House panel quizzes e-commerce firms on safety of user data

Members of a parliamentary panel held a meeting on Tuesday with big e-commerce players such as Paytm and Flipkart and others where they questioned them about the safety of the customer data these companies collect, sources said.

The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance, chaired by former Minister of State for Finance Jayant Sinha, examined issues related to cyber crimes and cyber security with senior executives of Paytm, Flipkart, Apple, Punjab National Bank, Bank of India, in Parliament on Tuesday.

In the first round of meeting, banks informed the panel about the safeguards taken by them to secure themselves from cyber attacks. They said while the number of cyber attack attempts may have risen in recent times, banks have succeeded in keeping the crimes under control due to stringent safety measures employed by them, sources said.

In the second round of meeting, some members asked Paytm, Flipkart and mobile company Apple whether they have taken necessary measures to safeguard the customers' data collected by them, sources said. Questions also focused on what the companies do to track the breach of data and how they compensate the customers for it, they added.