4 govt, 1 private agencies leaked voter data: EC

The Election Commission (EC) has served a show cause notice to four government agencies and one private entity for leaking data of citizens’ national identification (NID) card, EC Secretary Akhtar Ahmed told reporters Sunday.

Primary investigation reveals the five entities inadvertently or deliberately provided citizens’ data to third parties, the EC secretary said after a meeting with the 182 organisations accessing the data at EC server.

The meeting was held at EC office, Agargaon in the capital.

The Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS), Chattogram Port Authority, Department of Women Affairs, iBAS of the finance ministry and the “Upay” mobile financial platform of United Commercial Bank (UCB) provided the data to third parties.

Investigations are ongoing, and if the five organisations are found to provide data intentionally, they will be penalised, the EC secretary said.

Investigators will also study whether the organisations benefitting for EC’s NID data sharing service are taking more information than they need.

There should be a limit on how much organisations can take for their use, the EC secretary further added.