Are telephone conversations of the men and women who occupy the highest posts free from interception? This question has been haunting the security establishment for years, especially with VVIPs switching to the convenient mode of using cellphones for sensitive, day-to-day communication.After several rounds of trials and after national security bosses rejected the option of purchasing secure network solutions from foreign vendors, the task of making landline and cellphone networks used by VVIPs — including the Prime Minister himself — has finally been entrusted to the National Technical Research Organisation.The NTRO is the “super-feeder” agency for providing technical intelligence to all other intelligence agencies set up after the Kargil War.Sources say NTRO has a team of 15 scientists working round-the-clock on the secret secure telephony project. While trials have already been conducted, NTRO is expected to hand over a set of around 100 “encryption accessories” in six months. Sources said National Security Advisor M K Narayanan — NTRO reports to him — will decide on the final list of users. The Hyderabad-based Electronics Corporation of India Limited and the NTRO are designing a “piggyback module” that will be clipped onto landline and cellular phones used by VVIPs.Sources said this is the long-delayed upgrade of the existing system devised by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) eight years ago.This allows interception-free use of landline phones to about 200 users on the Government’s Restricted Area Exchange (RAX) but has no compatibility with cellular phone networks. Both systems use a digital encryption unit which encrypts the voice of the speaker at the transmission end so that no one can intercept the line and then decrypts it at the receiving end without any loss of time.
