Highlights
- Background: On August 1, 2019, we wrote to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) indicating concern and also suggested a few points of action with regard to the TrueCaller security breach that occured on July 30, 2019. Within no time, we received a response that an investigation was being conducted on the issue.
- New update: With almost two months since the incident, we thought it was necessary to check-in with the NPCI to enquire about the action and outcomes taken after the security breach.
Background
On 30.07.2019, media reports and various user complaints brought to light an issue that caused the automatic registration of unified payments interface (UPI) based IDs of Truecaller users without their knowledge and consent. We wrote to NPCI indicating concern and suggesting immediate and intermediate action (read more) and they informed us of two steps they took in response, firstly, that they had stopped onboarding new Truecaller users on the UPI Platform and secondly, that they started an investigation on the incident.
Keeping us in the loop
Not to talk their ears off (and yours), we basically asked them to provide information on insights and the outcomes of their investigation. Its important that the public be made aware of the reason for this security breach especially as it pertains to their own data. This also brings a level of accountability to platforms like TrueCaller to ensure that put the rights and protection of individuals first.
Additionally, we reiterated two of our previous interim steps that indicated the need for a complaint redressal mechanism and the importance of architecture documentation in the public space to enable concerned individuals identify vulnerabilities.
Links to important documents
- Follow-up representation to the NPCI dated 14.10.2019 (link)
- Response by NPCI dated August 6, 2019 (link).
- True (caller) or False (caller)? We ask NPCI to answer this question (link).
- Representation to the NPCI dated 1.08.2019 (link)