India Police Question Google Over Fake Gmail Bomb Threats

Indian police authorities are preparing to question Google concerning inadequate security measures on its platform. This action follows the successful disruption of a large-scale criminal operation that employed more than 500,000 fake Gmail accounts. The network used these accounts to disseminate hoax bomb threats targeting government offices across India.

The investigation, initiated after a bomb threat email was received by the Gujarat state government on September 10, has uncovered an unprecedented scale of fake Gmail IDs and passwords. Authorities were particularly concerned to find that each fraudulent account implemented two-factor authentication, a security feature typically used to protect legitimate user accounts.

Two individuals have been arrested in connection with the scheme, with one reportedly communicating with a buyer in Bangladesh who purchased batches of these compromised accounts. Payments were partially made in cryptocurrency. The misuse of Google's services, including its web development platform Firebase for financial scams, has drawn increased scrutiny in India, a major market for the tech giant.