NEW DELHI, June 25: Indian police were investigating reports that details of 1,000 British bank customers were allegedly sold to an undercover reporter by an Indian call centre employee, a report said on Saturday.
The enquiry began even as police said they were yet to receive a formal complaint against the alleged leak by Karan Bahree, an employee of Infinity eSearch, the Press Trust of India news agency said.
“We have begun the enquiry on the basis of newspaper reports,” Yogender Nehra, superintendent of police, told the news agency.
Many employees of the call centre were questioned on Saturday, the report added.
Earlier this week, Britain’s top-selling tabloid, The Sun, said its journalist had paid a computer expert in New Delhi 5,000 dollars to obtain account numbers, bank card details, secret passwords and other personal details of 1,000 British bank customers.
On Friday, Infinity eSearch said Bahree was a junior employee with no access to ‘sensitive’ documents.
Mr Bahree allegedly told The Sun he had obtained the information from a network of contacts inside call centres used by British banks, that have mushroomed in India over recent years.
Information he allegedly sold included details from credit and debit cards such as expiry dates and security numbers, which could be fraudulently used to make purchases.
The Indian government has played down the data theft scandal as the country’s multi-billion dollar business process outsourcing industry launched a damage control exercise.
India has emerged as a major back office to the world with global firms outsourcing work ranging from credit card processing to air ticketing to take advantage of its less expensive, educated, English-speaking workforce.
India’s Information Technology Act passed by parliament in 2000 lays down stringent punishments for data theft, including prison terms of two to five years. —AFP
