The Indian Institute of Technology, Powai, might soon find itself in the midst of a debate similar to the one raised after Kapil Sibal talked about censoring internet content.
The institute’s internal magazine — IITB Insight — recently published an article that has questioned the general surveillance at the campus, and particularly the IT surveillance.
The article reads, “As per the privacy statement, if the download logs are to be used as evidence to access your e-mail or other computer accounts, it dictates that all browsing data and downloads are logged for every account, and are accessible to determine objectionable doing. Download logs seem to be treated as open knowledge. Apart from being a breach of privacy (which is often passed off stating security reasons), it raises many other concerns and questions.
The article went on to say, “What measures are in place to protect the data from misuse and how effective is it? Who is authorised to view your download logs and what qualifies as “reasonable suspicion”? The institute should clarify and come up with a more descriptive privacy policy.”
Its author, Nivvedan S. said, “The thoughts in the article comprise my opinion about the general surveillance on the campus. There has to be somebody to raise the topic so that other thinking wheels start churning, leading to satisfactory explanation.”
Another IIT-B student, who did not wish to be named, said, “My friends or I didn’t give this any thought. Now when the topic has been raised, it seems worth understanding the policy.” There were a few other students who voiced a similar point of view.
However, a different view came forward when one student said,
“While signing the agreement, the policy was read. And if there is a server connecting all computers, there is likely to be one machine that will have log of all the accounts.”
Prof Urjit Yajnik, dean of student affairs at the IIT-B, said, “Such an issue has not come to me from students, so I am guessing it’s not as big. Also, there is a law that asks the service provider to keep a log of all cyber activities. Hence, the logs are kept to adhere to the law, but they aren't open for everybody to see.”
“All students signed the agreement when entering the institute, which allows the service provider to keep a check on the cyber activity by keeping a log to avoid any misuse. It is to oversee if the services are being used for non-academic purposes. However, there is no strict control and students are allowed to use the facilities for other purposes to a certain point,” he added.
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