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Story URL: http://www.silicon.com/research/specialreports/offshoring/0,3800003026,39128474,00.htm

Terrorists target India's offshore IT firms
Bangalore on Kashmiri separatists' terror watch list...

By Andy McCue

Published: Tuesday 08 March 2005

A police raid has uncovered plans by a Pakistan-based group to target India's booming offshore IT and call centre industry.

Police in New Delhi captured two and killed three members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba group at the weekend after an hour-long shoot-out in the city.

A subsequent raid on their base uncovered diaries revealing they had visited India's high-tech city of Bangalore in December to survey software companies as potential targets.

Police also found AK56 rifles, ammunition and over 10kg of the explosive RDX. The Lashkar-e-Taiba group is a Sunni Muslim anti-US organisation founded in 1989 and one of the largest organisations fighting for the separation of Kashmir from India.

Bangalore is the heart of India's offshore IT industry and many Western and global multinationals have outsourced IT and call centre operations there. A high profile attack on Bangalore would be aimed at damaging India's booming economy.

Wipro, India's number two IT company, is headquartered in Bangalore. Tamal Dasgupta, CIO at Wipro, told silicon.com the company has received no information about any specific threat but is watching the situation carefully.

"We have not observed, nor have we been specifically briefed by the government intelligence on, any need for continued heightened security concerns. Of course we do not take any such media reports lightly and we have commensurately stepped up our security processes to ensure human safety and business continuity," he said.

Infosys, India's number three IT company, also based in Bangalore, was contacted but did not respond to a request for comment on whether it had received any specific threats or tightened security.

The security risks of offshoring IT and call centre services were discussed in this article last year following silicon.com's fact-finding trip to India.