Jumbangla Desk: The Intelligence Department (DB) of Dhaka Metropolitan Police has arrested a person on charges of handing over 46 types of personal information of more than 11 crore citizens stored in the Election Commission's data center in exchange for money. The arrested person is the former director of the data center Tarek M Barkatullah.

He was arrested from North Kazipara of Kafrul in the capital on Wednesday (October 9).

Earlier (October 4, 2022) there was a bilateral agreement between the Election Commission of Bangladesh and the Bangladesh Computer Council under the Ministry of ICT regarding the adoption of NID verification services. According to Article 2 of the agreement, Bangladesh Computer Council Election Commission data shall not be exchanged or sold to any person or organization under any circumstances.

Muhammad Talebur Rahman, Deputy Commissioner of Public Relations of Dhaka Metropolitan Police, gave this information in a press conference at DMP Media Center on Wednesday (October 9).

He said, according to the agreement, in April 2019, the mirror copy of the personal information of more than 11 crore citizens was provided to the Bangladesh Computer Council from the Election Commission. Bangladesh Computer Council provided the mirror copy of citizens' personal information to Digicon Global Service Limited, a private company, for commercial use in September 2019. Digicon Global Service Limited has been selling the personal information of citizens through the website porichoy.gov.bd/ to more than 180 domestic and foreign, government and private organizations for money since September 2019.

According to DB, the data center containing the personal information of over 11 crore citizens stored in the National Identity Registration Division, Selection Commission Secretariat has been recognized as a critical information infrastructure by notification. Various companies have been illegally entering critical information infrastructures, collecting and transferring copies of databases from those infrastructures, and committing digital and electronic fraud. Also, they illegally collect and use personal data for commercial purposes.

This DB official also said that e-transaction information worth 20,000 crore rupees has been obtained for commercial purposes in violation of the Citizens' Personal Information Act.

A case has been filed against 19 people, including Tarek M Barkatullah, who was arrested on Wednesday in the incident under the Cyber ​​Security Act at the capital's Kafrul police station.