The Hindu Business Line : Privacy concept

This feature in fact makes Indian culture distinct in comparison with that of the West. But the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry is getting increasingly concerned about the notion of privacy in Indian culture as it is impacting the business.

One of the serious concerns of the outsourcing industry is the wide gulf between Indian and Western notions of privacy which is causing problems in information and data security aspects, Mr Shyamal Ghosh, Chairman of Data Security Council of India, told Business Line on the sidelines of Nasscom Information Conclave 2007 here on Tuesday.

“Foreign clients of our BPO companies need to be convinced that we take the issue of privacy more seriously. Though there are no big lapses on the issue so far, this is a serious one and steps should be taken to redefine the concept of privacy here,” Mr Ghosh said.

The personal data on health, financial aspects such as insurance and a host of others need to be protected to ensure continuous growth of business.

DSCI is also planning to take awareness and education programmes for the industry on a regular basis. On their part, most of the majors have also incorporated the data security awareness in the induction programmes.

Awareness programme

“These have now become a part of the industry and necessary clauses providing for non-disclosure agreements have also been ensured in appointments,” Mr Bipin Chandra, Senior Vice-President, Knoah Solutions, said.

Though the cultural aspect of data security is important, there has been significant success in the Indian BPO industry in this regard, he said, adding: “The business models are now marketed by well-defined processes and decent practices. Our track record in data protection is in fact better than in the US.”