GUWAHATI: The personal details of people from Nagaland, stranded in various states of the country due to COVID-19 lockdown, got leaked on the social media.
The victims shared the details with the state government after it had made an announcement to extend financial assistance to people from the state stranded elsewhere.
Highly confidential personal details including name, mobile number, bank account details along with IFSC, Aadhaar number, current address, phone numbers and address of parents, detailed description of working professionals etc got leaked.
Chief Minister Neiphiu Rio had on April 20 announced cash assistance to the people. Subsequently, a portal iamstranded.nagaland.gov.in was opened. People were advised to apply there for assistance.
Expressing deep concern, Opposition Congress said the breach of security of data reflected the state machinery’s unpreparedness and inefficiency.
“...For verification, Principal Director of School Education Mr Shanavas C, who is also the nodal officer for monitoring and coordination with other states, could have simply sent only details such as name, address and phone number given by the applicants to respective point of contacts. Moreover, the details sent in MS Excel format should have been in password-protected file known only to the point of contact,” the Congress said in a statement.
It said by sharing the entire information, the officials had committed a serious blunder.
“The state government must take cognizance of this major security breach and take action to restore some semblance of order which has so far been missing in its approach in handling the pandemic situation,” the Congress said.