The Kerala government’s procurement of a smart tool for data management from a US-based software company, to help the fight against Covid-19, has prompted Opposition allegations of a breach of data privacy. “Data gathered with the help of government machinery is being transferred to a private company outside India,” leader of the Opposition Ramesh Chennithala said on April 10. The letter contains a long list of data protection clauses in favour of the Kerala government and lays down how the entire data should be transferred to Kerala whenever asked. A senior official with a state-run IT body stressed that the data were being hosted in India. It won’t be good for the state if we start portraying all modern applications as instruments for data theft.”

Source: The Telegraph April 17, 2020 23:03 UTC