Govt mulls ban of official usage of Gmail, Yahoo

The development comes close on heels of concerns being raised by a section in the government, especially intelligence agencies, over use of email services, provided by foreign firms (mostly US-based), which have their servers located in overseas locations, making it difficult to track if sensitive government data is being snooped upon.



The move also assumes significance in light of the fallout of the Snowden saga, which contended the US intelligence agencies used a secret data-mining programme to monitor worldwide Internet data to spy on various countries, including India.

Former technical contractor for National Security Agency and Central Intelligence Agency Edward Snowden had leaked what was allegedly details of a top-secret American mass surveillance programme, which led to countries analysing the safety of their official Internet-supported communication networks.