Govt sold vehicular data to private firm years before formulating data sharing policy: Report
3 hours ago
We missed this earlier: In a September 2014 deal, the Indian government sold a copy of the country’s entire vehicle registration database to a private Indian company. The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways (MoRTH) database sold, in objection of government officials around pricing, to Fast Lane Automotive Pvt. Ltd. These revelations were reported by The Reporters’ Collective on the basis of RTIs filed by the Srinivas Kodali and Sreegireesh Jalihal.
The deal was signed five years before MoRTH announced the official Bulk Data Sharing Policy of 2019 that opened up bulk data purchase to all buyers. This policy was scrapped in 2020 over privacy concerns, but Fast Lane continues to have to the data.
Govt Scrapped Vehicular Bulk Data Deal Over Privacy Issues. But a German Firm Was Already Involved.
The partnership with German firm ManServ, in Fast Laneâs own written admission, included sharing of âvery sensitive informationâ.
Photo: Reuters/B. Mathur/Files
Read the first part of this investigation here.
New Delhi: Months after Indiaâs transport ministry allowed a New Delhi-based company access to data on Indian vehicle ownership and registration, the company went on to sign a separate and sensitive data sharing agreement with a German company, according to government documents obtained through RTI queries.
The Indian firm, in a letter to the ministry reviewed by