Question 1: In your opinion, what is the extent to which the national security justification is valid

when it comes to mass and targeted surveillance on citizens? What are the present pitfalls of India’s
surveillance law architecture?

Social theorists have conceptualized numerous institutional structures and techniques to monitor citizens'
actions for both specified and undefined goals throughout history, which is where surveillance as
statecraft has its roots. Preserving national security is one specific and acceptable goal, but India's
surveillance reform is now unbalanced between privacy rights and national security.

The government may and does use methods to monitor all of a person's behavior and actions without the
need for a spy to be physically present, taking surveillance to new levels. Spy Glasses and "dropping"
from the eaves of a roof are no longer necessary to observe people. It is obvious that these technological
advancements have a significant impact on the morality of placing people under surveillance. In today's
culture, where so many of our behaviors are visible, recordable, searchable, and traceable, close
surveillance is considerably more intrusive than it formerly was.

The gray area that comes into picture is essentially under the context of the K.S. Puttaswamy v. Union of
India Judgment, wherein, the Supreme Court upheld a citizen's right to privacy, specifically informational
privacy. However, given that the right to privacy is not absolute, it leaves scope for misuse by higher
authorities in the name of “National security”. In this perspective, it becomes pertinent to define what
exactly constitutes National security. Simply put, National Security is the requirement to maintain the
survival of the state through the use of economic power, diplomacy, power projection and political power.

Although, can National Security effectively respond to the following parameters of moral surveillance?
Does the method inflict unjustified physical or psychological harm?
Does the strategy break a personal boundary?
Whether it involves coercion, deception, a body, relationship, or spatial border—without consent?
Are people aware that their personal information is being gathered, who is looking for it, and why?

Surveillance in India is regulated under two principal laws: the Telegraph Act, 1885 and the Information
Technology Act, 2000. While the Telegraph Act deals with interception of calls, the IT Act was enacted to
deal with surveillance of all electronic communication. Ambiguity on topics including the sort of
interception, the level of information that can be intercepted, and the support provided by service
providers makes it easier to break the law and facilitates government spying. Since it gives the executive
an unfair amount of control over the citizens and has an impact on their daily life, surveillance encourages
the rise of authoritarianism in governmental operations.

In order to find a resolution, it is pertinent to strike a balance between Individual and community rights.
Under this narrative, we would need to alter the notion of our understanding of the surveillance system.
Undoubtedly, In a conflict between National security and Individual rights, the former prevails.
Nevertheless, the question intrinsically posed must now be, how far is public good infringing on personal
rights and whether they can be compromisable?
Question 2: Please go through this article: Indian Spy Agency Bought Hardware Matching
Equipment Used for Pegasus and draft an RTI application for the concerned Ministry(s). The RTI
application should contain the name of the Ministry(s) and at least 5 questions you wish to ask the
Ministry through the application of the RTI Act, 2005?

Public Information Officer

Name
Ministry of Information technology
Address

2 November 2022

Falguni Mahajan
Address

Subject: concerning the pegasus software

Sir, Ma’am,

I’m seeking records, documents and reports with regard to the delivery of a hardware shipment by the
Indian spy agency. I believe that the information pertains to matters concerning public reach and
integrality, therefore I urge you to provide me with the following information.

● Please provide me all the records that were part of the supreme court’s inquiry into the pegasus
project. This would include the time period between the start of the inquiry until today.
Alongside, I would like to be informed of the judicial officers who participated in the said inquiry
and their background of expertise with regard to public surveillance cases.
● I would like to know the specifications of the hardware supplied within the arms deal that was
struck with Israel. It must also constitute, if possible, the data material held in relation to the
hardware equipment in any electronic medium.
● Information on any contracts, MOUs signed with the Israeli aerospace industries before 2022.
● Detailed findings of the pegasus project and background of the people involved in the project
● Detailed reports and press releases during visits of PM Narendra Modi and Ajit Doval to Israel
● Please provide copies of all communication between Ministry of defense and Ministry of
Information technology before and after the period of shipment

I would like the information to become accessible to me by post. Additionally, if some of the documents
can’t be available via post, I would like to inspect the documents in person. Please give me a time and
date within the period of 30 days for the same. Furthermore, if any part of the information sought is held
by another public authority, the same may be transferred to the relevant public authority.

Thanking you
Sincerely
Falguni Mahajan
Question 3: In your opinion, should a government body regulate misinformation/disinformation?
Please state your reasons.

All over the world today, Governments are trying to take charge of regulating the spread of
misinformation and disinformation. The main objective of these would be enforcing content traceability,
ostensibly to promote accountability. However, it is pertinent to know, what exactly makes part of
misinformation?

Opinions, expressions and arguments form an integral part of any democracy, but today, even they have
the scope to be characterized under the banner of ‘misinformation’. The need to control anything that is
not blatantly unlawful is debatable and needs to be carefully considered. Unchecked social media,
according to the government, encourages false information, hate speech, defamation, threats to the peace,
encouragement of terrorism, bullying, and anti-national acts. This may be the case, but if the content is
not plainly prohibited, it is not clear why content regulation is the solution.

The regulation of material that is not immediately prohibited presents additional difficulties. If we take
false information, Who exactly determines what is and is not fake? Who judges if bogus stuff was
intended to be satire or harmful, even if some of it is? Even if the aim is to do harm, who gets to decide if
something is allowed (freedom of expression) or not? Within these, the ambit of ‘anti-national’ content is
something which should be looked deeper into. How can one perceive a content to be against the interests
of an entire Nation-state? What are the protocols followed in order to declare a content Anti-national in its
pursuit? These are some questions that need to be immediately addressed in order to give regulation of
misinformation by the state an ethically-right standing.

The reason why the government shouldn't try to regulate is because it doesn't know how to. . Government
lacks the technological capacity to quickly and effectively find and remove offensive social media posts.
Additionally, For the sake of avoiding responsibility, large social media networks will be delighted to
comply. But excessive compliance might stifle dissent or unpopular speech and severely restrict freedom
of expression, which could result in further "unimaginable harm to democratic democracy." This might
generate an overreaction on part of the companies.

However, this is not to say that the government has no role to play in preventing the spread of
misinformation. It should compel social media platforms to establish and reevaluate their content policies
on a regular basis. The ideal way to accomplish this is through an impartial body that includes
involvement from all relevant parties, including civil society and law enforcement. For the sake of
transparency, finalized standards and guidelines should be made available alongside an effective redressal
mechanism.