India's first level 3 data centre

Karnataka will soon have the country's first level 3 data centre, on its way to scoring yet another first in the e-governance sector, says Silicon India.

The data centre will be used to host government applications and related data, and will have a massive storage capacity of over 90 terabytes to meet the digital storage needs of Karnataka. The state government has already prepared a request for proposal for the project and is awaiting approval from the central government.

A level 3 data centre typically has advanced storage capacity and has 98.98% availability, making it operational almost 24 hours a day, seven days a week and 365 days a year.

Alan Calder, chief executive of IT Governance, warns organisations to prepare for a major new assault on breaches of data protection, according to Info Security.

As business prepares to get back to normal in the new year, the governance specialist says companies need to act now to meet the increasingly strict requirements of the data protection act (DPA) compliance regime, or risk the wrath of the Information Commissioners' Office (ICO).

According to Calder, the planned new penalties are of unprecedented severity. "From April 2010, the ICO expects to impose 25 monetary penalty notices every year for breaches of the DPA. Those fines could be as much as £500 000 (R5.8 million) each for serious contraventions", he says.

India is drafting new rules to avail the services of private IT firms for a range of government functions such as collecting taxes or issuing birth certificates, allowing transactions to be conducted electronically or through mobile phones, which are more pervasive in the country than computers, reports Live Mint.

The proposed rules bring out, for the first time, uniform national standards and policies to be adopted by the centre and states for improved public-private partnership in the delivery of e-governance services, analysts say.

India first drew up a cyber law policy to propel e-commerce and govern technology-related practices in 2000. The move comes as both the union and state governments are implementing computerisation projects aimed at providing such services to people.