Tightening the process of obtaining telephone call data records (CDRs), the Centre has decided that an officer no less than the rank of Superintendent of Police or above will be authorised to seek such details from telecom operators.
The move comes days after three Delhi Police personnel and as many private detectives were arrested for allegedly obtaining call detail records of several prominent persons, including BJP leader Arun Jaitley.
A fresh set of guidelines detailing the process of accessing the CDRs by security agencies will be issued soon, official sources said on Tuesday.
Henceforth, only an officer of the rank of Superintendent of Police and above can request for CDRs and proper logs of CDRs accessed has to be maintained and subject to audit.
The SP, after maintaining the logs of CDRs, has to give a mandatory declaration to the concerned District Magistrate about the CDRs obtained every month.
The SP will also have to mention the reasons for accessing the CDR of a particular individual and ensure that data does not fall into wrong hands.
The DMs will forward the information to the concerned Chief Secretary for maintaining a state-wide record.
The guidelines will be issued by the Department of Telecommunications in consultations with Ministry of Home Affairs.
The government is also contemplating to amend the Indian Telegraph Act to allow a few more entities to access the CDRs to keep a tab on dubious characters and organisations.
The illegal obtaining of Jaitley's CDR caused political furore in January with the opposition accusing the government tapping of his phone.
According to police, 52 CDRs, including three belonging to Jaitley, were sought by the group involved in the crime by using e-mail id of Assistant Commissioner of Police (Operations) New Delhi district.
The police personnel obtained CDRs of influential persons in this way and handed them over to the private detectives for returns in terms of cash and other benefits.
According to sources, the accused clients of this racket are mostly businessmen and political rivals. Investigators also suspect illegal tapping of phones by the gang using imported equipment.
CDRs generally list out the number of conversations between two or more entities and are different from phone- tapping wherein an agency can snoop on or record telephonic conversations of those suspected to be engaged in wrongdoings.
Regulators in the US and some other countries have often used tapped phone conversations to prove various crime, insider trading and other charges.
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