The significance of cyberspace for nations has grown significantly due to the rapid increase in usage in recent times. Its stability and resilience are critical for India’s economic vitality, as critical economic infrastructure such as financial services (e-kuber), banks, power, manufacturing, etc. are getting digitized in a swift way. Further, it holds importance for national security, as cyberspace offers a new dimension to traditional warfare. However, cyberspace is vulnerable to a variety of incidents and has become very sophisticated and complex with technological innovations. For instance, the number of cyber security incidents in India has gone up to 1,267,564 in 2022 from 41,378 in 2017 as per recent data produced in the Parliament.

Need for making India’s Cyber Security Strategy robust and effective:

• Growing Internet base and digitalization: India has one of the largest Internet user bases in the world with over 800 million internet users. Further, with the concept of ‘work from anywhere’ being the norm, there has been a dramatic shift to cloud computing services and mobile workforce, which has accelerated cyber security risks.
• Vulnerabilities of humongous data: The local, state, and Central governments maintain a huge amount of confidential data related to the country (geographical, strategic military assets, etc.) and citizens. As government offices are scattered across the country, bringing about a common minimum cyber security posture and hygiene poses a huge challenge.
• Emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI): The emergence of Al poses new threats to cyber security infrastructure. For instance, attackers can use Al-driven tools that constantly change their malware signatures to evade detection.
• State-sponsored cyber threats: Increasing cases of cyber espionage, cyber terrorism, and ransomware like that of the recent ransomware attack on AIIMS, data breach of Solar India Industries Limited, etc. indicate the possible involvement of state actors like Pakistan and China.

Measures that the government needs to take to tackle cyber threats are, as follows:

• Institutional measures: The draft National Cyber Security Strategy stresses the need for a legislative framework to address the emerging challenges in the technology space. Further, cyber forensic capacity building to investigate dark net activities and cryptocurrency transactions which abet cybercrimes is required.
• Enhancing coordination of CERT teams: A broad framework and standard procedure need to be developed for determining CERTs’ response to transnational cyber threats and developing resilient cyber systems.
• Augmentation of cyber security skills: Diverse and adequate cyber security experts need to be roped in towards building capacity and expertise in this area. Further, specialized cyber units should be formed at the state level comprising officers who have domain knowledge.
• Upgradation of technology: There is a need for advanced security technologies such as API security solutions, XDRs, cloud security tools, etc. in order to establish a resilient and robust cyber security infrastructure.
• Crisis management: The government should hold cyber security drills that include real-life scenarios with their ramifications. Further, in critical sectors, simulation exercises for cross-border scenarios must be held on an inter-country basis.

Cyber security has become an essential aspect of international affairs that requires adequate focus due to its economic and geopolitical implications. The need of the hour is effective implementation of the draft National Cyber Security Strategy to build a safe, trusted, and resilient cyberspace.