The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has ordered an immediate audit of the financial sector starting with the National Payment Corporation of India, in view of the recent hacking incidents, Economic Times reported. The aim of the audit is to strengthen the 16-year-old Information Technology Act and facilitate the setting up of a team to counter cyber crime.
The ministry has also asked social networking platform Twitter to increase its online security measures. Digital payment and online wallet firms have been directed to report any breaches to CERT-In, an agency set up to monitor cashless payments on a real-time basis. Union Electronics and Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said he has ordered a revamp of the “entire IT infrastructure” in the country to fortify the security wall.
Prasad said, “There is huge traffic flowing through the IT platforms, if there is any mishap, the systems have to be resilient and we have to take appropriate measures,” the English daily reported. During a meeting with representatives of security and technical officials from various banks on Tuesday, the minister had said, “We have to be alert, there is nothing to be scared of.” In an interview with the English daily on Monday, hacking group Legion which is allegedly responsible for the recent breaches on Twitter, said the Indian banking system is “deeply flawed”.
The government aims to launch the BotNet Centre and the National Cyber Coordination Centre to regulate increasing cyber crimes.
Legion – the hacker group responsible for breaching Twitter accounts of the Congress Party, its Vice President Rahul Gandhi, fugitive businessman Vijay Mallya, and journalists Barkha Dutt and Ravish Kumar – had said that their main objective was to make classified information public.
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