British journalists have identified two Indians who buy tens of thousands of private client data records from call centers before selling them to the highest bidder. According to experts at InfoWatch, the ability to safeguard private details is already becoming a major selling point for outsourcing companies.
Yet another scandal involving Indian call centers has been triggered after confidential information journalists revealed how data is stolen from outsourcing companies. A British television channel has aired the results of the research that show how insiders at Indian call centers regularly steal the credit card numbers, passport details and driving license numbers of foreign citizens, before selling the data for large sums of money.
Details of the report, shown on Britain’s Channel 4, were reported in The Sunday Times. It said, during the investigation a 'middleman', Sushant Chandak, offered to sell a database with credit card details of 200,000 people. At a meeting he boasted of a network of agents in call centers across India. "I have a good rapport with them. We cooperate. I pay them, so they trust me," the newspaper quoted Chandak as saying.
In addition to credit card numbers, Chandak was also offering passport numbers, driving license numbers and personal banking details of British citizens. At a separate meeting, the middleman offered the details of 8,000 mobile phone users.
The journalists also met another middleman, known only as Ghufran, who offered details of customers with British financial firms such as Halifax, Nationwide, Woolwich, Bank of Scotland and NatWest for Р€5 each. Ghufran said he received the information from call center insiders who simply downloaded the data on to USB flash drives.
The investigation comes in the wake of a security breach at Bangalore’s HSBC call center in June, where a worker was accused of hacking into customer data and selling the information. It is claimed Р€233,000 was subsequently stolen from customers’ accounts. Officials at the call center in question said then that it had been an isolated incident, but the British journalists have proved that that is not the case.
“Indian call centers have a huge problem – they don’t know how to control insiders and stop the leaks. Moreover, insiders are not taking the odd private record out of the call centers but whole confidential databases. I think it is high time the outsourcing companies took steps to safeguard against insiders and data breaches, especially since the ability to guarantee data security gives a company a distinct competitive edge,” says Denis Zenkin, marketing director at InfoWatch.
Source: The Times of India
