India’s Home Minister Amit Shah has approved a one-year exemption from the government’s “Make in India” procurement rules, allowing state forensic institutions to buy at least 422 foreign surveillance and forensic technology items, including products from the Israeli firm Cellebrite, according to an investigation by the Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) reviewed by Al Jazeera. The waiver, signed on January 7, opens the way for agencies to acquire phone-extraction, cloud-access and data-analysis tools despite concerns from lawyers and digital-rights groups that India’s surveillance powers are expanding without adequate legal safeguards.
Key Takeaways: The IFF found that Shah’s waiver covers 422 items, including 118 digital and multimedia forensics products. A separate January 20 letter reportedly allowed the National Investigation Agency to buy Cellebrite’s Premium Tool on a three-year licence worth about 50 million rupees ($529,947). The documents indicate that procurement rules can be bypassed with ministerial approval.
The exemptions matter because India’s “Make in India” policy normally requires government departments to give preference to eligible domestic manufacturers when awarding contracts. The rules do allow exceptions if the minister in charge of the procuring department approves them. According to the IFF, the January 7 letter signed by Shah cleared the purchase of foreign forensic items, including Cellebrite’s Pathfinder, Inseyets On-Prem Pro and Inseyets Offline. The review also found that opposition-ruled states such as Himachal Pradesh, Kerala and Karnataka bought similar phone-extraction and cloning tools, suggesting that the use of such technology crosses party lines.
The tender specifications, as reviewed by Al Jazeera, show that the required “solution” software must be able to use login tokens recovered from seized phones or computers to access more than 100 cloud services. Such tokens act as digital keys that keep users signed in to online accounts. The investigation also points to tools for open-source intelligence, dark-web monitoring and cryptocurrency investigations. Supreme Court lawyer Vrinda Bhandari told Al Jazeera that India’s surveillance capabilities are becoming “wider and deeper”, making mass surveillance easier and more intrusive. “Today, surveillance gives you a richer picture of an individual’s life,” she said.
The findings have renewed criticism from rights groups, which argue that India’s current laws offer no clear guardrails against overreaching surveillance and that data extraction often takes place in a legal grey zone. Cellebrite’s tools have reportedly been used against journalists and activists in countries including Serbia, Jordan, Kenya and Russia. The Delhi Police have also sought software for its National Cyber Forensic Laboratory, which comes under the Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre, according to the report. The issue is likely to intensify debate over privacy, oversight and the limits of ministerial exemptions in India’s security procurement.
Source: www.aljazeera.com