Will terrorism impact the India tech miracle?

Sufia Tippu
Friday, 14 July 2006 18:30

IT Industry - Market

India has had its share of terrorist attacks and is learning to live with it. Today, not only Mumbai and Delhi are high on hit list of terrorists but hi-tech hubs like Bangalore and Hyderabad have already begun to beep on the terrorist radar but no alarm bells are going off yet.
If Mumbai was shaken by the serial blasts in the local trains which left hundreds dead and injured and Delhi was in shock at the bombing that took place in a crowded shopping area, the attacks in India’s emerging high tech hubs like Bangalore and Hyderabad last year end came as an eye-opener.

Last December in Bangalore there was a terrorist attack on the Science Congress convention in the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore campus which killed a leading professor, while in Hyderabad growing ultra-left extremism is taking its toll.

“Today what is new is the fact that the terrorist has become more sophisticated and knows how to attack in places where it would hurt the most. Take for instance, the Mumbai blasts- orchestrating the seven blasts in a public transportation system is not the job of amateur. He is well trained, well connected and has the resources to do something like this in a well planned manner,” says Ashish Sonal, country manager- India, Hill & Associates, a risk-management consulting firm.

The Changing Face of Terrorism

More important is the fact that the terrorist groups have changed their targets. Earlier, the major targets of terrorist attacks were either the government establishments or public places (like the attack on Indian Parliament in New Delhi on the 13th Dec 2001). The objective then was to create panic among ordinary folks and send strong messages to the Government.

But today the terrorist knows that India is globally emerging as an economic superpower in IT, BPO and even conventional businesses. “The explosives in the Mumbai trains were all in the first class compartments – where the rich diamond merchants and exporters usually travel to avoid the congestion on roads if they were to drive,” Sonal points out.

The seizure of some crucial diaries and papers from people arrested in connection with the attack in Bangalore and Hyderabad led the police to alert IT companies in India to be more security conscious because they had found out that some militants had surveyed IT and call-center companies, to zero in on potential targets for future attacks.

Does this mean that country has a higher risk profile as a whole?

“Not really, the risk profile has not really gone up. Industry is now a target – but it is not an alarming situation,” says Sonal.

Over the last couple of years, Intelligence agencies have continually sent warning signals of militant groups planning attacks in Bangalore and the city going on high alert. Bangalore, where all the global giants like Intel, IBM, Motorola, HP have development offices, has more than 1,500 IT and BPO firms. Several Indian defence, space and scientific research institutions are also based in Bangalore.

There are three reasons for terror activities in high-tech centers. One, by attacking the IT industry, terrorists feel they are sending signals to international investors that India may not be the safest place to be. Two, a significant number of US firms have operations here and when the militant tendency is to get back at the US, this is one way of getting back. Three, security is not as tight as it could be.

“All these places are not very well protected – security is not a major concern and it is easy to carry out these attacks,” says Sanjay Pandey who was with the Intelligence bureau and now heads a security research firm, iSec.

But, these are the risks anywhere in the world. “When we set up development centre here five years ago, terrorist activities was never a top-of-the-mind risk associated with India. Even today, it is not -- India is as good or an even better place to invest as anywhere. There were terrorist attacks in the heart of London and New York – how can anyone pre-empt these attacks and say that India is high on the terrorist hit list?” asks the country head of an IT services multinational corporation.

Crippling – the network way

But Pavan Duggal, a leading cyber crime advocate in the Supreme Court takes another line of thought. “Today, the terrorist is looking at other means to attack - through technology. There are many companies here that are working on mission critical applications for US companies. To hit back at the US government, all you need is to cripple the operations here through technology and data theft –that is more damaging to companies,” he says.

Take the case of the recent Navy war-room leak where information containing classified information was stolen or senior system analyst at the National Security Council Secretariat who sold data to a foreign national. “If such thefts continue in private firms and critical data is stolen, I think the harm would be much more than what we normally perceive,” Duggal points out.

Today, except for a handful of multinational corporations, nobody takes security issues seriously. “When it is neglected, we pay the price,” says iSec’s Pandey.