Security audit of government websites delayed

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The directive of the Union Ministry of Communication and Information Technology for a security check of the government websites, following reports of hacking, is getting delayed as the websites of various departments are not standardised.The directive came last year when several instances of hacking were reported in Kerala. Around 166 websites of government departments and organisations were hacked till date. The security audit of websites was entrusted with the Computer Emergency Response Team-Kerala (CERT-K). A proposal in this regard is already pending with the State Government. CERT-K director Mahesh C I said that the websites of each department were hosted individually according to their needs.The websites were developed by third parties and there was no standardisation for the process.“Now the Response Team is in the process of standardising the websites so that the security audit could be conducted easily. Around 50 percent of the websites in Kerala are being developed by the State Data Centre, 20 percent by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) and the rest by agencies outside the country,” he said.After ensuring uniformity of the websites, the security audit would be conducted by a third party. Tenders would be floated and the audit is expected to start in two months. The number of hacking cases in Kerala is on the rise due to the weak security features on the websites.