to be, taken in such a way that upgradation to take care of technology obsolescence is performed in a scientific manner and on a need - to - upgrade basis. this would help banks avoid falling into the technology - obsolescence trap requiring huge sums of money for to come out. viii. thou shall provide a framework for incident management. security related incidents cannot be wished away. the best tool towards an effective it security framework would thus be one which acknowledges such security instances and provides for a framework for appropriate incident reporting within the organization and to the regulators. such a mechanism would provide insights into the security violations and other such attempts, but the single largest beneficial factor would be the development of a set of knowledge workers who hold the key to success of any it based initiative by banks in a country which can boast of some of the best it companies runs by effective it czars. ix. thou shall take care of data quality and integrity. the most vital component of it security is the data which forms part of the it enables business processing system. data is hard to get or create, easy for misuse and is tough to be channeled towards beneficial interpretation resulting in meaningful analysis. to this end, banks need to work out effective standards aimed at high levels of data quality and integrity. i am reminded at this juncture of a book called “ database nation ” written by simson garfinkel which outlines the death of privacy in the twenty - first century. the author skillfully elucidates the various facets governing data piracy while concluding that the owner of one ’ s own private information is not himself! banks cannot afford to fall into this category and data refinement is one approach which would facilitate good data management with adequate levels of protective covers. x. thou shall provide for it security as a way of life. the last commandment is more like a synopsis but is at the heart of all it security related initiatives. it security cannot be viewed in isolation ; neither can it be implemented in fits and starts. examples of good it security implementation reveal that good it security features are impregnated as essential requirements in a normal way of life. as banks, we need to imbibe the security culture in our normal day - to - day activities. this is a challenging and daunting task since the normal human mind is more attuned towards an easy, laissez faire approach towards reduced security so as to enhance convenience. it security

. non - bank entities are cooperating as well as competing with banks, either as technology service providers to banks or by directly providing retail electronic payment services. the regulatory framework has also encouraged this enhanced participation of non - bank entities in the payments domain. 5. in recent years, a focussed effort has been made to develop a state of the art national payments infrastructure and technology platforms, be it immediate payments service ( imps ), unified payments interface ( upi ), bharat interface for money ( bhim ), bharat bill pay system ( bbps ), or aadhaar - enabled payment system ( aeps ). this has changed the retail payments scenario of the country. the total volume of retail electronic payments witnessed about nine - fold increase over the last five years. 6. let me now mention some numbers with regard to digital modes of payment. the neft system handled 195 crore transactions valued at around rs. 172 lakh crore in 2017 – 18 growing by 4. 9 times in terms of volume and 5. 9 times in terms in terms of value over the previous five years. similarly, the number of transactions carried out through credit and debit cards in 2017 – 18 was 141 crore and 334 crore, respectively. prepaid payment instruments ( ppis ) recorded a 1 / 4 bis central bankers'speeches volume of about 346 crore transactions, valued at rs. 1. 4 lakh crore. thus, the total card payments, in volume terms, stood at 52 percent of the total retail payments during the year 2017 – 18. 7. developments in the spheres of banking technology and trade finance have been commendable as well. alternative models of lending and capital raising are coming up and have the potential to change the market dynamics of traditional lenders and the role of traditional intermediaries. crowd - funding, which entails raising external finance from a large group of investors, is at a very nascent stage in india. the peer - to - peer ( p2p ) lending for which rbi has issued master direction in october 2017 has the potential to improve access to finance for small and medium enterprises. eleven entities have been licensed to operate p2p platform. the reserve bank has also granted licenses and permitted seven purely digital loan companies ( nbfcs ) to commence operations. although they are purely digital players operating through mobile applications, we have ensured that they have at least one physical presence for customers to reach out to in case of need. 8. furthermore,