Synopsis
Starting April 1, 2026, the income tax department will have the authority to access social media, emails, and other digital spaces to curb tax evasion. This has been granted to them under the new income tax bill. This will also include search and seizure powers over your assets and documents, which have raised major privacy concerns. Experts warn of challenges to fundamental privacy rights without judicial oversight and procedural safeguards.
Yeah, sure! Make yourself comfortable:
-----BEGIN PGP MESSAGE-----
hQGMA/AUWUnm1aihAQv6AyU8x1fFlg5uTkAKfAJuWwfnMXzO0OHELq0dLe54PNnE 6Ov2ZNzNIV8mqG7upv0fTc2ZbKWmQFrtvDEnOV41EpD+mrCzfr4kcTjchHoIdJoL NEjCWWAgNq8ZA0zx70fpk71TudXY8q+aGYgOwe15iHuLNGjHLGqjZ4dytWm9I73V XF1Hha6kj4rMmfrDl2OSS7hKQZ+pvZNmUOScWCQa91CeCvtqWm5dAOubLT68ux31 2Z7HciDe031k+AJSOIcWnso60GyJtMNPrlbQx8urlqkuqNq7p8nOv4IvcY4KLi+b PZ2S3UIq1606muxl0rBmVLY1zODP8gwRDOyJrE4/JiWZt5L1enq+i51fUHrYlMjW hwYVPHPkiNAXL75LkM4UVpSiLuMrIn1HF5XOjsVLxkZnSw/oV+f5F7yhwbJvAgfv K4DjkCyq9pmDo1gAa5tav/4amWisF/f0u3OhFADfKzKwPfp4/+yTiDjeEoQboQ0f GHJkrXeHO1D5SMk5PE2G0kMBKKyaKy4VnJ/yTNpcdW830c8FEnZsmTHblcjC0oSg BGtw5PPxa6EWBbv78Pod4E00H3S3EtEOvnSVoffyn1AD8axI =zGmY
-----END PGP MESSAGE-----
Message contents are fairly unimportant. It is the metadata that counts.
Also encrypted messaging is illegal in India
Yeah, this is more of a joke considering most emails are not encrypted. As for illegality - I guess this is just one of the laws a lot of people just have to casually break. I didn’t quite understand how exactly the new rules would be enforced, but seems like avoiding passive detection at least would be trivial.
Emails are encrypted in transit but they are not typically encrypted at the mailbox. As for Gpg I would avoid it as it has only uses a single key and if someone gets access to the key they can decrypt stored messages. This is very different than a lot of other encrypted messagers that rotate keys based on an algorithm like double ratchet with old keys being deleted. If you delete a message in a app like Signal there is a very high likely hood that a message can not be recovered even if you device gets compromised later and the adversary stores all data that goes over the internet.
Yes, I understand the limitations of GPG. I myself mostly use OMEMO which does have PFS. However, there isn’t really an email encryption scheme that is as widely adopted (and even this is not saying much).
funny.