Cyber attacks on ministries, including home, external affairs, power
and telecom, could soon constitute cyber-terrorism and could be punished
with life imprisonment.
Tough new guidelines were released by national security advisor Shivshankar Menon on Friday by which these ministries with critical information networks could be declared protected systems as defined by the National Technical Research Organization (NTRO), the country's elite technical intelligence agency.
The guidelines have been drawn up by the NTRO's National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre to protect the country's digitized information networks — in public and private sectors — from cyber attacks, said Muktesh Chander, part of the joint working group that framed the guidelines.
Calling the guidelines topical and important, Menon said, "India's cyberspace is under attack from not one or two but several countries."
Cyber space is the most open and democratic, so it is important to maintain its privacy and secure it as well, he added.
"Now these are not necessarily always in conflict. What it does mean is that we have to probably change definitions of privacy. There are things which we can no longer do in this domain," he said, likening cyber space to a goldfish bowl where very little can be hidden.
On the privacy debate, Menon said, "It is very easy to convert this into a government versus private individuals. But, that's not the issue here. It is about privacy from each other as well. Frankly, the technology empowers individual and small groups with the same capacities that governments used to have. It used to be a monopoly of governments to be able to do some of these things. Today it's no longer so."
NTRO chairman Alhad G Apte said these guidelines try to bring a dynamic equilibrium to avert instability in the chaotic cyber space.
After the guidelines, framed through public-private partnership, were released, the NTRO will begin work on identify eight critical sectors, including energy, aviation, telecom and National Stock Exchange. Entities with digitized systems will be asked to declare themselves as protected systems. The NTRO will also monitor if they are following the guidelines.
Tough new guidelines were released by national security advisor Shivshankar Menon on Friday by which these ministries with critical information networks could be declared protected systems as defined by the National Technical Research Organization (NTRO), the country's elite technical intelligence agency.
The guidelines have been drawn up by the NTRO's National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre to protect the country's digitized information networks — in public and private sectors — from cyber attacks, said Muktesh Chander, part of the joint working group that framed the guidelines.
Calling the guidelines topical and important, Menon said, "India's cyberspace is under attack from not one or two but several countries."
Cyber space is the most open and democratic, so it is important to maintain its privacy and secure it as well, he added.
"Now these are not necessarily always in conflict. What it does mean is that we have to probably change definitions of privacy. There are things which we can no longer do in this domain," he said, likening cyber space to a goldfish bowl where very little can be hidden.
On the privacy debate, Menon said, "It is very easy to convert this into a government versus private individuals. But, that's not the issue here. It is about privacy from each other as well. Frankly, the technology empowers individual and small groups with the same capacities that governments used to have. It used to be a monopoly of governments to be able to do some of these things. Today it's no longer so."
NTRO chairman Alhad G Apte said these guidelines try to bring a dynamic equilibrium to avert instability in the chaotic cyber space.
After the guidelines, framed through public-private partnership, were released, the NTRO will begin work on identify eight critical sectors, including energy, aviation, telecom and National Stock Exchange. Entities with digitized systems will be asked to declare themselves as protected systems. The NTRO will also monitor if they are following the guidelines.
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