Tough time ahead with the issue of privacy

Whenever you enter any official premises, you are required to identify yourself by presenting Aadhaar card / PAN card / Voter card with address proof, contact number. Then, what else you need for a cybercrook to access your system. I found there are unwarranted pesky calls from various agencies for marketing promos and checking further details. It hardly seems there is any reasonable restriction on the right to privacy over taking the detail to enter any commercial and government premises. It could have serious implications for the government to effectively manage its massive public assistance programmes and to rein in fraud on several fronts. What I could forecast even more fundamental problem could happen with the database they are collecting and later selling it in the open market. 

Having said that, as of today, there is little understanding of personal privacy at every level of society. Experts are of the opinion that India needs a fresh data protection law with the increased digitization led by Aadhaar, the Goods and Services Tax and the push towards a digital economy to safeguard the privacy and security of our personal information. 

Going forward, data protection law has to be upgraded, especially at a time when technology is fast outpacing society’s ability to place checks and balances. The Government has also realized that, with the growing importance of data protection in India, the Government has finally constituted a panel of experts under retired Justice Srikrishna to develop a national data protection framework in India and recommend various methodologies to address the problem.

Secondly, with the Government’s vision to transform India into a knowledge economy there is a need for organizations of all sizes to create sustainable business practices. In fact, while companies are moving to the cloud to drive innovation and reduce infrastructure costs at the same time many organizations have also started helping to create wholesale shifts in all the industries and governments – making them more efficient, more intelligent, and more sustainable.

With the rapid growth of digital transformation and rising awareness among CEOs, the Government is putting pressure on companies across all industries to proactively invest into security to protect themselves against known and unknown threats and neutralize the threats and comply with new regulations. Organizations are increasingly looking to engage the services of highly trained information security professionals to cope with the problem. 

Lastly, with the recent escalation in the number of security issues and to ensure the security of smartphones, the IT Ministry (MeitY) has asked 21 smartphone manufacturers to share the procedures and processes they follow to fortify the security of data and smartphones vended in India. Our recommendation is that this has to be made applicable in the case of social media as well as for the e-commerce companies in India.