Porn search by junior staff compromised computer networks: Former home secretary

Comments come days after a suspected compromise of some government websites. The government had later said the websites had not been hacked, but attributed the problems to a hardware glitch.

Some subordinate staff in the Union Home Ministry would see pornographic content on internet and download malware in office, leading to compromise of the computer networks, former Union Home Secretary GK Pillai said in Mumbai on Wednesday.

Former Union Home Secretary GK Pillai said junior offers whiled their time away as their seniors were busy in meetings. (Shutterstock/Photo for representation)

“When I was the Union Home Secretary almost 8-9 years ago, every 60 days we would find the entire computers compromised,” said Pillai, who chairs the non-profit Data Security Council of India (DSCI) promoted by Nasscom.

Giving details, he said senior ministry officials used to be busy with meetings till late in the evening because of which the subordinate staff would have to stay back in the offices for post-meeting work.

“So what will they (subordinates) do? They go and open the internet and they are on porn sites, and download all sorts of things that come up with all the malware,” he said, addressing the maiden Finsec Conclave here.

He said the ministry issued a number of directives and it was a detailed review which led to this discovery.

Referring to the Cambridge Analytica revelations that have put social media giant Facebook in a spot, Pillai reminisced that the British company had given a presentation about the same service offerings at a conference in New Delhi two years ago.

Pillai said the DSCI had recommended to make it mandatory for companies’ boards to review cyber security and disclose the preparedness in the annual report which has not moved because arms like the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, SEBI and RBI are “sitting over it”.