Terror tech training
By Techgirl

By now every newspaper and TV station in our country has reported the arrest of Yahoo techie Mansoor Peerbhoy for allegedly using his sophisticated computing skills to send the hate filled emails before the cowardly bomb attacks.

Indian Express is now reporting that the 31-year old software engineer, Mansoor Peerbhoy, had done an advanced course in ethical hacking and cyber crime at E2Labs located in Banjara Hills, Hyderabad.  Mansoor was so impressed with this advance computer security course that he told E2Labs that he found it “Mind boggling.  And it really unleashes the power of information”.

Cyber law expert Na.Vijayashankar, also known as Naavi in Cyberspace, is one of the most respected names in the Indian tech world.  As Chairman of the Digital Society Foundation and as a Director of Cyber Law College, one of Naavi’s life mottos is “Let’s build a responsible Cyber society”.   Naavi’s views are highly regarded and he is regularly quoted by the leading Indian newspapers and magazines.  Naavi told techgoss that he feels that this incident should be a wake up call to our Government and they should ensure proper registration processes and background checks for every person who attends such advanced hacking courses.

(Techgoss had run the following story on Oct 7)

Terror techie salary
By Techgirl

Everyone is in agreement that terrorism in all its forms should be crushed.

But sometimes it seems our attention is diverted by some unimportant details to the point of being absurd. 

Mumbai police held a packed press conference where they announced that they had arrested Pune-based Yahoo techie Mansoor Peerbhoy for hacking unsecured WiFi connections in Mumbai to send the hate-filled terror emails before the cowardly bomb attacks.  At the same conference, Mumbai police commissioner Hasan Gafoor and crime branch Chief Rakesh Maria thanked the Muslim community for their invaluable help in the investigations, before answering a number of our (media) questions.  Crime Branch Chief Rakesh Maria was suitably awed when he told the journalists that 31-year old Yahoo terror techie Mansoor was earning Rs. 19 lakh a year from Yahoo, India. You could hear the collective gasp in the room when the figure was mentioned. Most young journalists are paid a fraction of that.

What has the salary of a terror suspect, not yet convicted in an Indian court, got to do with a security investigation?  Did the American Government release the personal income of Bin Laden when declaring him public enemy No. 1?

If that was not bizarre enough, newspaper articles mentioning the police breakthrough prominently mentioned Mansoors high salary.  And that grabbed the attention of the readers who left comments in the websites of our national newspapers.

The comments were predictable in multi religious, multi-cultural India where there are a few fault lines based on religion, caste and creed.  The comments went as follows

Right wing Hindus called for the terrorists to be hung by the nearest tree.
Moderate Hindus called for a united fight against terrorists.
Many from minority communities spoke about how they are Indians first and commended the police chief Hasan Gafoor on the investigation.  A few were suspicious of the pro-Hindu establishment.
Many commentators were philosophical. 

And then there were many commentators seemingly transfixed by the Rs. 19 lakh salary.  One commentator 'Mr. Sensible' only wanted to discuss the salary: "The suspect is 24 years and is drawing 19 lakhs salary. He should be at least an MBA to earn 19 lakhs a year. If he is an MBA he would have studied minimum 22/23 years. How can he be working for that company for several years?"

Rohit, from Bihar, had his eyes only on the money part of the terror arrests.  Rohit wrote in: "Which company pays Rs. 19 lakhs for this guy, let me know? Since when have MNC have the guts to pay 19 lakhs?"

And there were many more readers of our national newspapers who only wanted to comment on the salary. 

Bizarre, is it not?