ISLAMABAD - Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Azam Khan Swati on Friday apprised the Senate that Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has neither signed any contract for monitoring of Internet Traffic with any vendor nor was spending public money on the project.
Replying to a question during Question Hour, the minister said that in compliance to statutory and Policy obligations, PTA directed telecom industry to deploy a suitable technical solution capable of monitoring, analyzing and curbing grey traffic.
The said monitoring system would be termed as ‘Web Monitoring System (WMS)’. The contract was signed between relevant telecom operators and the vendor without involvement of public money, he said.
All LDIs (Long Distance and International), CMOs (Cellular Mobile Operators) and Submarine Cable Landing Station licensees were sharing the cost of the system under their regulatory obligations, he said.
The minister said for addressing security concerns, PTA has obtained undertaking from the vendor (Inbox Business Technologies) and manufacturer company Sandvine Inc., USA for any possible involvement of hostile element.
The vendor was also obligated to get the system certified as per ISO 27001 international standards. Moreover, security agency has been involved to conduct security audit of the system to find out any loop holes and vulnerabilities in the system he said.
He said to further ensure the security, a strict clause about system and material breach was included in the contract. In case, any such breach was identified and validated, contract would be terminated. To another question, the minister said that PTA along with Frequency Allocation Board (FAB) checked the Power Level of Base Transreceiver Station (BTS) (Towers) in accordance with regulations. So far, 5 surveys had been conducted in 36 cities wherein power level of 2,429 BTS (towers) had been checked.—APP