IT has been more than a week that my cell phone was hacked and because of me, many of the contacts in my phone were also hacked.

It all started when I received an early morning message from a friend on my whatsapp account asking me to message back. I did so and my phone was hacked.

Thereafter many of my friends’ phones were also hacked after they were messaged from my number and they answered as requested.

In these trying times when people especially the elderly are forced to stay home owing to the lockdown I am saddened that some misguided people take a sadistic pleasure in destroying and robbing people’s only means of contact.

What is worse is this hacker sent the most filthy abuse to my phone’s contacts some of whom were close friends, a few aged widows and even to my daughters and to my maid.

One friend who is a senior teacher at a prestigious school called me up in exasperation that because of the lockdown she was taking online classes and this hacker had invaded her phone and destroyed all the academic work of her class which was on zoom.

This is a request to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority officials, and the federal and provincial governments to make laws to make hacking a punishable crime carrying stiff penalties.

The least that can be done is the cell phone service providing companies can set up a helpline for customers who face this misfortune.

Tasneem Allibhoy Tharia
Karachi

Published in Dawn, July 24th, 2020