The first of the Scorpenes being built in Mumbai is expected to go into service by the end of the year, the first step in the Navy’s effort to rebuild its dwindling submarine fleet.
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Sensitive data on submarines being built for India’s Navy have leaked from a leading French shipbuilder with military customers around the world.
“Therefore, I don’t see any reason to worry because of the allegation of data leak that was reported because it does not affect our operations or the security of TLDM’s submarines”, Mohd Johari told Malay Mail Online, referring to the Royal Malaysian Navy.
An Australian newspaper published Wednesday more than 22,000 pages relating to the submarine’s combat capabilities.
As per reports, the information belongs to DCNS, the company that is building India’s Scorpene Submarines.
The Australian has uploaded some of the documents related to the Indian Scorpene submarine, days after it first reported that “classified” information regarding the submarine’s underwater warfare system has been leaked.
“The documents that have been posted. have been examined and do not pose any security compromise as the vital parameters have been blacked out”, the defence ministry said in a statement.
Six Scorpene submarines designed by DCNS are being constructed at Mumbai’s Mazgaon Dockyard at a cost of around $3.5 billion, one of which is undergoing sea trials and the second one is under construction.
Meanwhile, DCNS said that the matter is being thoroughly investigated by the proper French national authorities for defence security. “So we will find out all this”, Parrikar told newspersons in Delhi. “It’s part of the tools in economic warfare”.
“A variant of the same French-designed Scorpene is also used by the navies of Malaysia, Chile and, from 2018, Brazil, so news of the Edward Snowden-sized leak – revealed today – will trigger alarm at the highest level in these countries”, said the report. “What I understand is there is a hacking”.
It recently beat Germany’s ThyssenKrupp and a Japanese-government backed bid by Mitsubishi and Kawasaki in Australia for a 34 billion euro contract to supply the Barracuda next generation of submarines to the Australia navy.
“The Government as a matter of abundant precaution is also examining the impact if the information contained in the documents claimed to be available with the Australian sources is compromised”.
It further states that the source of leak is from overseas and not in India. “Uncontrolled technical data is not possible in the Australian arrangements”, the company was quoted as saying by the news daily.
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“Marked “Restricted Scorpene India”, the DCNS documents detail the most sensitive combat capabilities of India’s new $US3 bn submarine fleet and would provide an intelligence bonanza if obtained by India’s strategic rivals, such as Pakistan or China”, the report said.
