CBSE leak: WhatsApp groups under scanner; police seek Google help in cracking paper leak mystery

With the Delhi Police asking CBSE to collect all complaints on the alleged paper leaks, the Board has reported that they have received complaints from various parts of the country, police sources said. Police had asked the Board to carry out the exercise to come up with a pattern that can help ascertain the source of the leak.

Delhi Police has also written to Google to ascertain the source of the alleged leak in the Class X mathematics exam. A second FIR in the paper leak case has revealed that the CBSE had, on Sunday night, received an email containing photos of a handwritten question set. Police said the sender had requested the Board to cancel the exam, claiming that the paper had been leaked. The Crime Branch will now try to ascertain the chain in which the alleged leaks took place, and they believe making contact with the person who tipped off the CBSE could help reach the accused.

The Indian Express had Friday reported about the email to CBSE, that was generated from dev532@gmail.com. The mail also had 12 JPG images of handwritten questions, purportedly from the math paper. According to the FIR, the CBSE chairman had received an email on her official email ID at 1.39 am on March 28 — hours before the students were set to take the exam.

Apart from roping in their Cyber unit, police have approached cyber experts, The Indian Express has learnt. A source said police may also ask CBSE to provide server logs of the Board to identify if the leak had taken place from within the CBSE.

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“The IP logs have been uploaded to the CBSE server. An IP log analysis will have to be undertaken to ascertain the people who had logged into the server with admin logs. If any leak would have taken place, the logs should contain the information,” the source said.

Police said that three CBSE officials had shared their inputs with the Crime Branch on Thursday. Other CBSE officials are likely to join the investigation soon. So far, police have questioned 60 people. Four schools in Delhi have also been identified, where some teachers are under scanner.

The Crime Branch said they have also identified 10 WhatsApp groups with more than 50 members each that are under scanner. “The groups will be looked into as question papers leaked from there. The end-to-end encryption has been a problem, but we are trying to ascertain group admins and question them,” the source said.

Police sources said that the groups contain students, teachers and people associated with coaching centres.
News Source (IndianExpress)