India, eager to preserve its outsourcing industry, is scrambling to demonstrate that it takes foreign intellectual property seriously. IP THEFT India, eager to preserve its outsourcing industry, is scrambling to demonstrate that it takes foreign intellectual property seriously. But just because the country has established intellectual property laws, does not mean that the laws will be enforced. That’s what Sandeep Jolly, president of labeling software maker Jolly Technologies in San Carlos, Calif., realized after he discovered on July 19 that an employee at his three-month-old software development center in Mumbai had allegedly uploaded and shipped files that contained some source code and design documents for a key product to her personal Yahoo e-mail account. “The Mumbai police are not even registering the crime,” says Jolly, adding that he has tried but failed to get authorities to investigate. Mumbai police say their preliminary investigations suggest that there is no evidence of a source-code theft, and that Jolly did not have adequate security systems in place. Jolly has not cooperated in the investigations, says Anami Roy, Mumbai’s commissioner of police. On Aug. 19, Jolly Technologies filed a writ petition before the Bombay High Court in Mumbai to ask the court to direct the Mumbai police to register the offense and start an investigation. Jolly also tried to get Yahoo to block the former employee’s e-mail account, but to do that requires an order from the Indian authorities. “We were misled by the lawyers we consulted with before opening the facility,” says Jolly. “We were told that there are patent, copyright and IP protection laws in India. They failed to mention that the laws are impossible to enforce.” IP theft is not unusual in India, and the cops do investigate. Two years ago, the FBI and India’s Central Bureau of Investigation ran a sting operation that snared a former worker for an outsourcing company for doing business with design software maker SolidWorks. We wrote about the risks of outsourcing last November. For a refresher, read Big Savings, Big Risk. Related content news analysis Companies are already feeling the pressure from upcoming US SEC cyber rules New Securities and Exchange Commission cyber incident reporting rules don't kick in until December, but experts say they highlight the need for greater collaboration between CISOs and the C-suite By Cynthia Brumfield Sep 28, 2023 6 mins Regulation Data Breach Financial Services Industry news UK data regulator warns that data breaches put abuse victims’ lives at risk The UK Information Commissioner’s Office has reprimanded seven organizations in the past 14 months for data breaches affecting victims of domestic abuse. By Michael Hill Sep 28, 2023 3 mins Electronic Health Records Data Breach Government news EchoMark releases watermarking solution to secure private communications, detect insider threats Enterprise-grade software embeds AI-driven, forensic watermarking in emails and documents to pinpoint potential insider risks By Michael Hill Sep 28, 2023 4 mins Communications Security Threat and Vulnerability Management Security Software news SpecterOps to use in-house approximation to test for global attack variations The new offering uses atomic tests and in-house approximation in purple team assessment to test all known techniques of an attack. By Shweta Sharma Sep 28, 2023 3 mins Penetration Testing Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe