Made-in-India telecom plan to prevent Chinese Trojans

[Markus]

Made-in-India telecom plan to prevent Chinese Trojans​

The government of India wants to promote domestic manufacturers of telecom products as it is worried that foreign suppliers of telecom equipment, especially China, might indulge in cyber espionage during a crisis or war.

The department of telecom (***) under the ministry of communication and information technology has chalked out an elaborate policy and will soon come out with a notification. If all goes as planned, foreign firms like Chinese telecom giant Huawei will be wiped out from the Indian market.

Telecom department documents, accessed by DNA, talk of “heightened security risk” as the primary reason behind promoting ‘made in India’ products. The documents say that during war, an enemy country can control or instruct its suppliers to block equipment supply or critical support. “Some countries have the means, opportunity and motive to use their telecom companies for malicious purpose to shutdown or degrade India’s critical national security systems in time of crisis or war,” the *** notes.

At present, the Indian telecom sector depends heavily on foreign companies for equipment as well as maintenance.

The department has identified 18 hardware items used for telecommunications that will be put under a preferential market access category and that will be manufactured locally. They include SIM cards, base stations switching centres, network management systems, modems used for WiFi or 3G broadband services and EPABX boxes. The new rules are expected to come into force from April 1, 2013.

Though the government wants to achieve 100%dependence on domestic manufacturers, the shift will take place gradually. It will first be mandatory for all telecom companies to procure a minimum of 30% equipment from domestic manufacturers in the first year. This will go up to 45% by 2017 and so on.

“In the context of emerging cyber attacks, the security of the telecommunication infrastructure and network elements such as routers, switches, exchanges, transmission systems and other telecom infrastructure elements, is of paramount importance,” say the documents.

Threats cannot be ruled out “as the entire supply chain associated with hardware and software, including managed services, can be easily used to insert features or vulnerabilities into any product that could assist espionage and cyber warfare”.

Experts say post-production evaluation processes at present “may not necessarily be designed to uncover malicious codes”. “The evaluation programmes may only create a false sense of security that an incomplete, flawed, or misapplied evaluation would provide. And this may result in unwittingly dropping the guard simply because an accredited expert has approved the product,” one expert said.

DNA exclusive: Made-in-India telecom plan to prevent Chinese Trojans - Mumbai - DNA

 

[ironman1]

very long awaited policy initiative

 

[black_jack]

Govt woke up after 11 years ................

 

[kurup]

Nice move by the govt.

 

[Ammyy]

The department has identified 18 hardware items used for telecommunications that will be put under a preferential market access category and that will be manufactured locally. They include SIM cards, base stations switching centres, network management systems, modems used for WiFi or 3G broadband services and EPABX boxes. The new rules are expected to come into force from April 1, 2013.​

I dnt think its possible with current scenario all these equipment those mention imported.

As for NMS we have only one domestic company named Tejas Networks but it cant compete with quality of Isreali ECI or With Alcatel and NSN.​

 

[Ammyy]

We can ban Chinese equipment but to ban all is not possible

 

[karan21]

National manufacturing policy, national electronics policy and now this telecom policy. I can see when India had opened its auto sector after 1991 with new automobile policy every one was skeptical about it. But today it has made India a world leader in automobiles. We will soon be 2nd largest producer.

If these policies implemented properly same will happen with time in electronics sector too. India was take the lead within decade. Good thing is that Indian private industry is showing interest and their is a massive market with a huge supply of engineers. So wtf is stopping is.

 

[northeast]

Made in india by chinese corporation.That's the reality

 

[IND151]

a good step by GOI.

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

LOL, so they starting to do it now... for "security concerns"?

Indigenous industries are SO important, especially for vital infrastructure like communications and power.

I can't believe that they would only be motivated to do so now by security concerns, shouldn't they have been doing that since the beginning?

 

[Ammyy]

LOL, so they starting to do it now... for "security concerns"?

Indigenous industries are SO important, especially for vital infrastructure like communications and power.

I can't believe that they would only be motivated to do so now by security concerns, shouldn't they have been doing that since the beginning?

We cant do that in past cause we were not capable but if government start it now with proper support this target can be achieved may be fully indigenous telecom industry at the end of this decade or early.

I think your government did same

China Telco Replaces Cisco Devices Over Security Concerns - Slashdot

 

[Chinese-Dragon]

We cant do that in past cause we were not capable but if government start it now with proper support this target can be achieved may be fully indigenous telecom industry at the end of this decade or early.

I think your government did same

China Telco Replaces Cisco Devices Over Security Concerns - Slashdot

That was in response to an American decision against Huawei. Tit for tat economic diplomacy.

But our indigenous telecoms industry is the largest in the world, same with our domestic power industry.

And we are the biggest supplier in these two areas for India as well.

 

[Cherokee]

Ok I will clarify a Bit .

Here we are only Talking about Hardware based Trojans . Trojans Embedded in Driver or utilities of a particular hardware . It is difficult to find becuase of many many reasons . Noentheless it can be something as small as opening a port on your PC and let the "attacker" access it or can be of very devilious kind .

It is just not about making the hardware but the first layer of code over it as well . Otherwise its like you are producing your own hardware and than using somebody's else's software ( very common these days ) and they can push a trojan to your computer even through an "update Patch" .

All i can say about this step is too late and too little .

 

[karan21]

That was in response to an American decision against Huawei. Tit for tat economic diplomacy.

But our indigenous telecoms industry is the largest in the world, same with our domestic power industry.

And we are the biggest supplier in these two areas for India as well.

In the telecom sector maybe, but in the power sector China is not a big supplier. Indian bhel and L&T and most other companies are the biggest suppliers in India of supercritical broilers and turbines. Some provate companies have approached china because China is providing equipment with cheap loans but China won't be able to hold on in Indian power market. Although competition is good for every market.

 

[Ammyy]

That was in response to an American decision against Huawei. Tit for tat economic diplomacy.

But our indigenous telecoms industry is the largest in the world, same with our domestic power industry.

And we are the biggest supplier in these two areas for India as well.

No you are not ... European and US based companies are biggest suppliers till now (May be due to Chinese companies banned in India in past) but now every company want equipment of Huawei due to low cost, 90% of DWDM based products provided by Huawei but still all can be replaced within year if government want to do that.