Airtel spy code: Indian techie now demands apology for the legal notice from Israeli firm

Earlier this month, a Bengaluru-based programmer named **Thejesh GN** ,had accused Bharti Airtel of spying on its 3G internet subscribers. He has now expressed ‘outrage and shock’ over an Israel-based company’s legal notice and demands an apology. Thejesh was sent a notice by Flash Networks, an Israeli company for reporting the manner in which Airtel had introduced a JavaScript code in the pages browsed by Airtel customers. Flash Networks offers monetisation solutions to telecom operators across the world. Thejesh GN has sent a counter-claim to Flash Networks accusing the company of trying ’to intimidate and silence’ him with a legal notice. It has also asked for an unconditional apology. Thejesh has put his reply on his official blog.   Thejesh had earlier posted his findings on his twitter handle @thej that highlighted the injection of JavaScript code into webpages browsed by Airtel consumers. https://twitter.com/thej/status/606126370364649472 Later, his GitHub post was taken down after a DMCA take down notice was issued on 05 June. While Thejesh says the legal notice is to silence him, Airtel meanwhile denies the ‘spy code’ allegations. We had reached out to Airtel earlier and the official spokesperson had responded with the following reply: “This is a standard solution deployed by telcos globally to help their customers keep track of their data usage in terms of megabytes used. It is therefore meant to improve customer experience and empower them to manage their usage. One of our network vendor partners has piloted this solution through a third party to help customers understand their data consumption in terms of volume of data used. As a responsible corporate, we have the highest regard for customer privacy and we follow a policy of zero tolerance with regard to the confidentiality of customer data. We are also surprised at the Cease & Desist notice served by Flash Networks to Thejesh GN, and categorically state that we have no relation, whatsoever, with the notice.”