Lok Sabha Question No. 653 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2015-12-02
Subject: Cyber Attack
Ministry: COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
Asked by: RANJEET RANJAN, SUDHEER GUPTA, E. T. MOHAMMED BASHEER, Dr. BHOLA SINGH, SUNIL BALIRAM GAIKWAD, KUNWAR HARIBANSH SINGH, NARANBHAI KACHHADIA, KAMAL NATH, ANOOP MISHRA, GAJANAN CHANDRAKANT KIRTIKAR, LALUBHAI BABUBHAI PATEL, KANWAR SINGH TANWAR, OM BIRLA

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRONICS & INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY)

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 653

TO BE ANSWERED ON: 02.12.2015

## CYBER ATTACK

## 653 SHRIMATI RANJEET RANJAN:   SHRI SUDHEER GUPTA:

SHRI E.T. MOHAMMED BASHEER:  DR. BHOLA SINGH:

DR. SUNIL BALIRAM GAIKWAD:  KUNWAR HARIBANSH SINGH:

SHRI NARANBHAI KACHHADIYA:  SHRI KAMAL NATH:

SHRI ANOOP MISHRA:  SHRI GAJANAN KIRTIKAR:

SHRI LALUBHAI BABUBHAI PATEL:  SHRI KANWAR SINGH TANWAR:

SHRI OM BIRLA:

Will the Minister of Communications & Information Technology be pleased to state: -

- (a) the number of cyber attacks on Indian companies reported in the current financial year;
- (b) the reasons for frequent cyber attack on these companies and the losses incurred by these companies as a result thereof;
- (c) whether  Government has taken any steps to curb cyber attack  with  rapidly  growing  interconnected business operations and increasing digitisation and if so, the details thereof; and
- (d) whether the Government proposes to amend cyber laws and set up special cyber courts to try cyber cases and if so, the details thereof?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS AND INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY (SHRI RAVI SHANKAR PRASAD)

- (a): In  the  current  financial  year  a  total  number  of  54,483  cyber  security  incidents  including  phishing, scanning, spam, malicious code, website intrusion/hacking etc., involving Indian cyberspace were reported to the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In). These incidents were reported to CERT-In by various Indian organisations, individuals, CERTs and agencies from other countries.
- (b):    The  area  of  Information  Technology  (IT)  is  characterized  by  rapid  developments  and  fast  changing obsolescence.  With  every  IT  product  introduced  into  the  market,  newer  vulnerabilities  are  discovered, leaving scope for malicious actions. In tune with the dynamic nature of Information Technology, continuous efforts  are  required  to  be  made  to  prevent  and  recover  from  cyber  attacks.  Malicious  users  continuously target  India's  IT  infrastructure  to  infiltrate  and  hamper  the  functionality  of  IT  systems.  As  such,  the protection  of  India's  IT  infrastructure  in  general  and  critical  information  infrastructure  in  particular  is  a dynamic activity and continuing process. No separate data with regard to the losses incurred by the Indian companies  as  a  result  of  cyber  attacks  is  maintained  by  Indian  Computer  Emergency  Response  Team (CERT-In).
- (c):      The  Government  has  taken  the  following  key  steps  to  curb  cyber  attacks  with  rapidly  growing interconnected business operations and increasing digitisation and enhance the cyber security of systems in the country:
- i. A National Cyber Security Policy has been put in place for public use and implementation by all relevant stakeholders. Its stated mission is "to protect information and information infrastructure in cyber space,  build  capabilities  to  prevent  and  respond  to  cyber  threats,  reduce  vulnerabilities  and  minimize damage  from  cyber  incidents  through a combination  of  institutional structures, people, processes, technology  and  cooperation".    It  seeks  to  do  so  by  creating  a  secure  cyber  ecosystem  and  an  assurance framework, encouraging open standards, strengthening the regulatory framework, vulnerability management, promotion of research and development in cyber security and enhancing our technical skill sets and human resources.
- ii. Efforts  towards  setting  up  National  Cyber  Coordination  Centre  (NCCC)  to  generate  near  real  time macroscopic views of the cyber security breaches and cyber security threats in the country.  The centre will provide  a  structured  mechanism  and  facilitate  coordination  of  efforts  of  all  stakeholder  agencies  in  the country. NCCC will be a multi stakeholder body and will be implemented by Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) at Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY).

iii. Efforts towards setting up of 'Botnet Cleaning and Malware Analysis Centre' to provide for detection of malware infected computer systems and enable cleaning and securing the systems of end-users to prevent further malware infections. The project is being implemented in coordination and collaboration with Internet Service  Providers  (ISPs)  and  Industry.  This  would  help  in  enhancing  the  security  of  computer  systems across the country.

- iv. Information  Technology  Act,  2000  provides  legal  framework  to  address  the  issues  connected  with cyber crime, cyber attacks and security breaches of information technology infrastructure.
- v. Government has formulated Crisis Management Plan for countering cyber attacks and cyber terrorism for  implementation  by  all  Ministries/  Departments  of  Central  Government,  State  Governments  and  their organizations and critical sectors.
- vi. The Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) issues alerts and advisories regarding latest cyber threats and countermeasures on regular basis.  CERT-In has published guidelines for securing IT infrastructure, which are available on its website (www.cert-in.org.in).  CERT-In also conducts regular training  programme  to  make  the  network  and  system  administrators  aware  about  securing  the  IT infrastructure and mitigating cyber attacks.
- vii. Government  has  setup  National  Critical  Information  Infrastructure  Protection  Centre  (NCIIPC)  to protect the critical information infrastructure in the country.

viii. All Central Government Ministries / Departments and State / Union Territory Governments have been advised  to  conduct  security  auditing  of  entire  Information  Technology  infrastructure.  All  the  new government websites and applications are to be audited with respect to cyber security prior to their hosting. The auditing of the websites and applications is to be conducted on a regular basis after hosting also. CERTIn provides necessary expertise to audit IT infrastructure of critical and other ICT sectors.

ix. All  government  websites  are  to  be  hosted  on  infrastructure  of  National  Informatics  Centre  (NIC), ERNET India or any other secure infrastructure service provider in the country.

- x. Sectoral  CERTs have been functioning in the  areas  of  Defence  and  Finance  for  catering  to  critical domains.  They  are  equipped  to  handle  and  respond  to  domain  specific  threats  emerging  from  the  cyber systems.
- xi. Information Sharing and Analysis Centres (ISACs) for financial services has been set up at Institute for Development and Research in Banking Technology (IDRBT). Such a centre exchange information on cyber incidents in financial sector and advises them for appropriate mitigation.
- xii. The  organizations  operating  critical  information  infrastructure  are  regularly  advised  to  implement information  security  management  practices  based  on  International  Standard  ISO  27001.  Ministries  and Departments have been advised to carry out their IT systems audit regularly to ensure robustness of their systems.

xiii. Centres  have  been  setup  in  the  States  to  train  the  police  officers  in  area  of  cyber  forensics  for investigation of cyber crimes.

- xiv. Programmes for creating awareness about cyber security among Government officials and public are continuously being pursued by the government along with organisations from Government and Public.
- xv. Cyber Security Mock Drills are being conducted by the Government to help the organisations to assess their  preparedness  to  withstand  cyber  attacks.  Two  such  drills  are  being  conducted  every  year  with  the involvement of organizations.

xvi. The Government is encouraging development of indigenous technology by carrying out Research and Development (R&D) in the area of cyber security.

(d): There is no proposal before the government to amend cyber laws and set up special cyber courts to try cyber cases.

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