No cyber attack on Census Data Centre due to multi-layered security: Govt tells Lok Sabha

Cyber attack on Census Data Centre: Multiple Layered Security has been adopted for the security & safety of Census Data, the MoS Home told Lok Sabha on Tuesday.

New Delhi: The Centre on Tuesday assured the Lok Sabha that there has been no incident of cyberattack or data hacking in the Data Centre and all the Census Data is safe due to multi-level security put in place by the government. Speaking on the behalf of the government in Lok Sabha, Union Minister of State for Home Nityanand Rai told the lawmakers that “a multi-layered security approach has been adopted for the safety of census data and there has been no cyber attack or data hacking incident in the system.”

The Union Minister also stated that the intent of the government for conducting Census 2021 was notified in the Gazette of India on March 28, 2019, but due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the census and related field activities were postponed until further orders.

No cyber attack or data hacking incident has been observed in the Data Centre or its Disaster Recovery Sites of the Office of Registrar General & Census Commissioner, India. Multiple Layered Security approach has been adopted for security & safety of Census data: MoS Home in LS pic.twitter.com/8HwUTmYuoQ — ANI (@ANI) December 20, 2022

"Multiple layered security approach has been adopted for security and safety of census data. Data is encrypted at the data collection device, during the transmission and at servers and storage,” the MoS said in Lok Sabha.

"Advisories from National Critical Information Infrastructure Protection Centre (NCIIPC) and Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) are implemented to make the data centres secure," Rai said in Lok Sabha.

Replying to another question, the Union Minister said, "No cyber attack or data hacking incident has been observed in the data centre or its disaster recovery sites of the office of Registrar General and Census Commissioner, India."