New Delhi: Delhi Police has begun a probe into the hacking of Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi’s Twitter account and has sought log details of his account from the microblogging site.
“A case has been registered by the Economic Offences Wing under Section 66 of the IT Act. Twitter has been asked to provide details of log of the account for investigation purpose,” said Dependra Pathak, Delhi Police spokesman and joint commissioner.
Also, Lt Governor of Delhi Najeeb Jung has been briefed by the police regarding action being taken in this matter, said a senior officer. Police said they were trying to locate the suspect by tracking the IP address used to break into the official account of the Congress leader.
Congress’ chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala had filed a complaint with the EOW of the Police around 1 am, the officer said. Meanwhile the ministry of electronics and IT (MEITY) has started probe into the hacking. “We are probing the incident,” a MEITY official said.
MEITY’s cyber security arm Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) will investigate the matter. CERT-In has authority to collect information stored or communication carried out by any computer in the country for the purpose of cyber security.
However, sources at Twitter said there was no security breach at their end, but the accounts may have been compromised through breach of e-mail.
Congress blamed the hacking on “fascist” forces, a term it uses for BJP, which hit right back saying it showed the main Opposition party’s “mental bankruptcy”.
Blaming “fascist” forces for the hacking, Congress chief spokesperson Randeep Surjewala said, “it reflects the extremities of an intolerant culture that resorts to abuse when cornered and claimed the party has fought such hatred with Gandhian compassion and tolerance.”
The BJP hit back at Congress for pointing fingers at it and its supporters, saying it showed the opposition party’s “mental bankruptcy” as it blamed the main ruling party for everything that went against it.
“We absolutely reject the charge. It only shows Congress’ bankruptcy that it blames BJP for everything. When court asked their leaders to appear in National Herald case it blamed BJP, when summons were issued later it still blamed BJP, and now it is blaming BJP for something completely unrelated to the party,” BJP national secretary Shrikant Sharma said. He demanded that Congress to tender an apology for making such a “baseless” allegation.
