'Smart' phobia grips politicos

Hyderabad: The political war between the BRS and BJP is sending shivers down the spine of political leaders whether it be the ministers, MPs, MLAs, MLCs or even the Opposition leaders. As the probe agencies, whether it be the police or CBI or ED, tracking and retrieving mobile data, the leaders are now scared of using their smartphones.

The call data has become an important component of evidence in almost all sensational cases whether it is TSPSC Group-1 paper leak case or leak of Class X question paper and the Delhi liquor scam case. This has put leaders of all parties on high alert mode and they are taking extra care in using their mobile phones.

Most of the leaders have stopped taking calls unless they are from well-noted phone numbers. They are also not willing to use WhatsApp services like messaging and voice calls.

Prominent leaders and top officials are now said to be using the Signal App. They feel Signal App is a safe communication network since the Central and state governments cannot track the calls or messages instantly. It is learnt that Signal App servers are not installed in India and the agencies and tracking voice recording was not an easy task. The agencies would have to get permission from the US to retrieve the data.

The Opposition BJP and Congress leaders have also cut the use of smartphones suspecting that the state government was tracking their calls.