National
CBI favours monitoring internet gateways, networks

New Delhi, Oct. 8 (PTI): With terrorists' growing using the cyber network for communication, security agencies, including CBI, has asked the government to amend Information Technology Act to enable investigating and intelligence agencies to monitor the internet network and gateways.

This was opined at the just-concluded Directors and Inspectors Generals Conference being organised in the capital by Intelligence Bureau.

According to sources, monitoring of network was essential as this would help the probe and intelligence agencies in gathering real-time information and take necessary preventive measures.

Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP), used to transmit voice signals as data packets through the internet, was being misused by some people, posing a serious threat to national security, CBI said in its presentation at the Conference and the opinion was supported by representatives attending the conference.

"The calling person in a foreign country makes a call through calling cards. Once he or she calls any number to India using calling cards, the call is routed through VOIP gateway in the foreign country where the voice signals are converted into data packets.

"The same are transmitted over internet, and are converted into voice signals by VOIP gateway in India. The calls are further routed through a local telephone network to the destination numbers as local calls," the CBI said in the presentation.

National

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