India's cyber war

Experts say that India, which is an emerging Asian super power, faces a number of cyber threats such as the cyber warfare, cyber terrorism and cyber espionage. They say that a comprehensive cyber security strategy is needed to deal with these threats.

According to the Indian government's information technology ministry, more than 270 government websites were hacked in the first half of 2012. Four months ago, Internet hackers attacked a host of Indian government websites including the website of the Indian Supreme Court. The hackers said it was a protest against the Indian government's web censorship plans.

"Most websites, including the government sites, have little or no security," Ankit Fadia, an independent cyber security expert, told DW. "Unlike other countries, we don't have dedicated security professionals in India to manage websites and protect them from cyber attacks."

New cyber security policy

"Even though we are late in introducing new cyber-security mechanisms, we are certainly moving in the right direction,” Indian defence minister A.K. Antony told DW.

The Indian government's new cyber security policy has made it mandatory for private and public enterprises to get cyber security audits.

"The government will introduce specialized cyber security curriculum to engineering and management colleges and also establish the Institute of Cyber Security Professionals of India," a cyber expert told DW on conditions of anonymity.

India's new cyber plan will be supervised by national security advisor, Shivshankar Menon.

Currently, India has over 121 million Internet users. Only China and the United States have more Internet users than India.