

Gmail banned in Indian government offices - uiiooooo
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/Gmail-banned-in-government-offices/articleshow/46407967.cms?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=TOI

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greenyoda
_" The e-mail services provided by other service providers shall not be used
for any official communication," the notification says..."_

The U.S. government also mandates that official government e-mail accounts be
used for official business, since we have laws that require the archiving of
official communications (to avoid corruption, etc.).

For example, there was a controversy a few years ago when the head of the EPA,
Lisa Jackson, was found to have been doing EPA business using the e-mail alias
of "Richard Windsor", in an apparent violation of federal records laws.[1]

There are also industries like finance where laws mandate that e-mails must be
archived for a certain period of time to make them accessible to regulators in
case improprieties are alleged. Many other businesses also want to keep
archives of employee e-mails in cases patent disputes or other lawsuits arise.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_P._Jackson#EPA_Administra...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisa_P._Jackson#EPA_Administrator)

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mc32
No, they don't ban Gmail in particular, they banned all non-NIC email
providers in general. This is not a focused ban, it's a general ban. Obviously
they want to have editorial control over government employee generated
information.

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theshadowmonkey
Why is this even sensational when all governments around the world do sth of
this sort one way or another ?

~~~
PeterWhittaker
Exactly what I was wondering. Governments and private companies. This isn't
news, it's not even linkbait.

~~~
theshadowmonkey
When dealing with a lot of sensitive government data a lot of things can
happen. It makes so much sense to ban widely used email services where
appropriate. Indian media houses just try to make an issue out of nothing just
to grab attention instead of concentrating on things that matter. These days
media houses like times of India are becoming bad examples of responsible
journalism. It's a shame.

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denzil_correa
Oh no, not again. The amount of times this news has been circulated over the
last 1-year is amazing.

August 30, 2013 : Cyberspying: Government may ban Gmail for official
communication [0]

October 29, 2013 : Govt. mulls ban of official usage of Gmail, Yahoo [1]

March 27, 2014 : Centre asks for ban on Gmail, Yahoo and Facebook sites in
government offices [2]

September 12, 2014 : Email services like Gmail and Yahoo! may be banned for
government's official use [3]

I looked around for an official notification but could not find any. Usually,
it is the DeitY (Department of Electronics & Information Technology) that
issues such notifications and the latest one still makes NIC mails a
"preferable" option over a mandatory ones [4].

[0] [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-
news/internet/C...](http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-
news/internet/Cyberspying-Government-may-ban-Gmail-for-official-
communication/articleshow/22156529.cms)

[1] [http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/govt-mulls-ban-of-
offi...](http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/govt-mulls-ban-of-official-
usage-of-gmail-yahoo/article5284904.ece)

[2] [http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/centre-ban-yahoo-gmail-
so...](http://indiatoday.intoday.in/story/centre-ban-yahoo-gmail-social-
networking-sites-k-n-govindacharya/1/351399.html)

[3]
[http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-09-12/news...](http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-09-12/news/53851235_1_sensitive-
government-data-government-communication-government-offices)

[4]
[http://dot.gov.in/sites/default/files/2014%2012%2008%20Posti...](http://dot.gov.in/sites/default/files/2014%2012%2008%20Posting%20Information%20on%20Social%20Media.pdf)

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leereeves
> monitoring online activities ... on official computers, block content which
> it feels is adversely affecting productivity ... and also have a right to
> delete e-mails or internet history

Is this unusual in India? In the US this is normal.

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kornakiewicz
When I was working in American financial institution we got the same, all
Google services (expect Youtube) were banned. I had a little experience in
working for big companies, but I think it's pretty standard, isn't it?

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DyslexicAtheist
could be additional reasons such as the fear of sensitive data being
transmitted to a company notorious for it's close relationship with the US
surveillance apparatus

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DanBC
Doing business in India is, apparently, really hard.

[http://www.doingbusiness.org/data/exploreeconomies/india](http://www.doingbusiness.org/data/exploreeconomies/india)

They come 142nd out of 189 countries!

The Indian railway ticketing system is bafflingly terrible.

I'd love to hear from people who live there about what it's like, and if
there's any chance it can turn around. It's kind of surprising to me that
India is not much more powerful than it is.

~~~
krisgenre
The Indian railway ticketing system was recently improved and it looks like
its vastly better now.

~~~
virtuabhi
Yes, true. Here are the technical details: [http://pivotal.io/big-data/case-
study/distributed-in-memory-...](http://pivotal.io/big-data/case-
study/distributed-in-memory-data-management-solution) \- a worthy HN
submission by itself

