India seeks access to Google, Skype data

India has asked Google Inc, internet telephone company Skype Ltd and others to let Indian security agencies monitor their user services to guard against terrorism and other crimes, according to a minister.

In a clear message that India still continued to push for access to encrypted communication services, minister of state for telecommunications and information technology Sachin Pilot said there were a whole list of companies that had been asked to provide access.

"Law enforcement agencies, the home ministry and intelligence agencies want that information for national security," Pilot told reporters on the sidelines of an industry event.

India is concerned that terrorists would use services such as those offered by Skype and Google as they were heavily encrypted and security agencies could not monitor them.

However, Google and Luxembourg-based Skype denied receiving any communication from Indian authorities on the matter.

Pilot's comments come at a time when the government was engaged in finding ways to monitor the corporate email services offered by Canada's Research In Motion Ltd. 
 
While the BlackBerry maker has already offered systems to monitor internet browsing and messenger services used on its smartphones, it says interception of corporate emails was impossible as there no technology to allow monitoring of the service was available.