data analyst Srinivas Kodali on a report. “Where did the data come from,” he asked.  Cyberabad police has booked a case under Section 66 and 72 of the IT Act.