Indian IT industry: Marred by trials and tribulations

The year 2019 continued to take forward the trends in the world of Information Technology with increased usage of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT) and Machine Learning.

But controversies also cropped up on the use of social media, impacting the industry and common man.

Regulation

The common man has started feeling the need to regulate the sector to ensure harmonious and progressive growth. It was in 2019 that people started thinking on these lines, especially after WhatsApp started spying on Indian journalists and human rights activists earlier this year.

The Facebook-owned company also accepted that Indian journalists and human rights activists were among those globally that were spied on by unidentified entities using Pegasus, an Israeli spyware.

Data Protection Act

This was one of the main reasons why the government set a priority to bring in the Data Protection Act.

Till last year, there was no urgency to implement the Personal Data Protection Bill, which was in the preparation stage by a committee led by Justice BN Srikrishna. But today, there is a dire need to getit implemented.

However, after the Bill was tabled in Parliament, Justice Srikrishna said that changes have been made to the draft, as it mentions that data cannot be processed without the consent of the person. And, if passed in its current form, the Bill should be “challenged in the Supreme Court”.

The need to regulate the sector was felt even more after the general elections because of the immense need for data to securepopular support.

From the industry’s point of view, too, companies globally are also working on safeguarding their data as they are equally vulnerable.

Trishneet Arora, Founder and Chief Executive Officer at TAC Security, says: “In terms of threat perception, estimates suggest that about 70 per cent of the companies are vulnerable partly because they haven’t got their systems assessed or are not adequately protected. For instance, in 2019, more than 1.3 million credit and debit card details from Indian banks were breached, Facebook’s user passwords were found exposed, and Twitter, too, faced data leak.”

JustDial also struggled to secure the data of its users, he added. And with 5G being rolled out from next year, data security will be more important.

According to Dan Schiappa, Chief Product Officer at Sophos, 5G will introduce security threats, and it will be the most fundamental game-changing technology to impact the cybersecurity landscape.

5G not so safe

“It (5G) promises to connect almost all aspects of life through the network with game-changing speed and lower latency, it will also introduce significant security risks with new potential entry points that will expose organisations to new types of attack,” said Schiappa.

But2019 also saw the emergence of more start-ups and big foreign players investing on them. Be it e-commerce or electric mobility solutions, the start-up culture has built up its own industry.

“Adding over 1,100 start-ups in 2019, India continues to reinforce its position as the third-largest start-up ecosystem across the world, taking the total number of tech start-ups to 8,900-9,300 in the last five years.

“Further, promoting business opportunities India opened newer markets, both international and domestic, and introduced key policy measures to further strengthen its potential as an innovation hub,” said Debjani Ghosh, President, Nasscom.

Going forward, the Indian IT industry is expected to grow faster as part of the Industry 4.0 revolution and investments in are coming from all over.

According to Gartner,worldwide IT spend is projected to total $3.7 trillion in 2019, an increase of 0.4 per cent from 2018.

In India, IT spend will touch $94 billion in 2020, an increase of around 7 per cent from the current levels.

The major contributor of the IT industry – the services sector – will continue to grow higher with companies such as Infosys, Wipro, Tata Consultancy Services and Tech Mahindra diversifying their offerings and showcasing leading ideas in blockchain, Artificial Intelligence to clients.

According to Nasscom, India’s IT and ITeS industry grew to $181 billion in 2018-19.

Exports from the industry increased to $137 billion in FY19, while domestic revenue (including hardware) advanced to $44 billion.