Indian IT aims for more secure outsourcing

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The Indian IT industry is looking to tighten up security following a number of high-profile incidents that have damage the reputation of country's outsourcing efforts.

Shyamal Ghosh, who will be chairman of a new Self Regulatory Organisation (SRO), set up by Indian software body Nasscom to promote and enforce data privacy and protection standards for the country's IT industry, said that one of the major issues concerning the Indian IT industry is data privacy.

"This has also been the concern of the (Indian) government too, but the government is acting more as a facilitator for the industry," said Ghosh.

But rather than wait for the Indian government to regulate the IT industry, a more hands-off approach should be taken. "The industry feels that if regulation is required than it should be from the initiative of the industry in the form of self-regulation," he said.

He said this would show that the industry is mature enough to tackle these serious problems and this was why Nasscom has moved to set up the self regulating body.

The body to be called, the Data Security Council of India (DSCI) is hoped to be up and running in the country by this June and would act as an independent body that will encourage companies to adopt a basic set of security and privacy standard practices.

"The key objective of creating the DSCI is to raise the floor when it comes to strengthening India as a secure outsourcing destination, across the IT industry," said Ghosh.

Ghosh said that in addition to creating standards and a code of ethics, its work should be backed by "a legal framework, which can be triggered off by the proposed DSCI, depending on the scale of breach in case all else fails."

He said it is hoped that the creation of the new body will change the rules of offshoring from being the lowest

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