Visakhapatnam: Group coordinator (Cybersecurity), ministry of electronics and information technology (MeitY) Savita Utreja has said India recorded over 20 lakh cybersecurity incidents in 2024, largely due to improper software coding.

Speaking at a seminar on ‘secure software development lifecycle practices towards building software with security by design thinking’ organised at GITAM here on Tuesday, she noted that the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) has been designated as the national agency to respond to cyber incidents.

Further, Savita Utreja observed that cyberattacks are becoming more sophisticated, targeting large organisations, small businesses and individuals alike and advised adopting secure software development lifecycle (SSDLC) practices to safeguard users and digital assets.

Jointly organised by MeitY, C-DAC, and IIT Bhilai, the seminar saw experts stressed that embedding security into software from the design stage is critical to counter the rapidly growing cyber threats in the digital era.

They warned that insecure software development and emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence are significantly increasing the risk and scale of cyberattacks.

IIIT Hyderabad director Sandeep Kumar Shukla highlighted the growing threat of supply chain attacks, where hackers exploit less secure third-party vendors or compromised software updates, as seen in the SolarWinds incident, to infiltrate well-protected organisations.

C-DAC Hyderabad Centre head P R Lakshmi Eswari said rapid AI advancements are intensifying cyber threats, making it vital to design security into software from the outset rather than relying on post-deployment fixes.

C-DAC Scientist ‘E’ N. Satyanarayana, seminar convener K Naveen Kumar, CSE department head K Tirupathi Rao and others participated in the discussions.