The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has reportedly chalked out a Rs 4.50 billion plan to develop a secure communications network to be used by the government.

Of this, Rs 3 billion would be spent on establishing a fixed and wireless communication system for high security of classified government communication, Rs 1 billion would be for operational expenditure for the next five years and Rs 0.50 billion will be spent on research and development.

It is believed that the government wants to ensure that no official communication goes outside the country and wants all such traffic to be routed through the National Internet Exchange of India (NIXI).

In its latest report, DoT states, ?Many email and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) users in India rely on services of foreign origin. All communications made through these services can be accessed by the government of other countries, where the servers for providing these services are hosted, by invoking the provisions of their laws.?

The report adds, ?Substantial amounts of intra-government communication are classified. The security of this communication has to be ensured by an alternative mechanism, as it is neither advisable to wait for such a mandating and capacity building nor is it appropriate to rely on the level of security provided by such a scheme as communication would still remain in the open domain of the Internet.?