NEW DELHI: The high court has sought a response from the Central government regarding a PIL alleging the unlawful leak of sensitive information of vehicle owners via certain mobile applications.
The plea raises concerns over how easily insurance and finance-related details of vehicles are being accessed by merely entering the vehicle’s registration number and paying a nominal fee.
Filed by lawyer Gopal Bansal, the PIL stressed that the data being exposed includes information exempted from disclosure under the RTI Act, making the breach particularly alarming.
According to the petition, this information is drawn from key national databases, such as the National Register of Driving Licenses and the National Register of Registered Certificates, both of which are under the Union transport ministry.
During a hearing on October 15, Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Tushar Rao Gedela took up the matter.
The counsel representing the National Informatics Centre (NIC) stated that the agency had not authorised any of the mobile apps in question to access the leaked information.
However, Justice Gedela noted the seriousness of the issue, remarking, “Maybe you never fathomed that this would happen. You cannot do anything about it now since it has come into the public domain.”
The counsel for the Central government, Apoorv Kurup, acknowledged that the situation is being investigated and sought more time to file a detailed response. The court has granted the government eight weeks to respond, with the next hearing scheduled for February 19, 2025.
The PIL also shed light on the transport ministry’s previous “Bulk Data Sharing Policy & Procedure” (BDS Policy), which had been scrapped after concerns over privacy breaches. However, Bansal argued that under the new policy, too, sensitive data is still being sold.