I and B Minister Prakash Javadekar condemns alleged attack on Arnab Goswami

New Delhi, Jun 27: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday said that India fared much better compared to some other countries in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. The PM made this observation while delivering the inaugural address to mark the 90th birth anniversary celebrations of Reverend Dr Joseph Mar Thoma Metropolitan.

"Earlier this year, some people had predicted that the impact of the virus in India would be very severe. Due to lockdown, many initiatives have been taken by the Government and in this people-driven fight, India is much better placed than many other nations. India's recovery rate is rising," Modi said in his virtual address.

He further warned that the time was not apt to "let our guard down".

The prime minister greeted the Mar Thoma Metropolitan and wished him a "long life and best health."

"Dr Joseph Mar Thoma has devoted his life for the betterment of our society and nation. He has been particularly passionate about the removal of poverty and women empowerment," the prime minister said.

Praising the Mar Thoma Church for its contributions to the country the Prime Minister added that it has worked to bring a positive difference in the lives of people in the country in areas of healthcare and education.

"The Mar Thoma Church is closely linked with the noble ideals of Saint Thomas, the Apostle of Lord Christ. India has always been open to spiritual influences from many sources. It is with this spirit of humility that the Mar Thoma Church has worked to bring a positive difference in the lives of our fellow Indians," Modi said.

Followers of the Mar Thoma Church from India and abroad participated in the programme through video conference.

Singapore, Jun 2: Moody's Investors Service on Tuesday downgraded 11 Indian banks along with as many non-financial companies and infrastructure majors besides four government-related issuers following a downgrade of the Indian government's issuer rating to Baa3 from Baa2 with a negative outlook.

The rapid and widening spread of the coronavirus outbreak, deteriorating global economic outlook, volatile oil prices and asset price declines are creating a severe and extensive credit shock across many sectors, regions and markets, said Moody's.

The Indian banking sector has been affected given the disruptions to India's economic activity from the coronavirus outbreak, which is weakening borrowers' credit profiles, it added.

The 11 lenders include Bank of Baroda, Bank of India, Canara Bank, Central Bank of India, Export-Import Bank of India, HDFC Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, IndusInd Bank, Punjab National Bank, State Bank of India and Union Bank of India.

The 11 non-finance companies are Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation, Oil India, Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation, Petronet LNG, Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Reliance Industries, UPL Corporation and Genpact.

The 11 infrastructure companies are NTPC, NHPC, National Highways Authority of India, Power Grid Corporation, Gail India, Adani Green Energy Restricted Group (RG-2), Adani Transmission Restricted Group, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, Adani Transmission, Adani Electricity Mumbai and Azure Power Solar Energy.

The four Indian government-related issuers are Indian Railway Finance Corporation, Housing and Urban Development Corporation, Power Finance Corporation and REC Ltd.

"Government-related issuers in India have been affected because of disruptions to India's economy which will weaken borrowers' credit profiles," said Moody's.

In a startling revelation, cybersecurity researchers have claimed that a hacker has posted personal details of nearly 2.9 crore Indian job seekers at one of the hacking forums on the Dark Web for free.

As part of the regular sweep over the Deep Web and Dark Web, researchers from cybersecurity firm Cyble came across an interesting item, where a threat actor posted 2.3GB (zipped) file on one of the hacking forums.

"The leak actually has a lot of personal details of millions of Indians Job seekers from different states," Cyble said in its blog on Friday.

This breach includes sensitive information such as email, phone, home address, qualification and work experience etc from job seekers spanning across states, from New Delhi to Mumbai and Bengaluru. 

Cybercriminals are always on the lookout for such personal information to conduct various nefarious activities such as identity thefts, scams, and corporate espionage.

"It appears to have originated from a resume aggregator service given the sheer volume and detailed information," it added.

Cyble indexed this information at ‘AmIbreached.com; – Cyble's data breach monitoring and notification platform.

Cyble researchers have identified a sensitive data breach on the dark web where an actor has leaked personal details of nearly 29 million Indian job seekers from various states. 

"Cyble's team is still investigating this further and will be updating their article as they bring more facts to the surface,” it said in a statement.

Cyble said it has acquired the leaked data. 

The same cyber security firm earlier exposed that Bengaluru-based edtech firm Unacademy was hacked.

According to Cyble researchers, nearly 22 million Unacademy user accounts were affected and the data was dumped and sold on Dark Web.

'We would like to assure our users that no sensitive information such as financial data or location has been breached," said Hemesh Singh, Co- Founder and CTO, Unacademy, in a statement.

In April, hackers sold personal data of a whopping 267 million Facebook users for just Rs 41,500 (approximately 500 Euros) that includes email addresses, names, Facebook IDs, dates of birth and phone numbers.

No passwords of the 267 million Facebook users were exposed by the hacker, according to Cyble.