Earlier this year, the Government of India announced 16th January, 2022 as “National Startup Day”. Perceived as the backbone of India, the startup ecosystem is envisioned to foster innovation, and strengthen the digital infrastructure along with an overall growth of the nation. 

This is an exciting time for startups and an excellent initiative as well. However, as an Information Security proponent, we would like to bring the area of Information Security at the forefront of this initiative. As modern startups build businesses on the foundation of digital technologies, robust infrastructure is essential to thwart looming IT threats.

Information Security goes hand in hand with startup initiatives

In a typical startup, IT security measures and concerns generally take a back seat. With so many parameters such as registrations, legal permissions, investment, suppliers, logistics, pricing among other areas dominating the list of priorities, Information Security policies typically take a backseat. This happens due to the prevailing misconception that Information Security is a problem for large organizations with a large and distributed environment. 

There are numerous inherent risks associated with the IT security loopholes of the startups. 

• Startups are targeted directly by the malefactors to penetrate bigger targets via mutually shared and accessible databases
• To ensure operational efficiency from the beginning, start-ups deploy advanced technologies without considering adequate IT security measures
• There might not be any dedicated IT team in a startup – even if they have, the number of resources might not be sufficient; as a result, cyber incident response is comparatively slower

How to ensure IT security?

India, in the recent past, is witnessing a massive surge in adopting advanced and sophisticated technologies, thanks to the “Digital India” drive. However, can we claim this initiative revolutionary unless there is adequate cyber resilience? It is mandatory irrespective of small startups or large organizations.

As the confidential business data is migrated to one or more multiple digital platforms separately, it starts challenging the IT security preparedness of the startup. The organizations need to adapt to the trends from the very beginning of this transition. Extensive dissemination of Information Security awareness among the startups cannot just ensure cyber resilience but also comply with the regulatory standards. Compliance rules are applicable to every organization. Even the smallest startups might have access to a huge customer database that could fall under global/ regional regulatory standards. 

Identity and access control vulnerabilities lead to data breaches. With any stringent IT security policy, a single data breach incident might halt the startup even before it takes off. It could even damage brand value before creation. In this scenario, a robust identity and access management practice is highly imperative to ensure secured IT administration. Related solutions secures every access to data resources in the IT environment. 

Conclusion

India is eyeing to fulfill its dream of becoming a leading startup destination globally. While there is dedicated support from the Government, the IT security policies, once implemented, could ensure reliable and handsome investment from all over the world. In the next couple of years, India is expecting the best contribution in GDP from the startups. To materialize that dream, adoption of robust IT security policies and adequate awareness to follow those policies is a must. Without it, the emerging IT threat patterns might play spoilsport.

Information Security has taken a center-stage in the nation-building process. It significantly influences the annual GDP of every nation. 

While digitalization is adopted rapidly, the business data flows unceasingly from one device to another, from one IT environment to another. Data generation, processing and analysis of the same builds the foundation for any organization. This is a growth enabler for businesses and organizations. Big data helps businesses and organizations to understand the trends and patterns leading to innovation and experimentation. That in turn contributes to the nation’s economic growth. 

Now, if this sea of information that is generated, shared and stored every minute is not protected from cyber criminals, organizations and businesses might suffer irreparable loss in terms of both finances and reputation. This in turn can impact the national GDP. 

While explaining the role of the internet in GDP growth, McKinsey, in one of its reports, has stated that the internet contributes to 3.5% of global GDP, which is definitely a respectable portion. Moreover, the wave of digitalization has impacted significantly on the wealth and standard of people’s living. 

And it is not just the IT or e-commerce industry, the role of cybersecurity has become critical for manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, financial services among many other traditional industries. It is estimated that around two-thirds of the economic value created over the internet is from traditional industries. 

Gross Domestic Product (GDP) functions as a comprehensive scorecard of a given country’s economic health, hence, the role of IT security cannot be ignored.

Who are the threats to IT infrastructure? 

Compromised Corporate Insiders: The insiders are privy to confidential information and business sensitive data, sometimes with privileges to access critical systems. 

Unethical Third-Parties: Third-party vendors/consultants control organization’s data indirectly – they have access to systems and applications for maintenance and storage purposes that can be compromised. 

Organized Cybercriminals: Call them hackers, “hacktivists”, or by any other terminology – the objective is to harm businesses and organizations by stealing/encrypting/or misusing the data for financial gains. 

What Measures can be taken to secure Information Assets?  

IT Security plays a pivotal role in securing global enterprises from cyber threats. At the same time, it ensures that business continuity is unhindered, and the graph of GDP remains stable. 

At the macro level, the national-level cyber-defense strategies help enterprises to reinforce their IT ecosystem by providing

•  Laws to define what constitutes a cyber-crime
•  Incident Response and Disaster Management Agencies to thwart and detect cyber-attacks
•  Cyber-security Awareness Programs at the national level

Besides, 

• Every organization from both traditional and unconventional industry should educate and train the workforce on safe IT practices 
• Regardless of geographical location, every organization from every country should cooperate and communicate with each other to stay updated with safe IT practices. 
• There should not be any alternative to following standard global regulatory compliances. Every industry from every region needs to follow the applicable mandates to ensure smooth IT operations.

• And of course at the micro level, businesses and organizations should assess the critical IT infrastructure, its vulnerabilities and how the data can be best managed securely in a large ever-growing IT infrastructure. 
• Endpoint security, Identity and Access Management, Vulnerability Assessment tools, Privileged Access Controls are some of the critical safeguards that can strengthen the IT perimeter. 

Conclusion

Human capital, technology and disciplinary law tops the list of factors that contribute to GDP growth across the world. And the technology part is arguably inclined towards new-age digital transformation. That’s why Securing IT processes and operations is at the core of nation-building.