Sanjay Dubey Additional Chief SecretaryDepartment of Science and TechnologyGovernment of Madhya Pradesh It began with a simple click. A government official in a small district of Madhya Pradesh opened what looked like a regular circular attachment but within seconds, the system froze, screens went black, and sensitive departmental data was locked behind a ransom note. What could have been a crisis was averted swiftly thanks to a state-level cybersecurity response team that detected, isolated, and neutralized the threat before it spread. This isn’t just a story of prevention – it’s a story of preparation. In an era where every service from land records to education, health, and public safety runs on digital platforms, cybersecurity has become the invisible backbone of governance. India’s push toward Digital India has brought unmatched connectivity, with over 1.15 billion mobile users and 700 million internet subscribers. Yet, this digital vibrancy has also made the country a hotbed for cyberattacks. In 2023 alone, CERT-In (Computer Emergency Response Team – India) handled over 1.5 million incidents, ranging from phishing and ransomware to attacks on critical infrastructure. As these threats multiply, the question facing every state government is not ‘if’ but ‘when’ the next attack will come and how prepared they are to face it. In this high-stakes landscape, Madhya Pradesh has quietly emerged as one of India’s most cyber-resilient states, building not just systems, but a culture of security. The Turning Point: MP-CERT’s Vision for a Secure Madhya Pradesh In December 2022, the Department of Science and Technology, Government of Madhya Pradesh, established MP-CERT (Madhya Pradesh Computer Emergency Response Team) a specialized body designed to protect the state’s digital ecosystem. This initiative positioned Madhya Pradesh as one of the first few states in India to develop a dedicated cybersecurity response system. MP-CERT’s mission goes beyond firewalls and encryption it’s about ensuring that every department, every official, and every citizen becomes a stakeholder in digital safety. Cybersecurity Awareness Month: A Time to Reflect and Reinforce Every October, the world observes Cybersecurity Awareness Month, a global reminder that security is everyone’s responsibility. For Madhya Pradesh, this observance carries special meaning. Since its inception, MP-CERT has driven significant initiatives: Now, building on this foundation, MP-CERT has proposed a specialized 3-day residential training program for Group A and Group B mid-management officers and policymakers, scheduled for 27-29 October 2025 at NFSU Centre, Gandhinagar, Gujarat. The program is designed to impart a holistic understanding of cybersecurity, covering emerging global trends, best practices in cyber defense, and strategic frameworks for policy formulation and implementation. The CISO Network: Building Cyber Leaders Across Government At the core of MP-CERT’s strategy lies decentralized vigilance. The state has appointed 175 Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs) across departments and districts, ensuring that cybersecurity isn’t limited to IT cells, it’s embedded within every policy and workflow. To further strengthen this ecosystem: Securing the Code: The SBOM Advantage One of MP-CERT’s most impactful innovations has been the introduction of the Software Bill of Materials (SBOM) methodology. In simple terms, SBOM acts like an ingredient list for software, helping identify vulnerable outdated components in real time. By mapping potential weaknesses to the National Vulnerability Database (NVD), MP-CERT has been able to detect and resolve vulnerabilities faster than ever. Key Achievements as of October 2025: Supporting this robust architecture is the State Data Centre (SDC), which is now certified at CMMI Level 5—the highest factory-level standard for data security and quality management. This achievement underscores the precision and rigor of MP’s digital backbone. Every government department developing a new digital service, application, or portal is now mandated to create a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) and conduct a pre-audit at the CMMI Level 5 standard ensuring security is embedded right from the development stage. A Model for Secure Governance The story of MP-CERT is not about crisis management, it’s about confidence. It’s about a state that saw the digital wave coming and built lifeboats before the storm arrived. It’s about transforming cybersecurity from a technical term into a pillar of governance, trust, and innovation. As India accelerates toward its goal of becoming a trillion-dollar digital economy, Madhya Pradesh offers a living example of how digital progress and digital protection must evolve together. From early threat detection and secure coding to awareness campaigns and national cyber drills, the state is demonstrating what it means to move from Digital India to Secure India. The state’s forward-looking approach is now evolving into institutional innovation. Under the newly launched Madhya Pradesh Tech Policies, a Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Cybersecurity is being established to nurture innovation, R&D, and skill-building in collaboration with academia and the private sector. October, the month of cybersecurity awareness, thus serves as a reminder that behind every secure system lies a story of foresight. And in Madhya Pradesh, that story is being written today – one secure byte at a time. *(The views expressed by the author are personal.) Read More

Sreekumar NarayananChief Growth Officer, BNB Security & Automation solutions India’s core sector infrastructure is going through its most exciting and most vulnerable phase. Power plants, refineries, ports, airports, LNG terminals, metro systems, data centres, transmission networks and large logistics hubs are all becoming more digital, more connected and more automated. This brings huge efficiency gains. It also creates new kinds of risk that cannot be handled by ‘security teams’ alone. To protect these assets, India now needs a very different approach. Risk managers, security professionals, IT teams, OT engineers and behavioural scientists must work as one integrated ecosystem. Only then can we protect physical and digital assets, map human and machine activity intelligently and still respect the privacy of employees, visitors and citizens. This article explores why that convergence is necessary, what it looks like in practice and how organisations can move in that direction. What Makes Core Sector Infrastructure So Special? When we talk about core sector infrastructure, we mean assets like: These assets have three common features: 1. High impact A single incident – a fire in a refinery unit, a major substation outage, a pipeline leak, a cyber breach in a control room – can affect millions of people, cause environmental damage and disrupt the economy. 2. Converged environments Inside the same facility you will find: These are increasingly interconnected, which means a weakness in one layer can be exploited to affect the others. 3. Complex human ecosystems Employees, contract workers, shift technicians, drivers, seafarers, pilots, regulators, auditors, visitors and vendors all move through the same space. Their behaviour – deliberate or accidental – can create or reduce risk every day. Because of this, traditional siloed security (guards + cameras + fire alarms) is no longer enough. We need a joined-up approach that looks at risk from multiple angles. Why ‘Activity Mapping’ is the New Core of Protection Earlier, most security planning focused on assets – protect this transformer, guard that control room, fence this tank farm and so on. Today, the more powerful idea is to protect activities and flows around those assets. This includes how people, vehicles and materials move from gate to plant to storage and back; which digital commands go from control room to field devices and under what conditions; or what patterns of behaviour usually precede a safety incident, a leak, an outage or a cyber breach. This is called activity mapping – creating a consolidated, time-based picture of who/what did what, where, when and with which dependencies. Examples in a refinery or power plant: Done well, activity mapping turns raw logs into meaningful stories about how the plant is being used. That is the true foundation of modern asset protection. But this is only possible when: The Four Professional Worlds That Must Converge 1. Risk Management Risk professionals think in terms of Threats (what can go wrong?), Vulnerabilities (where are we weak?), Consequences (what happens if it goes wrong?), and Likelihood (how often might this happen?). In core sectors, they work with frameworks such as ISO 31000 (risk management), ISO 22301 (business continuity) and sector-specific safety standards. Their job in this new world is to: 2. Security (Physical + Cyber) Security teams bring expertise in Perimeter protection (barriers, bollards, fences), Surveillance (CCTV, video analytics, drones, thermal cameras), Access control (badges, biometrics, visitor management), and Cybersecurity (firewalls, endpoint protection, SIEM, incident response). In a converged environment they must: 3. IT (Information Technology) IT teams run data centres and cloud platforms, business networks (LAN/WAN/Wi-Fi) and identity systems, central logging, SIEM and analytics platforms, and endpoint management and patching. In the new model, they play three crucial roles: 4. OT (Operational Technology) OT engineers work with SCADA, DCS, PLCs, RTUs, field instruments; industrial networks (Modbus, Profibus, OPC, IEC 61850, etc.); Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS) and emergency shutdown; and maintenance and reliability systems. Traditionally, OT has been air-gapped and isolated. But with more remote monitoring, OEM support and integration with enterprise systems, that isolation is fading. OT’s role in convergence includes: Why Behavioural Science is the Missing Glue Most incidents in core sectors are still linked to human factors: This is where behavioural scientists and organisational psychologists become vital partners. They help in: Understanding ‘normal’ behaviour What is a typical shift pattern for a crane operator? How do technicians really bypass interlocks under pressure? Without this, analytics may treat normal workarounds as ‘suspicious’ or miss genuinely abnormal actions. Designing alerts that humans can handle If operators already see hundreds of alarms per hour in DCS, pushing another 50 ‘security alerts’ on another screen will create fatigue. Behavioural experts help design tiered alerts, colour coding, phrasing and escalation paths that humans can respond to meaningfully. Building a security and safety culture Training, communication, safety observations, peer feedback and leadership behaviours all shape how seriously people take risk. Behavioural science ensures these programmes are realistic, empathetic and grounded in how adults actually learn at work. Ethical use of monitoring If employees feel they are under constant surveillance, trust collapses. Behavioural inputs help design transparent, fair monitoring policies that focus on high-risk zones and actions, not micro-control of individuals. Technical Building Blocks for Converged Privacy-Aware Security While each site will be unique, certain technical building blocks are common across power plants, refineries, ports and data centres. Integrated Command and Control A modern Integrated Command & Control Centre (ICCC) or Security Operations Centre (SOC) brings together: The goal is not just to see more screens, but to build correlated views – ‘Gate 3 badge-in + vehicle number plate + route deviation + door forced in substation + unusual setpoint change in feeder panel’ becomes a single high-priority incident, not five unconnected alerts. Data Architecture and Event Correlation A typical data flow for activity mapping might look like: 1. Collection layer 2. Transport and storage 3. Correlation and analytics 4. Response orchestration OT Security Basics Even at a general level, there are some non-negotiable OT security practices: Privacy-by-Design in Monitoring and Analytics Since activity mapping deals with people as…

Body-worn cameras are increasingly being adopted in the transportation sector to enhance compliance and safety. Body-worn cameras (BWCs) improve traffic incident security and compliance by providing objective evidence of officer actions and civilian behaviour, deterring misconduct, and enhancing accountability for both officers and the public. In traffic scenarios, they capture the entire scenario scene-by-scene, witness interactions, and vehicle stops, creating a comprehensive record that can be used in prosecutions and to challenge false allegations through encrypted secured video evidence. This technology increases transparency, fosters public trust, and can lead to more consistent adherence to procedures, though some argue it may reduce officer discretion. Fixed monitoring usually covers important urban scenes, but is limited in scope. For the city as a whole, this means there will still be some blind spots. The Mobile Control System is tailored to solve this problem. The system consists of body-worn cameras for flexible and agile responses, enabling rapid deployment in emergency situations and where fixed monitoring is not available or feasible. The Smart Cities and Safe Cities require Mobile Control System in traffic management and security scenarios, in this regard Body-worn cameras are highly effective to serve the purpose of ensuring compliance, enforcement and security management. Here are some ways body-worn cameras are making a difference: Reducing violence and abuse: Studies have shown that body-worn cameras can lead to a significant reduction in staff assaults, with one study citing a 47% decrease. This deterrent effect helps create a safer working environment for transportation staff. Increasing transparency and accountability: Body-worn cameras provide an objective record of events, helping to resolve disputes and complaints in a fair and transparent manner. This increased accountability also promotes adherence to professional standards and ethical conduct. Enhancing evidence collection: High-quality video and audio footage captured by body-worn cameras can serve as valuable evidence in investigations and prosecutions, helping to ensure justice is served. Improving situational awareness: Body-worn cameras enable decision-makers to assess situations in real-time, allowing for more effective response strategies and enhanced safety for both staff and passengers. Hikvision Body-worn cameras offer bespoke features that are best suited for various application scenarios in traffic management, manned guarding and security petrol at toll collection points on highways. These body-worn cameras are designed to withstand harsh environments, including rain, snow, and dust, ensuring reliable performance in various conditions. Hikvision body-worn cameras capture high-definition video, often with features like pre/ post-recording, wide-angle lenses, and infrared capabilities for low-light situations. These body-worn cameras offer extended battery life, allowing staff to work for longer periods without needing to recharge. Body-worn camera applications traffic scenarios Evidence collection: Body-worn cameras capture video and audio of traffic stops, vehicle searches, and other encounters, providing a comprehensive record from the officer’s perspective. Deterrence: The presence of a body camera can deter misconduct by both officers and the public, reducing conflicts and promoting responsible behavior. Officer protection: The recorded footage serves as evidence against false accusations of misconduct or inappropriate behavior by citizens. Accountability: Body-worn cameras hold officers accountable by documenting their actions, which can then be reviewed for adherence to procedures. Transparency & public trust: By providing objective evidence, body-worn cameras enhance public confidence in law enforcement by demonstrating transparency and accountability in their operations. Impact on compliance Standardized procedures: The requirement to record interactions can lead to stricter adherence to traffic laws and departmental policies, as officers’ actions are subject to review. Reduced misconduct: Studies indicate that body cameras can lead to a reduction in excessive force complaints and other forms of misconduct. Challenging false allegations: The recorded footage offers objective proof that can be used to challenge baseless complaints and support legitimate complaints. Enhanced transport and traffic security Data security: Recorded footage is stored on secure device, requiring authorized user credential to access which ensures privacy and protect evidence. Enhanced incident response: In dynamic traffic situations, security personnel can remotely view live feeds from body-worn cameras to provide timely support and manage incidents more effectively. Improved investigations: The video and audio from body-worn cameras provide detailed and reliable evidence for investigations, ensuring swift and appropriate judicial responses. GPS coordinates: The GPS module in Hikvision’s Bodyworn cameras uploads each user’s location data to the command center in real time, so that command personnel can determine their location and patrol route. Efficient & secure data management: Live view & playback, alarm linkage, two-way audio, GIS, multi-level authority management HikCentral Professional, automatic charging and offloading when a BWC is connected to the dock station, Data encryption available following the AES-256 standard, tagged video footage locked and cannot be overwritten, only authorized personnel can access the footage , device assignment with ID verification via password, card, face recognition, and fingerprint, full control over access rights by assigning roles, responsibilities, and devices to security staff. Read More

Property managers and residents face mounting challenges in multi-site security management, remote access control, communication gaps, and balancing modern convenience with budget constraints. Cloud-based solutions are revolutionizing how residential properties address these universal pain points. Sarah’s phone buzzed at 2 AM. As the property manager for three residential complexes across different cities, she’d grown accustomed to latenight emergencies. This time, it was a locked-out tenant at the downtown apartment building – and Sarah was 50 miles away at home. Meanwhile, across town, the Chen family was dealing with their own frustration – their 8-year-old son had forgotten his key again, and they were tired of constantly worrying about missed visitor calls while at work. These scenarios play out thousands of times daily across apartment buildings. Whether you’re a property manager juggling multiple sites or a resident seeking convenience and security, certain pain points seem universal. This blog will explore the worries plaguing both sides, and discover how modern cloud-based management solutions are transforming residential property operations. The property manager’s dilemma: Efficiency meets complexity Managing multiple residential properties can often feel like playing three-dimensional chess blindfolded. Traditional systems require expensive on-site servers for each location, dedicated IT staff, and complex VPN setups. There are also significant challenges to working remotely. Property managers often need the flexibility to work from anywhere, yet most conventional access control and video intercom systems chain them to physical locations. Emergencies, especially, don’t wait for business hours, and tenants expect immediate responses regardless of time or location. The resident’s reality: Convenience vs. security trade-offs The same limitations are felt by many residents who have become used to the convenience of modern technologies. Every resident, after all, has experienced that sinking feeling of patting empty pockets while standing at their apartment door. Equally frustrating is missing important calls. Whether it’s a food delivery, emergency services, or a family visiting unexpectedly, conventional intercom systems tie communication to physical presence. Despite these increasing expectations, not every resident has the same budget or renovation flexibility. Young professionals, for example, might prioritize smartphone integration over traditional wall-mounted units, while families with elderly members may prefer more familiar, traditional interfaces. The ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach of many systems often leaves some people unsatisfied. Installation concerns add another layer of complexity. Many residents hesitate to damage finished walls for hardwired systems, especially in rental properties where modifications may violate lease agreements. The cloud-based solution: Hik-Connect 6 transforms residential management Modern cloud-based management platforms like Hikvision’s Hik-Connect 6 address these challenges with unified, scalable solutions that serve both property managers and residents effectively. Sarah’s phone buzzed at 2 AM. As the property manager for three residential complexes across different cities, she’d grown accustomed to late-night emergencies. This time, it was a locked-out tenant at the downtown apartment building – and Sarah was 50 miles away at home. Meanwhile, across town, the Chen family was dealing with their own frustration – their 8-year-old son had forgotten his key again, and they were tired of constantly worrying about missed visitor calls while at work Streamlined multi-site operations Instead of maintaining separate servers and IT infrastructure for each property, cloud-based systems centralize management through a single platform. Property managers can monitor multiple residential complexes, create site hierarchies, and handle visitor access from anywhere with internet connectivity. The cost savings are immediate and substantial. Elimination of on-site servers, reduced IT maintenance, and simplified deployment processes translate to better profit margins and more resources for tenant services. Remote management empowers virtual concierge services Cloud-based platforms enable property managers to function as virtual concierge services. They can receive and handle calls from any location through a mobile app. Advanced features such as temporary PIN codes and QR code access, allow proactive visitor management. Rather than reactive problem-solving, managers can create seamless experiences for expected visitors while maintaining security protocols. Such systems enable property managers to create temporary credentials in advance for scheduled visitors and vehicles – visitors can enter using PIN codes or by scanning QR codes, while visitor vehicles can be automatically recognized by ANPR cameras at entry points, providing both convenience and security. Customized camera resource management Different residents receive tailored monitoring permissions based on their location and needs. For instance, residents in Unit 1, Floor 1 can access different video footage for preview and playback compared to residents in Unit 2, Floor 2. This granular approach ensures that each unit’s residents have appropriate monitoring privileges aligned with their specific security requirements and building layout. System reliability and stability assurance The most robust configurations utilize wired connections between indoor stations and door stations via Ethernet cables, with a PoE power supply for both indoor stations and doorbells. The entire intercom system operates on UPS backup power, ensuring uninterrupted service even during power outages. Door stations with 4G routers maintain cloud connectivity and direct-to-app communication, minimizing maintenance requirements and system downtime. Flexible resident solutions Modern systems accommodate different resident preferences and budgets. Tech-savvy residents can manage everything through smartphone apps – receiving calls, viewing common area cameras, and controlling access – without wall modifications. Traditional families, meanwhile, can continue using familiar indoor stations while benefiting from cloud connectivity. Enhanced security and accountability Cloud-based systems provide comprehensive logging and forensic capabilities that traditional systems simply cannot match. Every call, access event, and system interaction create a digital record accessible for security investigations or operational analysis. This transparency benefits everyone – property managers gain valuable insights into usage patterns and security trends, while residents enjoy the peace of mind from knowing their building’s security systems are both modern and accountable. As residential properties evolve toward smart building status, the divide between property manager needs and resident expectations continues to narrow. Cloud-based systems and AI-driven automation are at the forefront of these changes, with technology adoption standing out among the defining property management trends of 2025[1]. Cloud-based management platforms such as Hikvision’s Hik-Connect 6 represent more than technological upgrades – they’re operational philosophies that prioritize flexibility, efficiency, and user experience. For property managers tired…