Pakistan approves encrypted phones for senior officials after data theft disclosure

Pakistan has approved a project to issue encrypted phones to senior government officials for official communication, days after the National Cyber Crime Investigation Agency disclosed that sensitive records of public officials had been stolen and sold.

IT and Telecommunication Secretary Zarrar Hasham Khan told the Senate Standing Committee on Information Technology and Telecommunication on Thursday that a government development committee had cleared the project. He did not provide the number of devices, the issuance schedule or the cost.

'It will be secure phones, whose development is done, on which all official communication will happen,' Khan said.

The plan follows a separate briefing at the same hearing. Ehsanullah Chohan, additional director of the cybercrime agency's Islamabad office, told lawmakers that records concerning senior officials, bureaucrats and personnel of other agencies had been targeted. The information included call-detail records, travel histories, data linked to the national identity database, family information, mobile subscriber details and location records.

Chohan said a raid in Rawalpindi uncovered a five-person network accused of obtaining and selling the data. He did not specify how many officials were affected, where the records originated or whether the theft involved systems the new encrypted phones are meant to replace. The agency's claims could not be independently verified, Daily Times reported.

Khan also told the committee that government offices had started using Beep, a locally developed application for messaging and calls, for official business. 'Instead of using WhatsApp or Zoom, we have started using it in our official business,' he said.

The government introduced Beep in 2023 as a platform for communication among public employees, with data hosted in Pakistan. It was not clear how widely the application is now used or whether officials have been formally barred from other apps.

Khan cited mobile-device tracking in Iran as one reason to strengthen security of government communications but did not identify a specific incident. He said work was under way on a broader application combining messaging, payments and other services, without giving a completion date.

The Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication and the Federal Investigation Agency did not respond to requests for details on the phone project's cost, specifications or timetable, according to Daily Times.

Lawmakers at the meeting called for the pending personal data protection bill to be advanced. Pakistan has yet to enact a comprehensive personal data protection law despite years of draft legislation.