50% cyber cafes use Deep Freeze banned since 2010

Despite a police ban on the use of Deep Freeze, a workstation integrity application, more than 50 per cent cyber cafe operators in the city have been still using the software. The application has been banned because it deletes the history of a computer thereby hampering police investigation.

Police issued this notification to cyber cafe owners in 2010, after the application affected the investigations into the German Bakery blasts. Apparently the order was not properly implemented.

Joint commissioner of police Sanjeev Kumar Singhal has been issuing orders every two months to renew the ban on the use of Deep Freeze. His recent order in this regard will be valid till December 16.

Explaining the lack of proper implementation of the order, Pune Cyber Crime Cell (CCC) claimed that it was not its duty to check all the computers at city’s cyber cafes. “Police stations should keep a check on the cafes in their respective areas,” cyber crime police inspector Sanjay Tungar said, adding that manpower shortage was another reason. DCP (cyber) Sanjay Shinde said, “We recently took action against cyber cafes using the software, but we do not have adequate manpower to keep a constant watch.”

As a result, most of the cyber cafes are not following the police order. “As many as 750 cyber cafes have been registered with us, of which 50% are still using the software. We have been taking action against them, but its of no use.” 

What’s Deep Freeze?
If a suspect uses a computer on which Deep Freeze is installed, it becomes impossible to retrieve the history of his computer use.