Chavan questions data safety in app

As allegations of data theft at the international and national level continue to grab headlines, former Chief Minister and Congress leader Prithviraj Chavan on Tuesday claimed that the State government’s ‘Mahamitra’ mobile application shares users’ information with a private charitable trust.

“The government’s publicity department launched the Mahamitra app on February 1. We decoded the software, and it was found that all the collected information from the application has been shared with Anulom, a private charitable trust run by one Atul Vaze,” said Mr. Chavan.

The Congress leader raised the issue in the Assembly on Tuesday. Mahamitra is used to spread information about government programmes and schemes through social media influencers.

Later in the day, Minister of State for Home Ranajit Patil said no private information has been shared with any private entity, specifically Anulom.

Anulom was registered as a trust 2016. As per Mr. Vaze’s video available on YouTube, he works under the guidance of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis. He says in the video that Anulom keeps away from politics and focuses only on social work.

The allegations

Mr. Chavan said Anulom had launched its own Android-based mobile app, whose code has similarities to that of Mahamitra. “Information such as a user’s social media presence, photos, contacts, audio and video are being shared with the URL anulom.org and the server is based in West Germany. The government must explain the reason for sharing user information with a private trust,” the Congress leader said.

Mr. Chavan raised several questions, starting with whether the government signed a memorandum of understanding with Anulom to share information. “Does the Directorate General of Information and Public Relations (DGIPR) take permission from users before sharing their information with a private trust? Will the DGIPR take the moral and legal responsibility of sharing the information with a private entity? Who will be responsible if a user’s identity is misused? The social media influencers were chosen through Collectors, Zilla Parishad CEOs and District Information Officers. How can government officials share information with a private entity?” he asked.

He said the government had also sought information on 66 topics from farmers while announcing the farm loan waiver. “Where is this information? Was that shared with a private entity as well? We demand the government to come clean on this issue,” he said.

The State’s say

Mr. Patil said no private information had been taken from the Mahamitra participants, neither had it been given to any private entity. “A total of 84,000 youth had participated in the Mahamitra initiative. The only information collected from them was mobile numbers and e-mail addresses,” the minister said.

He also refuting the allegation of similarities between the Mahamitra and Anulom apps. “Anulom has not entered into any agreement with the government. It works to promote government schemes without any charges. There is no relation whatsoever between the two apps,” he said.