Crisis manage plan (CMP) is a measure of readiness to meet uncertainties and future risks and accidents. If we have a good crisis management plan at place, we can minimise the damage and harm to maximum possible extent.CMP pertaining to information and communication technology (ICT) is an essential part of national ICT policy of India. The other parts of national ICT policy of India are cyber security policy of India, critical infrastructure protection policy of India, critical national infrastructure protection policy of India from cyber attacks, national security policy of India, etc.
We have no ICT policy of India. National security and ICT policy of India are closely related and we cannot take the ICT policy casually. In the absence of national ICT policy of India, cyber security of India is at grave risk.
Issues like cyber terrorism, cyber espionage, cyber warfare, etc require serious deliberations and actions. We have weak cyber law, ineffective cyber forensics capabilities and missing cyber security.
Indian cyberspace is not at all secure. In the name of cyber security, Indian government is stressing upon e-surveillance. E-Surveillance can never be a substitute for effective cyber security in India. In fact, national security and civil liberties must be reconciled to get best results.
India has a single techno legal initiative for protection of civil liberties in cyberspace in the form of human rights protection centre of India (HRPCI). This platform has been spearheaded by Praveen Dalal, managing Partner of Perry4Law and leading techno legal expert of India. The national security policy of India must be urgently formulated that must cater the requirements of protection of civil liberties in cyber space.
It is apparent that India is not ready for crisis management at all. The problem lies at the policy formulation level. Firstly, we do not formulate policies at all. Even if we formulate some sort of policy, we never implement the same in letter and spirit.
Ironically, Indian Parliament always needs a tragedy of gigantic proportion to wake up and formulate effective policies. It seems we need a digital pearl harbour before India would wake up and consider formulating suitable ICT polices and national security policies.
