In severe allegations of data privacy breach, personal information of more than 30,000 students and alumni of IIT-Roorkee has been exposed on a public website for years. The institution has now launched an internal inquiry, TOI reported.
The has been allegedly electronically siphoned from the institute's academic affairs department records and was accessible to everyone. This has raised concerns over internal cyber safeguards at one of the country's premier engineering institutes.
The leak information includes mobile numbers of students and their parents, caste category, financial background, email addresses, and year of admission and graduation.
Anyone could view personal details of a student, including photographs, by entering the student's enrolment number.
"Since the information on the website can be retrieved only through an enrolment number, it means the data has either been leaked or stolen from the academic affairs section. This is clearly a case of cyber security and personal privacy breach," said a professor told TOI on condition of anonymity.
The breach was alerted by TOI, which was followed by an inquiry. "We have forwarded the matter to dean academic affairs and dean of student welfare for necessary action," said UP Singh, deputy director of IIT-R.
The website is allegedly active for over 10 years. It has not uploaded data of the current year, but contains older records. "It is extremely serious that the website operator is sharing vital personal information of institute's students from an unknown place, and for unknown purposes. Unfortunately, the institute is not yet aware of it," said a student.
Officials have not further revealed the details of students and alumni affected. The institute has a rich history of producing brilliant engineers, scientists and industry leaders. Established in 1847 as the Thomason College of Civil Engineering, IIT-Roorkee is Asia's oldest technical institution. It became the University of Roorkee in 1949 and was upgraded to an IIT in 2001.
(With TOI inputs)
The has been allegedly electronically siphoned from the institute's academic affairs department records and was accessible to everyone. This has raised concerns over internal cyber safeguards at one of the country's premier engineering institutes.
The leak information includes mobile numbers of students and their parents, caste category, financial background, email addresses, and year of admission and graduation.
Anyone could view personal details of a student, including photographs, by entering the student's enrolment number.
"Since the information on the website can be retrieved only through an enrolment number, it means the data has either been leaked or stolen from the academic affairs section. This is clearly a case of cyber security and personal privacy breach," said a professor told TOI on condition of anonymity.
The breach was alerted by TOI, which was followed by an inquiry. "We have forwarded the matter to dean academic affairs and dean of student welfare for necessary action," said UP Singh, deputy director of IIT-R.
The website is allegedly active for over 10 years. It has not uploaded data of the current year, but contains older records. "It is extremely serious that the website operator is sharing vital personal information of institute's students from an unknown place, and for unknown purposes. Unfortunately, the institute is not yet aware of it," said a student.
Officials have not further revealed the details of students and alumni affected. The institute has a rich history of producing brilliant engineers, scientists and industry leaders. Established in 1847 as the Thomason College of Civil Engineering, IIT-Roorkee is Asia's oldest technical institution. It became the University of Roorkee in 1949 and was upgraded to an IIT in 2001.
(With TOI inputs)
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