Surveillance data to be deleted within 6 months, MeitY amends IT rules 

According to a February 26 gazette announcement, The Ministry Of Electronics and Information Technology (MEITY) has proposed amendments to the Information Technology(Procedure and Safeguards for interception, monitoring and decryption of Information) Rules, giving the Union and State home Secretaries the power to order the removal of surveillance data after six months. 

The government has made changes to the IT rules about Information, interception, monitoring and decryption that allow a “competent authority” to mandate the removal of documents. The competent authority in these situations is the home secretary, both at the state and union level who can now request deletion of its records such as surveillance orders. 

Previously, the security agency in charge of the surveillance, whether permitted by the home ministry or a competent court, was the only entity with the authority to remove surveillance records. The designated home secretaries now have the authority to order deletions thanks to a recent modification that was announced by the IT industry. 

According to an IT official, “This is just a technical clarification. Since the home secretary is not a ‘security agency’, it was done to prove that clarity, Once a resource is classified as critical information infrastructure, the level of protection accorded to it is more.”