he/she keeps an eye on every flight, every call, everything is being heard, who is spying on you?

Ashish Aryan, Himanshi Lohchab, New Delhi: Nowadays your personal information is being sold for Rs 150 to 300. Yes, you heard it right. Your flight details, broadband connection, car insurance, even which mutual fund you bought, all this is in the hands of data collectors. Employees of call centers, BPOs and telemarketers are buying this information. This has been revealed in a report of our associate English newspaper Economic Times.

Shocking report

According to the report, 22-year-old Rishabh Shukla (name changed) works in a telemarketing company. Every day he/she is given phone numbers of 70-100 people who have recently bought, sold or rented a flat in Noida. Rishabh calls these numbers every day. In just one month, he/she found 13 people who had bought or sold property through the broker. For this, Rishabh got a salary of Rs 8000 and an incentive of Rs 5000.

How are the earnings going?

Rishabh says, ‘Initially I used to get a lot of incentives, but gradually the list started ending.’ After this, Rishabh himself would go to every new apartment in Noida and take photos of the visitors register by paying the security guard. Rishabh would sell this information to online real estate platforms. These platforms would then sell this information to interior designers, brokers, property dealers, housekeeping agencies and internet service providers. Rishabh says, ‘I earned around Rs 1.5 lakh in three months because I had the most accurate information.’ Online companies would pay him/her up to Rs 10,000 for each dataset.

What do the experts say?

Digital privacy experts say that data is being leaked in many ways and it has become a big business. Dheeraj Gupta, CEO of digital fraud detection agency mFilterIt, says, “Data is being stolen openly in the name of lead generation, it has become an organized business.” A simple search on Google brings up dozens of websites that offer targeted marketing leads for Rs 120 to Rs 300 and claim that these have been generated through market research. Anyone can search and buy leads for a city or take services for a specific project.

What does the law say?

With the coming of the Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) law, strict rules will be made to keep people’s personal information safe. Legal experts believe that this will stop sharing of data without permission. This law will be fully implemented in two-three years. According to the law, companies will have to set limits on storing data, using it and for how long to keep it. According to Shreya Suri of INDUSLAW, ‘Under the DPDP law, violators will be fined, so companies using data will have to be careful.’ he/she further said that now people’s consent will be required for any other work. Former IT Ministry Secretary Alkesh Kumar Sharma says, ‘In this law, limits have been set for the use of data and companies have been made accountable for it.’

• GOQii founder Vishal Gondal told how scammers targeted 7-8 members of his/her team on WhatsApp. These scammers were calling themselves Gondal and saying that they were stuck in London and needed money. Gondal was surprised how the scammers got the numbers of his/her team members. he/she believes that scammers are now using data, analytics and AI. Gondal raised the question that how to confirm identity now?
• Upgrade founder Mayank Kumar said that his/her company now runs mock drills organised by the IT department to protect employees from such scams. Kumar said that these mock drills are like a mock drill for a fire. A fake account is created and it is observed who falls prey to the scam. Such employees are given special training.

What are AI experts saying?

Cybersecurity and AI expert Prashant Mali said, “AI will make the way scammers use personal data even stronger. It will not be limited to just voice calls and SMS. Deepfake content will be created by changing videos and audios of friends, family or even CEOs using multimedia formats like photos, videos and audio.” Experts warn that the power of generative AI, which can scour multiple databases and create comprehensive data profiles in a matter of seconds, could send the problem out of control.