Preventive And Offensive Cyberspace Capabilities Of India

India is in the process of establishing cyber war capabilities. This is a good step in the right direction as of late India has been under constant attack through cyberspace.

However, as usual India has taken almost five years to implement the suggestions of Praveen Dalal in this regard. He had suggested use of preventive and offensive defence for cyberspace violations and provided the exclusive techno legal framework for India more than five years ago.

According to Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of Perry4Law and CEO of the cyber security research, training and educational institution of India (CSRTCI), India has been very slow in adopting both defensive as well as offensive cyber security measures. Whether it is critical ICT infrastructure protection or cyber security of defence forces of India, neither are in order till now, says Dalal. At last India has shown some sensitivity to the preventive and offensive capabilities in cyberspace that has been suggested by us more than five years ago, informs Dalal.

The outline though has been formulated yet it is an altogether different game to execute it. The proposed initiative would require many complex concepts like human rights protection in cyberspace (HRPIC), technical framework, legal framework, etc. The real challenge would be to formulate a techno legal framework that is presently missing in India.

Cyber Security Policy Of India

By
V.K.Singh

Cyber security in India has not received the attention of Indian policy makers. As a result India has witnessed many sophisticated cyber security attacks against its computer systems operating at crucial departments and places from time to time. Even the terrorists are using technology to further their nefarious objectives in India. The problem is that Indian government, like any other government, is not capable of tackling cyber security issues single handedly. It needs private sector support to achieve this task.

According to Praveen Dalal, Managing Partner of the exclusive techno-legal cyber security research and training centre of India (CSRTCI), cyber security in India needs an urgent rejuvenation. He informs that till now Indian government has not thought it fit to consider cyber security as a part of National Policy.

It is obvious that India is finding it difficult to gather necessary cyber security expertise and this is resulting in a weak cyber security. Fortunately, private initiatives like CSRTCI are bridging the much needed gap of cyber security in India. The centre is providing techno-legal solutions for areas like cyber law, cyber security, cyber forensics, cyber terrorism, cyber espionage, critical ICT infrastructure protection, cyber war, etc. It is also providing techno-legal solutions for Indian projects like CCTNS, Natgrid, NCTC, etc.

CSRTCI also maintains a “repository” of software and tools for areas like cyber security, cyber forensics, penetration testing, malware analysis, encryption, stegnography, etc. It also maintains a rich techno-legal literature, articles, databases, etc for ready reference.

However, the most important and crucial achievement of the CSRTCI is that it has an “Exclusive Techno-Legal Repository” of software and research literature. It also has expertise for “aggressive defence” and human rights protection in cyberspace. In short, it is a single place destination for the techno-legal cyber security and allied fields.

The government of India and private sector of India must concentrate upon cyber security as soon as possible. Further, there is an emergent need to make proper amendments in the otherwise impotent, weak and ineffective cyber law of India. The increasing cyber crimes in India is also attributable to the “welcoming law” of India incorporated in the information technology act 2000 that instead of deterring the cyber criminals is in fact encouraging them to indulge in cyber crimes.