Over 6.07 lakh cybersecurity incidents were observed in India during the first half of 2021, the Indian Parliament was informed.
The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) is mandated to track and monitor cyber security incidents in India, Minister of State for Electronics and IT Rajeev Chandrasekhar said in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.
“CERT-In has reported that a total number of 3, 94,499, 11, 58,208 and 6,07,220 cyber security incidents are observed during the year 2019, 2020 and 2021 (up to June), respectively,” he said.
He further added that the government has taken a number of measures to enhance the cyber security posture and prevent cyber-attacks, including CERT-In issuing alerts and advisories regarding the latest cyber threats/ vulnerabilities and counter-measures to protect computers, networks, and data on a regular basis.
To another question, Chandrasekhar said the government has formulated a draft National Cyber Security Strategy 2021 (NCSS2021), which holistically looks at addressing the issues of security of national cyberspace, a report added.
The total amount of funds allocated by the Ministry of Electronics and IT for strengthening cyber security in 2015-16 was Rs 85 crore.
This increased to Rs 70 crore in 2016-17, Rs 140.48 crore in 2017-18, Rs 150 crore in 2018-19, Rs 162 crore in 2019-20, Rs 310 crore in 2020-21 and Rs 416 crore in 2021-22, said Chandrasekhar.
The report further added that in response to another question, Chandrasekhar said there is no proposal with the ministry to review the IT intermediary rules, which have been formulated based on wide public consultation and suggestions from stakeholders.
The rules have been introduced to ensure accountability of digital platforms to users and prescribe additional due diligence to be followed by large social media intermediaries.
“There have been some complaints received by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) about the misuse of certain sites for online prostitution.
The National Informatics Centre (NIC), under MeitY, has developed an indigenous solution ‘Sandes’ for instant messaging communication.” added Chandrasekhar.
He further added that Sandes is an Open source-based, Secure, Cloud-enabled platform hosted on Government Infrastructure so that the strategic control remains with GOI.
It has features like one-to-one and group messaging, file and media sharing, audio-video calls and e-gov application integration, etc. The solution is being used by the Government and is available at Google Play Store and App Store.
