What is CERT-In?

About: CERT-In is the national nodal agency for responding to computer security incidents as and when they occur. The constituency of CERT-In is the Indian Cyber Community.

• CERT-In was established in 2004 as a functional organization of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.
• Functions: The Information Technology (Amendment) Act 2008 designated CERT-In to serve as the national agency to perform the following functions in the area of cyber security:

• • Collection, analysis and dissemination of information on cyber incidents.
  • Forecast and alerts of cyber security incidents
  • Emergency measures for handling cyber security incidents
  • Coordination of cyber incident response activities.
  • Issue guidelines, advisories, vulnerability notes and whitepapers relating to information
  • security practices, procedures, prevention, response and reporting of cyber incidents.
  • Such other functions relating to cyber security as may be prescribed.

Additional facts:

• Budapest Convention on Cybercrime: It is the first international treaty that seeks to address Internet and cybercrime by harmonizing national laws, improving investigative techniques and increasing cooperation among nations.It came into force in 2004.India is not a signatory to this convention.
• Cyber Surakshit Bharat Yojana: It was launched in 2018 by Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology in association with National e-Governance Division(NeGD) and industry players.It includes awareness programs on cyber security; workshops on best practices and enablement of the officials with cyber security health tool kits.
• Cyber Swachhta Kendra (Botnet Cleaning and Malware Analysis Centre): It provides for the detection of malicious programs and free tools to remove such programs.
• Indian Cyber Crime Coordination Centre(I4C): It was established in 2018 to combat cybercrime in India in a comprehensive and coordinated manner.It functions under the Ministry of Home Affairs.