An alert from i-Phone giant Apple to multiple individuals including political leaders and journalists has hinted that they might be targets of “state-sponsored” hackers. “They are trying to remotely compromise the iPhone associated with your Apple ID … and they may be able to remotely access your sensitive data, communications, or even the camera and microphone,” was how the alert went. While such alerts are not specific to India, and these have reached the phone users in several countries repeatedly since 2021, there’s more to this than meets the eye. What Apple stated in a circumspect manner, apparently in order not to get into a tiff with the Indian government, effectively exposes the obsession on the part of the government to undermine individual freedom and fix those set against the establishment. On both these counts, the government is in the dock. It remains to be seen how the Opposition handles this matter.
A safe assumption is that the government is now spying on Opposition leaders and also journalists. Fact is also that this is a continuation of the previous exposes linked to the Pegasus spyware, which also had directly targeted prominent politicians, media personnel etc. Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi has launched a sharp attack on the government on this count, saying all these were part of the BJP-led government’s attempts to stonewall the opposition’s investigations into the “unholy nexus” between the establishment and the Adani group. It is unlikely that the issue limits itself to Adani. When a government spies on the Opposition and the media, its indulgence would be on a larger canvas. The extent of this spying is as yet unclear, though.
Governments engage in spying in the normal course and on the plea of “national security.” There’s no escape from it. Autocracies and dictatorships, far removed from the people, do this all the time. In democracies like India, the scenario was not all that ugly in the past. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is believed to have a special penchant to make full use of the intelligence network. As chief minister, he famously kept a close tab on the activities of not just the opposition leaders in Gujarat but those who caused trouble for him within the BJP itself. The media is dead scared of Modi – evident also in the fact that there is hardly any expose about the wrongdoings of the establishment. The lethargy on the part of the Opposition is legion too. Despite this alert too, the game of spying might perhaps continue unhindered. Meanwhile the Communications & IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnav has stated that an investigation into this matter will be taken up at the earliest but that must be seen to be believed.
