Over 26,100 Indian websites hacked in 2020 as per CERT-In data: Dhotre

A total number of 110, 54, and 59 websites of Central Ministries, Departments, and State Governments were hacked during the year 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively, Minister of State for Electronics and IT, Sanjay Dhotre said in a written reply to the Rajya Sabha.

''As per the information reported to and tracked by Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In), a total number of 17,560, 24,768, and 26,121 Indian websites were hacked during the year 2018, 2019, and 2020, respectively,'' he added.

Attempts have been made from time to time to launch cyber attacks on Indian cyberspace, the minister said, noting that attackers have been found to be compromising computer systems located in different parts of the world, use masquerading techniques and hidden servers to hide the identity of actual systems from where attacks were being launched.

''According to the logs analyzed and made available to CERT-In, the Internet Protocol (IP) addresses of the computers from where the attacks appear to be originated belong to various countries, including Algeria, Brazil, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Netherlands, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Serbia, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkey, USA, Vietnam, etc,'' he said.

The government has taken multiple measures to enhance the cybersecurity posture and prevent cyber attacks, he stated while outlining key initiatives like Cyber Swachhta Kendra (or botnet cleaning and malware analysis center), formulation of cyber crisis management plan, and empanelment of security auditing organizations to support and audit the implementation of best practices.