Cyber crime: Health department receives threatening emails

Police asked to monitor all internet cafés, maintain record of visitors.


Umer Farooq October 06, 2013
“The email was traced by the police and we found it had been sent from a café in Bilour Plaza," Home Secretary. DESIGN: SIDRAH MOIZ KHAN

PESHAWAR:


Following threatening emails received by the health department – particularly the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI) aimed at polio eradication – the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) Home and Tribal Affairs Department asked the provincial police chief to adopt monitoring procedures.


The home department wrote to the provincial police officer to adopt safety measures including strict monitoring of internet cafes, stating a threatening email had reportedly been sent from a net café situated in Bilour Plaza, Peshawar Cantt.

“The email was traced by the police and we found it had been sent from a café in Bilour Plaza. We have collected all the relevant information and the person who sent the email is being pursued,” said Home Secretary Akhtar Ali Shah.

Shah told The Express Tribune any person can come and use the facility, adding the email could be the result of departmental discrimination or an act of revenge against a boss.

“The police chief has been asked to install CCTV cameras and direct café owners to maintain a record of all those who visit, including names, addresses and other required information,” said Shah, adding the police chief has been asked to complete the process at the earliest.

On September 24, the home department asked local cellular service providers to stop activating illegal Afghanistan-based subscriber identification modules (SIMs), saying foreign SIM cards are being used by terrorist groups, as a result of which they are difficult to trace.

The department claimed SIM cards were being smuggled from Afghanistan on a massive scale and were being activated by Pakistani cellular service providers through porting facilities.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 6th, 2013.

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