Safeguarding India From Digital Foes

With India facing a number of cyberattacks in recent times, the big question still remains unanswered- How to safeguard India’s vital strategic installations from digital terrorists?

- Neeraj Mahajan

India is the third most cyberattacked country after USA and UK. Cyberattacks have become increasingly sophisticated and dangerous, and India is on the hitlist of some of the most sophisticated cyber criminals from around the world.

The Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of computers from where the attacks appear to originate belong to Algeria, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Netherlands, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Serbia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, USA and Vietnam.

The government of India is setting up a unified national cyber security task force to counter the national security risks and the risks of cyber-attacks and infiltration.

Efforts are also in place to set up a subdepartment for telecom cyber security under a unified national level cyber security task force instead of setting up a separate task force under the telecom ministry. The task force is expected to be in place by March 2022.

Currently cyber threats are handled by the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team or CERT-In, which operates under the Ministry of Electronics and IT. It is the nodal agency to deal with cyber security threats like hacking and phishing and strengthens security-related defence of the Indian internet domain.

The sub-task force will work in conjunction with the unified national-level cyber security task force. Around 20 top-notch officers from different agencies have been hand-picked for the project and others with specialised skills will be inducted in the team as and when required.

One of their main tasks will be to perform background checks of telecom vendors who participate in tenders and ensure virtually every chip and semiconductor comes from a trusted source. Their findings are transmitted to nodal officers in central ministries.