INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
The ex-home secretary said staff also watched pornographic content on internet in office
and download malware in office, leading to compromise of the computer networks, former union home secretary G K Pillai said on
Wednesday."When I was the union home secretary almost 8-9 years ago, every 60 days we would find the entire computers compromised," said Mr
Pillai, who chairs the non-profit Data Security Council of India (DSCI) promoted by Nasscom.Giving details, he said senior ministry
officials used to be busy with meetings till late in the evening because of which the subordinate staff would have to stay back in the
offices for post-meeting work."So what will they (subordinates) do They go and open the internet and they are on porn sites and so on and so
forth, and download all sorts of things that come up with all the malware," he said, addressing the maiden Finsec Conclave here.He said the
ministry issued a lot of directives and it was a detailed review which led to this discovery.The comments came days after a suspected
compromise of some government websites
The government had later said that the websites had not been hacked, but attributed the problems to a hardware glitch.Referring to the
Cambridge Analytica revelations that have put social media giant Facebook in a spot, Mr Pillai reminisced that the British company had given
a presentation about the same service offerings at a conference in New Delhi two years ago.Nobody questioned the company then and it is only
due to the arrogance of the management which spoke about bribing people that they have come under a spot today, he said.Mr Pillai said the
DSCI had recommended to make it mandatory for companies' boards to review cyber security and disclose the preparedness in the annual report
which has not moved because arms like the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, SEBI and RBI are sitting over it.There has been a headlong rush for
digital solutions lately, especially after the thrust given by the government on such initiatives, "which has increased vulnerabilities and
made us more insecure", he said.People are using alternative accounts exclusively to carry out internet banking transactions to limit their
losses in case of a hacking incident, he said.There has to be a focus on the human resources and training the personnel in order to ensure
