T-Mobile data stolen
By Sumir Singh

One of the big challenges facing India’s booming outsourcing industry is to follow best practices in ensuring the security of confidential data they process for clients in US and Europe.  NASSCOM has taken a number of proactive steps to ensure the client data remains secure in India.

At least two British media organizations have done sting operations to expose some of the weaknesses in Indian IT and BPO companies.  The latest sting was broadcast by British TV station ITV in Oct, 2009 detailing how confidential medical records were being sold by 1 manager at the Scanning and Data Solutions BPO in Pune, India.

While any sting operation that uncovers bad practices in the Indian IT-ITES industry would eventually clean out the bad apples and improve local systems, perhaps the British media should conduct similar undercover operations in UK and Europe as well.

Deutsche Telekom AG owned T-Mobile is one of the largest mobile companies in the world. T-Mobile International has 86 million customers in US, Germany, Austria, Netherlands, Poland and Czech Republic.

T-Mobile UK outsourced many of its core financial services to Infosys in August, 2009.

Now it has emerged that some T-Mobile UK local staff sold customer details to another Britain-based telecom company.  Cellular-News is reporting:

“
Investigators at the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) have been working with the mobile phone company after the firm suggested employees allegedly sold details relating to customers' mobile phone contracts, including their contract expiry dates.

It is being alleged that the information was being sold on to the service provider's competitors whose agents were using the material to cold call customers prior to contract expiry dates to offer them an alternative contract.

The service provider has alleged that many thousands of customer account details have been unlawfully obtained.
“

Perhaps the British media could look in their backyard as well.