India 5th among cyber crime affected countries

BANGALORE: India is ranked fifth in the worldwide ranking of countries affected by cyber crime, claims a report by the Security and Defence Agenda (SDA) and McAfee.
According to the report titled ‘Cyber Security: The Vexed Question of Global Rules’, the premium on internet privacy in the country is quite low.
SDA, a leading defence and security think-tank in Brussels, spoke to leading global security experts to ensure that findings would offer useful recommendations and actions.
“Much of the vulnerability is explained by widespread computer illiteracy and easily pirated machines,” pointed out the report. This is another reason for the phishing and other scams, it said.
“In India, we went straight from no telephones to the latest in mobile technology. It is the same with internet-connected computers. They came in all of a sudden and no one was taught even the basic facts about cyber security,” explained Cherian Samuel, Institute of Defence Studies and Analyses (IDSA), New Delhi, in the report.
Other respondents in the research study said that many internet users need to understand basic concepts of cyber safety before logging on. “People in India have to understand basic security like PIN numbers and passwords,” said Kamlesh Bajaj, Data Security Council of India (DSCI).
At the two-day Cyber Security Summit which concluded in the city on Friday, officials from the National Security Advisory Committee claimed that the government is firstly looking at capacity building and then eventually will work on the draft of the national cyber security policy which is currently under discussion.
The report further highlighted, “India is acutely aware that cyber crime is bad for its reputation as a country where foreign investors can do business and have been investing heavily in cyber security.”
However, it raised a grave issue that India lacks a single operator to control the internet, telecom and power sectors.
“Though CERT-India is the official coordinating authority, a host of other agencies are still involved. However, India has developed valuable experience in dealing with compliance regulation from around the world with the IT Amendments Act of 2008, that established strong data protection,” the report stated.
Further, experts claimed that the main challenge for India now is to train and equip the law enforcement agencies and judiciary, particularly outside big cities like New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore.