The KiranaPro crisis, which initially seemed to be another case of a cyberattack, turns out to be an unusual case of internal sabotage. The company’s CEO and founder Deepak Ravindran shared a detailed post on his social media feed to alert all the stakeholders and suggest all the damage control steps taken to bring the company’s service back online.
KiranaPro, which is a Bengaluru-based grocery startup, conducted its internal investigation on the data wipeout crisis and found out that it wasn’t an external cyberattack. Instead, it was done internally by an ex-employee who wanted to seek revenge. The name of the employee was shared by Ravindran and all the remedies have been implemented to ensure that the differences are sorted without heading for a legal battle.
“After careful investigation, we conclude that this was not a hack. No external party penetrated our ordering or payment systems, exploited vulnerabilities, or bypassed security protocols. Our external security posture remains intact, and there is no evidence of any unauthorized access from outside the organization. All customer data stays intact,” assured Ravindran about the safety of user data via a post made on X.
“Instead, this was an internal data breach. Specifically, it was the result of actions taken by a trusted internal employee who had legitimate access to our systems. This individual intentionally deleted critical server logs while they were being tested and/or edited, an action that goes directly against our policies, our principles, and the trust we place in our team,” he added. In a separate interview to Hindustan Times, the CEO identified the person as Lava Kumar – an ex-colleague who previously worked with him.
“Lava comes from a business background. He has worked with me in the past in Lookup. He wanted to work on product so I said okay. We did not have much by way of product, so I said ‘Fine, you can explore.’ But then my new CTO Sourav joined the company and he is creating a new team. So we are reshuffling the team,” explained Ravindran. The firing was not a firing, actually. It was just a removal. It wasn’t a firing,” Ravindran explained to HT.
“After the termination, we did have arguments of business, but we have settled it now. We are coming closer to the settlement. There is no hate among the employees now, it’s all peace,” added the CEO.
As far as the future plans are concerned, the CEO says that the internal teams are working to bring the KiranaPro app back online. Additionally, there will be a change in internal policies to prevent such future mishaps.
