ISLAMABAD, March 11: Privacy of some seven million e-mail users in the country is prone to violation as the government admitted in the National Assembly on Friday that log-files of users’ internet activity were kept for a period of one month for security reasons.

The government’s admission came in response to a question of MNA Muhammad Pervez Malik. The same question had been asked in the house on two occasions earlier, on Feb 23 and March 3, however, on both the occasions, the government did not reply to the question.

MNA Pervaiz Malik had asked if the approval of the cabinet had been obtained before starting the process of e-mail scanning in the country.

He also sought the name of the agency responsible for scanning e-mails; the expenditure incurred on scanning e-mails over the past two years; the benefits gained from the exercise and the number of e-mail users in the country.

In a measured response, the government informed the house that the cabinet’s approval for any such process had not been sought by any organisation. However, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, as the regulatory body of the telecommunication sector, has issued instructions to all ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to maintain record (log files) of their customers for a period of one month to help trace cyber crime culprits if required in any investigation under the law.

The government also informed the house that Internet users in the country maintained more than one e-mail accounts.

“As per record held with PTA, at present there are about one million registered Internet subscribers in Pakistan. As estimated, seven million people use Internet and each user is maintaining about three e-mail addresses.

Therefore, over 21 million e-mail addresses.

National Assembly Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain had directed the parliamentary secretary for cabinet division, MNA Firdous Ashiq Awan, in the previous sitting of the house to ensure that the questions were answered. Otherwise, he said, strict action would be initiated against officials for breach of privilege of the house on account of not furnishing desired information.

However, the ministries concerned did not furnish answers to 12 questions on Friday. This prompted the opposition to accuse the government of deliberately hiding information from public representatives.