Face The Book Of Digital Monopolies: Why India Must Develop Swadeshi Apps

Article first published in Outlook at https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/opinion-time-to-end-digital-monopolies-and-promote-indian-apps-for-atmanirbhar-bharat/358971?utm_content=buffer925b4&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer

Now that the bugle call of Atmanirbhar Bharat has been raised, one has to put money where the mouth is and start supporting the Indian apps. It is high time that the government and public institutions chart out a glide path away from digital monopolies that are not completely under the control of the Republic of India.

Jaijit Bhattacharya19 August 2020

Representational image

What are digital monopolies and why are they so dangerous? A digital monopoly, as the name says, is a monopoly of any service in the online universe. An online monopoly derives its monopolistic behaviour from a phenomenon called the Network Effect. It follows a principle in electrical engineering called the Metcalfe’s law that essentially says that the value of a network grows exponentially with each addition to that network.

Translating this to digital monopolies, if you are not on Facebook, then your joining Facebook will not increase its value by 1, but will add value to the Facebook network in an exponential fashion since you can now connect with not one person on Facebook, but with hundreds and thousands of people. So, if you are given a choice of joining a digital platform where you can connect with hundreds of your friends and acquaintances versus joining a new platform where you can connect with perhaps ten or less of your friends, what will you join? Clearly you will join the platform where you can connect with more people. This is a simple game theoretic outcome. So, you and everyone else, will gravitate to two or three such platforms, which will transform into the nerve centre for influencing society. This is Network Effect.

The question that arises is how does Network Effect make such platforms dangerous? Why is a company that has, say monopoly over salt distribution, not considered to be dangerous? The reason why such digital monopolies are dangerous is because they continue to largely operate outside the jurisdiction of the sovereign government. Any issue that is brought up to their local representative office is answered with an excuse that the local office is a different company that is not responsible for content. It is the parent company, sitting outside the borders of the nation, that is responsible for the content, and the sovereign government has limited jurisdiction over the parent entity.

However, what makes them even more dangerous is that they derive their powers directly from the people. They are possibly more powerful than the government in the area they operate in. Imagine the government coming down heavily on violations by these digital monopolies which include not just Facebook but Google, Amazon, Twitter etc. Let’s say, hypothetically, the government found that Facebook is working against the interest of the nation and asks Facebook to stop operating in India. Such a decision would disrupt humongous amount of commerce in India, would impact MSME’s who do business through Facebook, disrupt communication as Facebook-owned Whatsapp would also have to stop operating and there would be a massive pushback from the people who are addicted to the new opium of social media. Or if one stops Google, millions of taxi drivers of cab aggregator companies will become jobless without the location service. Such is the power of the Digital monopolies, which is why I had coined the term “Technological Sovereignty” more than a decade and a half ago, as the government does not just lose sovereignty to another country but to a company (rings a bell with how one of the most profitable companies in human history, The East India Company, started off?).

Hence, one should look at the recent controversy on Facebook that erupted based on an article in the American newspaper, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) “Facebook’s Hate-Speech Rules Collide With Indian Politics”, through this lens. The headline has an interesting focus – it focuses on Facebook’s meddling with Indian politics and hence with the will of the people. This is an extremely dangerous phenomenon. The power of narrative, which stitches a story based on selective data points, can strongly influence decision making of people to extreme levels. If one recollects the havoc that was played out by the game “Blue Whale” that pushed teenagers and young adults to commit suicide by playing with their thought process and judgement. And the algorithms have since been improved manifolds with massive increase in computing power and with dollops of funds flowing into the science of mind control through data.

It is not shocking anymore that voters can be manipulated to vote in a certain manner en masse, based on the manipulations through the social media platforms, which not only know who your friends are and what your opinion is on a browser, but knows your deepest desires based on the messages you are sharing on your mobile phone (in case of Facebook, they control Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram, giving them insight to not only what you are posting, but also what your children and close relatives are posting). It was not long ago that the main opposition party in India was accused of collaborating with Cambridge Analytica, a UK-based entity, that received data from Facebook to go around the globe helping political parties use the personal data to win elections (it is another story that the opposition party did not win the elections).

Now is the turn of the ruling party to face the heat of standing to gain from the actions, or more accurately the inactions of Facebook on a hate comment allegedly posted by one of its MLA’s from Telangana. The said MLA has come out with his side of the story that his Facebook page had been hacked two years ago in 2018, and he had filed a complaint at that time that supposedly blocked his page. However, the accusations on Facebook made by WSJ are grave accusations. The WSJ article says that Facebook detected that the postings on the page of the said politician were offensive, but took the call of not removing them as the person was from the ruling party. It demonstrates how Facebook has abrogated the power to decide what information to be provided to people, and what needs to be filtered out, and this decision is not based on any ethics or morality, but based on the sole motive of profit maximization (again reminds us of the arbitrary rules that were imposed by the East India Company, albeit, Facebook is no East India Company, but handing over the probity of running a nation to a company, even if it is in small parts, is a highly dangerous situation to be in, as the precedents in history tell us).

It is also interesting to note that the newspaper that brought out the so-called expose, runs a paid online site, where one can read the full news article only after paying. What is visible on the site, without making any payments, is a highly sensationalized byte which says “In Facebook posts and public appearances, Indian politician T. Raja Singh has said Rohingya Muslim immigrants should be shot, called Muslims traitors and threatened to raze mosques.” It serves to catch attention, pique the interest and let the issue spread like wildfire in India, which offers one of the largest online catchments of readers in the world. It would be interesting to know how many more paid readers did WSJ manage to garner with this sensationalised news article, that hits a raw nerve in India.

To conclude, one has to note the actors in this rather sordid saga – it has the Wall Street Journal and Facebook and we still do not know what the facts are as Facebook has denied that it had deliberately not removed the alleged hate speech. Neither WSJ, nor Facebook are under the jurisdiction of the Republic of India. Their interests in India do not go beyond their revenue maximization goals. They neither have their families in India, nor have any plans to move to India. If India burns due to riots (as we saw happening in Bangalore recently where allegedly a tweet led to instant riots), it does not affect them, unless it leads to advertisement revenues going down. Unfortunately, with every such event, more people join these platforms out of curiosity, contributing to a vicious cycle.

Having noted the issue, one cannot take a luddite stance either of breaking everything that is not under our control. But, when the political framework of the country is under threat, it is equally surprising to see the Election Commission, the temple of India’s democracy, endorsing a platform such as Facebook. Now that the bugle call of Atmanirbhar Bharat has been raised, one has to put money where the mouth is and start supporting these Indian apps. If user base is an issue, there are established Indian apps such as Sharechat with over 250 million users, Hike messenger with over 100 million users and others, which are as sizable as Facebook’s user base in India.

It is high time that the government and public institutions chart out a glide path away from digital monopolies that are not completely under the control of the Republic of India. This is crucial from the perspective of national security and technological sovereignty.

(The author is president, Centre for Digital Economy Policy Research. Views expressed are personal.)

एप्स पर प्रतिबंध से चीनी कंपनियों को लगा तगड़ा झटका वहीं अन्य देश भी भारत की राह पर चल सकते हैं

 First Published in Dainik Jagaran at https://m-jagran-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/m.jagran.com/lite/editorial/apnibaat-ban-on-apps-will-give-big-blow-to-chinese-companies-while-other-countries-can-also-follow-path-of-india-20463280.html?usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D&amp_js_v=0.1#aoh=15979378046333&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.jagran.com%2Feditorial%2Fapnibaat-ban-on-apps-will-give-big-blow-to-chinese-companies-while-other-countries-can-also-follow-path-of-india-20463280.html

देर से उठाया गया दुरुस्त कदम

[ जयजित भट्टाचार्य ]: सोमवार को भारत सरकार ने 59 चीनी मोबाइल एप्स पर प्रतिबंध लगा दिया। इस प्रतिबंध के पीछे डाटा सुरक्षा और निजता जैसे पहलुओं को वजह बताया जा रहा है, मगर यह मसला तो गूगल, फेसबुक और ट्विटर के साथ भी है। फिर उन्हेंं क्यों बख्श दिया गया? स्पष्ट है यह कवायद केवल डाटा सुरक्षा और निजता को ध्यान में रखकर ही नहीं की गई। यह आवरण केवल कुछ अंतराराष्ट्रीय परंपराओं का सम्मान करने के लिहाज से डाला गया है। इसका मकसद तो चीन को सख्त संदेश देना है।

एप्स पर प्रतिबंध: चीन की बिलबिलाहट से साफ है कि मोदी का निशाना एकदम सटीक जगह लगा

वास्तव में चीनी एप तो हमेशा से सरकार के निशाने पर रहे, लेकिन सीमा पर चीन के साथ हालिया तनाव के बाद सरकार ने आखिरकार ट्रिगर दबा ही दिया। चूंकि चीन अब प्रमुख रूप से एक व्यापारिक देश है और भारत उसके उत्पादों का एक अहम बाजार तो अपने एप्स पर प्रतिबंध के फैसले को लेकर चीन की बिलबिलाहट से साफ है कि सरकार का निशाना एकदम सटीक जगह लगा है।

चीन पर दोहरी चोट

वास्तव में यह चीन के लिए दोहरी चोट है। भारत के इस कदम से जहां चीन की दिग्गज टेक कंपनियों की वैश्विक महत्वाकांक्षाओं को तगड़ा झटका लगेगा वहीं तमाम दूसरे देश भी भारत की तर्ज पर चीनी कंपनियों से पीछा छुड़ा सकते हैं। अमेरिका द्वारा मंगलवार को हुआवे और जेटीई जैसी चीनी कंपनियों को राष्ट्रीय सुरक्षा के लिए खतरा बताना इसी रुझान की पुष्टि करता है।

चीन का रवैया हमेशा से संदिग्ध रहा

मोदी सरकार का यह कदम बिल्कुल सही है। वास्तव में यह तो काफी पहले ही हो जाना चाहिए था। हम कम से कम बीते एक दशक से इसकी दुहाई देते आए हैं कि सरकार को देश के व्यापक हितों में विदेशी तकनीकी पर निर्भरता कम करनी चाहिए। यदि वह तकनीक चीन जैसे देश की हो तो हमें और सतर्क रहने की जरूरत है। चीन का रवैया हमेशा से संदिग्ध रहा है। अतीत में मंगोलिया से लेकर तिब्बत और शिनजियांग तक उसका अतिक्रमण और वर्तमान में भी तमाम देशों के साथ तकरार उसकी विस्तारवादी बदनीयती को ही जाहिर करता है।

दुनिया की सबसे बड़ी ताकत बनने के लालच में चीन अनुचित नीतियों का सहारा ले रहा

दुनिया की सबसे बड़ी ताकत बनने के लालच में वह अनुचित नीतियों का सहारा ले रहा है। इसमें नई तकनीक और एप्स उसके हथियार बनते दिख रहे हैं। बीते दिनों ऑस्ट्रेलिया पर हुआ साइबर हमला इसकी मिसाल है। यह हमला प्रायोगिक तौर पर किया गया ताकि चीन अपनी क्षमताओं को भांप सके कि कैसे वह एक गोली दागे बिना अपने प्रतिद्वंद्वी देश को घुटनों के बल पर ला सके। चीन ने इसमें महारत हासिल कर ली है और वह अपनी इन क्षमताओं को लगातार धार भी देता जा रहा है।

भविष्य की लड़ाइयां तकनीकी मोर्चे पर लड़ी जाएंगी

तमाम सामरिक विश्लेषकों का मानना है कि भविष्य की लड़ाइयां तकनीकी मोर्चे पर लड़ी जाएंगी। कोई देश अपने दुश्मन देश की बिजली व्यवस्था को छिन्न-भिन्न कर उसे लचर बना सकता है। दुश्मन देश के लड़ाकू विमानों की उड़ान को ही प्रभावित कर सकता है। सैन्य रसद को पहुंचाने में गतिरोध उत्पन्न कर सकता है। तब बड़ी से बड़ी सेना भी उपयोगी नहीं हो सकती। इसे संभव बनाने में निजी जानकारियां बहुत उपयोगी होती हैं जिन्हेंं एप के जरिये चुराया जा सकता है।

ईरान में तो परमाणु ठिकाने पर तकनीकी दक्षता से तोड़फोड़ तक करा दी गई

यह सही है कि सेना और अन्य संवेदनशील विभागों में तमाम एप्स प्रतिबंधित हैं, लेकिन उनके मित्र और स्वजन तो उन्हेंं इस्तेमाल कर सकते हैं। इसमें सेंधमारी कहीं से भी हो सकती है। सूचनाएं जुटाकर किसी को लुभाकर या मजबूर कर राष्ट्रीय हितों को क्षति पहुंचाई जा सकती है। यह एक तरह से मिनी हनीट्रैप जैसा ही मामला है। बीते दिनों बांग्लादेश में एक बैंक से बड़ी रकम इसी तरह निकाली गई, जिसके बारे में अभी तक कोई सुराग नहीं मिला है। ईरान में तो परमाणु ठिकाने पर तकनीकी दक्षता से तोड़फोड़ तक करा दी गई।

संवेदनशील सूचनाएं जुटाने के मामले में एप भेदिये का काम करता है

संवेदनशील सूचनाएं जुटाने के मामले में एप किसी भेदिये का काम करते हैं। पुराने जमाने में किले बहुत मजबूत बनाए जाते थे, लेकिन कोई न कोई भेदिया उन किलों को भी ध्वस्त करा देता था। ये एप भी कुछ ऐसे ही हैं। ऐसे में हमें अपना सुरक्षा घेरा और सशक्त बनाना होगा जिसमें सबसे पहला कदम तो इनसे छुटकारा पाना ही है। फिर हमें अपना मोर्चा मजबूत बनाना है। याद रखें कि इस दौर में तकनीकी संप्रभुता भी भौगोलिक एवं राजनीतिक संप्रभुता जितनी ही महत्वपूर्ण है। हमें इस मामले में कोई ढिलाई नहीं करनी होगी।

खोजडॉटकॉम गूगल के संसाधनों के सामने फुस्स हो गया

भारत सरकार ने भले ही 59 चीनी एप्स प्रतिबंधित कर दिए हों, लेकिन यदि एपल स्टोर और गूगल एंड्रॉयड प्ले स्टोर इन्हेंं अपने प्लेटफॉर्म से हटाने को राजी नहीं होते तब सरकार क्या करती? ऐसे में तकनीकी रूप से संप्रभु कौन होता? एपल और गूगल जैसी कंपनियां या भारत सरकार? हमें यह स्थिति बदलनी होगी। इसके लिए सरकारी प्रोत्साहन आवश्यक ही नहीं, बल्कि अनिवार्य होगा। हमने काफी पहले ही कुछ पहल की थीं, लेकिन सरकारी सहयोग के अभाव में वे फलीभूत नहीं हो पाईं। जैसे गूगल का मुकाबला करने के लिए 2007 में हमने खोजडॉटकॉम जैसा दांव चला जो गूगल के संसाधनों के सामने फुस्स हो गया। यह उस समय की बात है जब चीन में गूगल के विकल्प बायडू का अंकुर भी नहीं फूटा था। इस दौरान चीन कहां से कहां पहुंच गया।

वॉट्सएप पर दंगों से लेकर हिंसक भीड़ के हमले और चुनावों को प्रभावित करने तक के आरोप लगे 

एप्स से जुड़े जोखिमों को देखते हुए कुछ समय पहले वॉट्सएप जैसे मैसेजिंग एप को लेकर भी सवाल उठे थे। सरकार की सख्ती के बाद उसने कुछ बदलाव कर सहयोग किया है, फिर भी हमें एहतियात बरतने की जरूरत है, क्योंकि वॉट्सएप पर दंगों से लेकर हिंसक भीड़ के हमले और चुनावों को प्रभावित करने तक के आरोप लगे हैं। चूंकि वह अमेरिकी कंपनी फेसबुक का एप है तो उसके लिए हमारा नजरिया अलग है। इसका कारण यह है कि अमेरिका से हमें कोई खतरा नहीं दिखता, जबकि चीन समय-समय पर हमारे लिए चुनौती पेश करता आया है।

चीन को जवाब देने के लिए सरकार ने उसके संदिग्ध एप्स पर किया प्रहार 

चीन को जवाब देने के लिए सरकार ने उसके संदिग्ध एप्स पर जो प्रहार किया है उसका लाभ तभी मिल पाएगा जब वह उनके विकल्प तैयार करने के लिए देसी उद्यमियों और इनोवेटर्स को प्रोत्साहन देकर एक आदर्श परिवेश तैयार करे। इस सिलसिले में शेयर चैट, चिंगारी, जोहो मीटिंग, एयरमीट और जुप-पीओएस जैसे तमाम नाम सामने आए हैं। यदि इन्हेंं सरकार और यूजर्स का समर्थन मिले तो ये न केवल देश, बल्कि वैश्विक स्तर पर भी सफलता के झंडे गाड़ सकते हैं।

( लेखक सेंटर फॉर डिजिटल इकोनॉमी पॉलिसी रिसर्च के प्रेसिडेंट हैं )

With App Ban, India Has Fired First Salvo In Trade War With China. How Can Dragon Retaliate?

Story first appeared in Outlook magazine at https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/opinion-with-app-ban-india-has-fired-first-salvo-in-trade-war-with-china-how-can-dragon-retaliate/356169

Even though Beijing has been indulging in a low-intensity trade war for over a decade, with rampant dumping of state subsidised products, it is only recently that India took the first big overt step towards this regard.

With the banning of 59 Chinese mobile apps, the first salvo in the trade war between India and China has officially been fired by New Delhi. Even though Beijing has been indulging in a low-intensity trade war for over a decade, with rampant dumping of state subsidised products, it is only recently that India took the first big overt step towards this regard. However, the question that needs to be answered is why has China not upped the ante on the digital trade war by stopping selected imports from India? And what will China do to retaliate against apps ban, which the government says poses a threat to country’s security.

The answer to that question lies in the nature of trade between India and China. It is no secret that India largely exports raw materials to China and China provides value-added finished products to India. India’s exports to China consists of cotton yarn, which account for 12.17 per cent of total exports to the country, followed by iron ores and concentrates, including refined copper and copper alloys which account for 10.53 per cent and 6.98 per cent of exports respectively. India’s exports to China largely comprise of ores, slag and ash, iron and steel, plastics, organic chemicals, and cotton.

Indian imports from China consist of high value-added products including electronics, home products, construction material, phones, telecom equipment and so on.

This is the same trade template that was followed by the East India Company once it had political control over India, and it promptly went on to destroy the weaving industry in order to eliminate competition to low quality, large-scale textile coming from Britain. So, India would provide the raw materials for textiles and eventually for other products and, in return, would import low quality finished goods. In such a trade template, the trading partner that cuts off import of raw materials will be hit harder than the trading partner that is cutting off import of finished goods.

In the context of apps, stopping the import of digital offerings, i.e apps which only have entertainment value, will have the least impact on downstream value chain. Of course, there will be some job loss in terms of those who provided content and the operational jobs, but it would not be a deep fundamental impact. Moreover, it is exactly what China did more than a decade ago to digital offerings from the West, that included Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, etc. and allowed domestic firms to rip-off the Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) of these digital offerings and make local versions with additional local features. These local firms—Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba, Bytedance, etc. have now turned into global predatory digital companies and have continued their practice of scant regard for IPR in the local markets where they operate. 

Now if India stops the import of APIs needed for drug manufacturing, then it would be a different story, as it would decimate the entire Indian pharma industry and cause pain to the general public. So, in the short run, India will find it difficult to stop imports of raw materials such as APIs.

By the same token, China will find it difficult to stop raw material imports from India, unless they can be replaced by imports from another country.

And that is the conundrum that China faces. Over the years, it has crafted a mighty wall of non-tariff trade barriers which are daunting for anyone who does not bring in IPR into their offerings. So, largely companies who were willing to let go off their IPR, through forced joint ventures with local Chinese partners, were allowed access to the Chinese market. It was as late at April 2018 that China finally removed restrictions on foreign automobile companies to have more than 50 per cent ownership of their operations in China. But then again, it was too little, too late, as by then, Chinese companies had leached out all the IPR of these foreign auto companies. Therefore, India’s IT and pharmaceutical companies have a mere toehold in China, as they do not bring in any differentiating IPR and have had to face the gauntlet of China’s mighty protectionist wall. Hence, even the initial Indian IT companies which were allowed to set base were more into training such as NIIT, which essentially makes it a raw material supplier.

So, Indian exporters kept hitting the wall of non-tariff trade barriers in China in their attempts to enter the Chinese market with value-added products. Such trade barriers include lack of information on customs procedures; imposition of excessive customs and other levies with frequent rate changes; complex customs valuation procedure; absence of a specified nodal agency; lack of transparency regarding technical standards; differentiated testing norms for imported and domestic products; unfamiliarity with regard to provincial rules and regulations; and frequent change in policies without any advance information.

The outcome is that China is largely an importer of raw materials from India, and hence, cutting off any supply from India will actually hit its own industries. And since China has rapidly and successfully antagonised almost all its trading partners, with Australia being the latest, it will find it difficult to replace these Indian imports with that of another country. Not that this will stop China from taking a mis-adventurous step in the trade war.

Thus, it would be interesting to see what retaliatory steps China takes in the trade tangle. With wriggle room limited for the Dragon, can it take real retaliatory steps? That brings the thought that a Tiger is real, a Dragon is not.

India-Australia Cybersecurity cooperation in context of deteriorating ge...

Need to achieve Technological sovereignty

First published in https://stratnewsglobal.com/technological-sovereignty-and-how-india-lacks-it/

 

Sovereignty is one of the cornerstones for ensuring the security of the country and ensures that India as a nation can stand up to pressures from other nations. Sovereignty is critical to ensure our economic independence.

As India moves into occupying the space of an IT superpower, the ability of the ICT industry to provide the requisite technologies reliably for civilian requirements and for military requirements, needs to be significantly enhanced. The issue is compounded with the fact that India has limited presence at the high-stake tables of Digital standards. Standards has turned out to be a major stumbling block in the quest for technological sovereignty. Given that India, as of now, appears to have limited presence at the global forums on international digital standards, we appear to be abdicating our responsibility to secure our IT and digital industry as well as IT usage. This situation has very deep implications on our economy and our defence preparedness.

With the lack of control over the technological layers, Indian economy and defense institutions will be challenged to protect the nation from Cyberwarfare.

More importantly, military hardware itself could be subject to intrusions and control by adversaries, thanks to the increased “intelligence” of the equipment.

Given that tactical initiatives on the ground need to be backed up with complex supply chain which are increasingly dependent on critical information infrastructure such as Railways Signaling, telecommunications network etc, the entire economy and military strategy could be threatened by compromising the critical information infrastructure which has non-authenticated ICT components.

With the same “ICT intrusions”, the Financial Infrastructure of the country can be brought down, impacting the ability of the military to sustain a conventional warfare.

The impact on Network Centric Warfare is also obvious.

Thus, it is imperative that we move towards digital ecosystem which provides greater control over the digital infrastructure.

More importantly, imagine the impact on the economy in general, and the defence logistics in particular, if the “.in” Top Level Domain (TLD) is deleted from the Internet root servers. Such a move would cripple the economy and severely restrict the ability of the Indian defence forces to respond to a strategic situation. It would be worthwhile to mention at this stage that India has minimal control, if not no control, over the root servers. In other words, India has no technological sovereignty over the theatre where cyber warfare gets played out. Thus, an obvious way forward for India as a nation is to build the ecosystem of technological sovereignty which will strengthen its capability.

There is also an increased threat to Technological Sovereignty from Digital Monopolies that control vast amounts of data pertaining to the country, the citizens and the businesses. It is important to address the threat to Technological Sovereignty from Digital Monopolies. This is especially true of Digital Utilities that are widespread, are ubiquitously used and that benefit from network effect an hence become natural monopolies. Since these Digital Utilities operate in an over-the-top manner, where they ride on regulated utilities but the apps themselves are unregulated, they pose a significant threat to India’s security and internal law and order. Digital monopolies that are originate from nations that pose themselves in an adversarial manner to India’s interests are especially worrisome. Among the top 20 apps used in India, one can easily identify TikTok, Likee, UC Browser, Helo, VMate ans ShareIT as apps that are present in most phones in India and that could easily by used to create inimical situations for India.

The impact of polices, regulatory frameworks and standards on technology sovereignty is critical for the growth of the Digital economy as well as the larger economy linked to the digital economy. Digital Economy permeates into all aspects of a modern society, from agriculture to education to health and industry. Therefore, it is imperative to have an appropriate policy framework for technology sovereignty, especially for the Digital Economy. India would need to gain technologies that are not necessarily Frontier Technologies but are critical from the perspective of Technological Sovereignty.

 

Scenarios of Covid recovery and path to growth

China Virus and its impact on Digital Economy

First published in StratNews Global https://stratnewsglobal.com/china-virus-and-its-impact-on-digital-economy/

As the China virus globally ravages people’s lives and the economy, and as more than 50% of the people on this planet are in a lockdown, the virus has had a deep impact on the digital economy. For starters, people have moved towards a more digital approach to work and life. A cultural change that would have required atleast a decade, if not more, has happened in a few weeks’ time.

As per Forbes, by March 25, internet usage had gone up by 70% in US. And this is mostly a pre-lockdown stage data. As per Ookla, the internet speed-test company, except for China, all countries had a significant dip in either their mobile internet speeds or their fixed line internet speeds or both, as more people suddenly started consuming more bandwidth. This shows the massive uptake of online activities post global lockdown.

The data also shows that perhaps China was already well prepared for the virus as it is the only country whose mobile internet and fixed line internet speeds actually went up considerably.  

Students (millennials) are now getting lessons online, which also implies that whenever they start going to school, and the school shuts for unforeseen reasons such as heat wave or pollution, students will continue with their classes online from home, seamlessly. The same applies to many professions and life in general, where online meetings, online business deals, online trainings, online concerts and webinars have all become much more acceptable. 

This is the shift that has led to increase of internet data consumption. Interestingly, the Internet Protocol was developed in a manner that it could survive a nuclear attack, where the internet gets splintered and can still function. Its robustness and reliability is now getting tested under a different kind of attack – a biological virus attack. Thankfully, the internet is being able to largely scale up, inspite of the significant increase in data consumption, thanks to all the video streaming applications such as software web conferencing to streaming movies and series.

The data usage is also reflected in the stock prices. Stock prices of software web conferencing company, Zoom, went up by 2.5 times since the pandemic started, and then dipped on revelations of the company routing calls and user data to China. Zoom was founded by a Chinese American. 

The crisis has also led to growth of other web conferencing software providers including recent startups such as Loom. There is an increased usage of document signing solutions such as DocuSign and HelloSign, whose usage is up by 5x. Even open source solutions such as FalsiScan has had a significant jump in usage. In fact most SAAS (cloud hosted) offerings has seen an uptick in usage.

However, the impact on hardware manufacturers, has been to say the least, hard. In India alone, mobile handset manufacturers stare at a Rs 15,000 crore production loss. There is similar impact on laptop and PC manufacturers. Atleast 2 month’s worth of sales has been impacted, and there is more expected due to the economy having an overall -5% to -6% contraction, accompanied with significant job losses. Needless to say, the stocks of hardware manufacturers globally is significantly down.

There has been similar losses for software companies that do not have SAAS based offerings, that is, their offerings are not hosted on cloud. It is ofcourse expected as with reduced sale of hardware, software sales will also have an impact.

However, one class of apps that are not tracked, and have shown significant uptake, are the predatory apps such as Bigo Live, Likee, TikTok etc. Bigo Live is a live streaming app that has recruiters hiring young women from across India and encourages them to titillate viewers at a cost and takes a high share of money that is earned. Likee is a similar app and both are Chinese origin with the money getting sucked out to China. TikTok is already banned by the US military but has proliferated even more during the lockdown. They pose myriad challenges, including potential honey-trapping in the military and violation of RBI norms.

But the hardest impact of the China virus has been the exacerbation of the digital divide. Those who are digitally enabled, are able to continue with their lives and their livelihoods in a significantly better manner than those who are not digitally enabled. Thus students who have access to the digital infrastructure, are continuing with their education as opposed to students in large parts of India, Africa and other places, who do not necessarily have the requisite digital infrastructure. Similarly, many of the white collared workers who are digitally enabled, are continuing to be productive, whereas blue collared workers are facing the prospects of loss of income and livelihood. The virus is ripping apart the social fabric which will have a deeper impact on the global economy in future, as the digital have-nots will not be able to compete in future due to lack of access, leading to lack of appropriate skills.

Managing businesses in the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic

First Published by IIM Calcutta Innovation Park in http://www.iimcip.org/resource/entrepreneur-speaks-7/

We are going through unprecedented times, where the COVID-19 virus has brought our economy, our businesses and our way of life down to our knees. It has disrupted supply chains, demolished demand in short term, evaporated jobs, especially blue collared jobs, decimated balance sheets and fundamentally changed how employees work and interact.

However, it has also provided multiple opportunities. It has provided the opportunity to become significantly more efficient by adopting techniques such as WFH (Work From Home) in a more permanent bases, and its collateral benefit of Reduced Travel as the acceptability of closing deals through video conferencing has gone up. It would not only reduce cost of doing business, but also save commute time and reduce carbon footprint of businesses. Which also means that there will be a long-term effect on airlines as they would face a reduced demand even after the pandemic is over.

The question really is, how do businesses and startups manage this pandemic. TO being with, each business should form a coordinating body or what I would prefer to call a War room that will address immediate challenges such as employee morale, cash flow management, customer/ client outreach and ensuring business continuity. It would also work out the modalities for post lockdown working protocols. No company should immediately get all its employees coming to office, especially critical employees, since if they get infected, it will impact the company significantly. Rostering systems need to be worked out so that the same batch of employees come at the same time and do not mix up with another batch of employees.

The war room would then need to address near-term challenges, including Cash management, future lockdowns, safe environment protocol etc. It will also have to work out how the organization returns back to BAU (Business as Usual) and also, what will the new BAU look like? If we have been able to successfully work from home, do we still need all employees to come to office or can we reduce office space requirement and get some people to continue to work from home?

The war room would also have to therefore envision new processes for the new BAU and also work out new business models as opportunities that the disruption will present. It would also look at restructuring the capital structure and perhaps retire some of the high cost debt and borrow from the current market that is offering a much lower cost debt. It should also look at possibility of buying out other businesses that are available cheap now and also look at acquiring technologies that are now available cheap.

And lastly, the war room should have an investor outreach program to ensure that your investors are on-board with the fast pace of changes that your company will go through.

This is an excellent opportunity or organizations to emerge as more competitive entities that will go out and win more market segments and more market share.

Economic impact of Coronavirus - করোনায় না হলেও আর্থিক দুরবস্থায় মৃত্যু বাড়বে দেশে, জানাচ্ছেন ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য

First published in https://prohor.in/interview-of-dr-jaijit-bhattacharya-on-indian-economy/

সেন্টার ফর ডিজিটাল ইকনমি পলিসি রিসার্চ’-এর প্রেসিডেন্ট তিনি। দেশজুড়ে লকডাউনের এই পরিস্থিতিতে আর সকলের মতোই চিন্তিত। কী ভবিষ্যৎ রয়েছে আমাদের সামনে? দেশের অর্থনীতি কি ঘুরে দাঁড়াতে পারবে? নাকি বাড়বে আরও দুর্দশা? আমেরিকা-চিন সম্পর্ক নিয়েই বা কী ভাবছেন? নিজের চিন্তা ও মতামত জানালেন ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য। শুনল প্রহর…

দেশ তথা পৃথিবীব্যাপী করোনা সংক্রমণের জেরে সবকিছু লকড ডাউন। অর্থনীতি ও মানুষের জীবনের উপর এর প্রভাব সম্পর্কে কী বলবেন?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : প্রথমত, আমার ধারণা অনুযায়ী অন্তত তিন মাস বড়ো বড়ো কোম্পানিগুলিকে কাজ না করিয়ে বেতন দিতে হবে, অর্থাৎ বছরের ১/৩ ভাগে কোনো উৎপাদন না থাকলেও ব্যয় থাকবে। এই সময় চুক্তিভিত্তিক শ্রমিক কর্মচারীদের বেতন দেওয়ার সামর্থ্য হয়তো কোম্পানিগুলির থাকবে না। ফলে বিপুল সংখ্যক মানুষ, যারা অর্থনৈতিক ভাবে দুর্দশাগ্রস্ত, তাদের আয় বন্ধ হয়ে যাবে। ফলে ভাইরাস সংক্রমণে না হলেও আর্থিক দুরবস্থায় বেশ কিছু মৃত্যু হবে।

দ্বিতীয়ত, RBI হয়তো কিছু ঋণ পরিশোধের সময়সীমা পিছিয়ে দিয়েছে, কিন্তু তার সুযোগ ছোটো শিল্পগুলির কাছে আসবে না। দেরিতে হলেও ঋণ শোধ তো করতেই হবে, উৎপাদন না হলে তখন অসুবিধায় পড়বে সংস্থাগুলি।
তৃতীয়ত, ১৯১৮ সালের স্প্যানিশ ফ্লু-র সময় মানুষ খাবার ঠিকমতো পায়নি, এখন হয়তো খাবার আগের তুলনায় পর্যাপ্ত, কিন্তু জনসংখ্যাও বেড়ে গেছে।
তবে, লকডাউনের বিকল্প নেই, কারণ তা না হলে ভাইরাস সংক্রমণে গুণোত্তর প্রগতিতে মানুষের মৃত্যু হবে।

আমরা দেখছি, দিল্লিতে অসংগঠিত শ্রমিকেরা কীভাবে বাড়ি ফিরতে চাইছেন, শহর থেকে গ্রামে, এ-প্রসঙ্গে কিছু বলবেন?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : গ্রামগুলি এখন জনবহুল, যারা ফিরছে তারা পর্যাপ্ত খাবার পাবে কিনা সন্দেহ। আর যারা ঘরে ফিরছে, শুধু দিল্লি না, ভারতের সমস্ত জায়গা থেকে, তারা আবার লকডাউন উঠলেই কর্মক্ষেত্রে ফিরবেন না বলেই মনে হয়। ফলে অর্থনীতি বেশ কিছুদিন স্থগিত হয়ে থাকবে। আর গ্রামে যদি ভাইরাস সংক্রমণ হয় চাষবাসে তার প্রভাব পড়বে, ফলে পরিস্থিতি আরো খারাপ হবে। ১৯১৮-তে স্প্যানিশ ফ্লুতে ১৪ মিলিয়ন মানুষ মারা গেছিলেন, তা-ও তখন জনসংখ্যা এখনকার ১/৭ অংশ ছিল। এই মানুষেরা ঘরে ফিরলে লকডাউনের সময়সীমা বাড়ানো দরকার। অর্থনীতি আর কতটা সহ্য করতে পারবে সে সম্পর্কে আমি সন্দিহান। গরম পড়লে ভাইরাস নিষ্ক্রিয় হবে কিনা জানি না, নয়তো দেশ বড় আর্থিক সমস্যার সম্মুখীন হবে।

আরও পড়ুন
লকডাউন পেরোলে কাজ হারাতে পারেন ভারতের ১৩ কোটি মানুষ!

আপনার মতে করোনা পরবর্তী সময়ে কী পরিবর্তন আসতে পারে?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : অটোমেশনের চাহিদা বাড়তে পারে, মানে আমাদের কাজগুলি যন্ত্রনির্ভর হয়ে পড়তে পারে আরো বেশি মাত্রায়। এমনকি ঘরের কাজেও যন্ত্রমানব ব্যবহার হতে পারে। এই সময় এটা প্রমাণিত যে অনেক কাজ আমরা নিজেরাই করে নিতে পারি, কম্পানিগুলি ওয়র্ক ফ্রম হোম নীতিতেই প্রচুর কাজ করিয়ে নিতে পারে, সেক্ষেত্রে বড় অফিস এবং অফিস সংক্রান্ত প্রচুর নিয়োগ না করলেও চলে। এভাবে সকলে ভাবলে আবার ওই আর্থিক ভাবে দুর্বল শ্রেণীর উপরেই কোপ এসে পড়ে। আসলে ভারতে তরুণ জনসংখ্যা কোরিয়া, চিনের মতই বেশি, কিন্তু ওই দেশগুলির মত শিক্ষার প্রসার নেই। যদি থাকত তাহলে আমরা সারা পৃথিবীর যন্ত্রনির্ভরতার সুযোগ নিতে পারতাম।

তবে কি কৃষিভিত্তিক হওয়ার দরুণ ভারতীয় অর্থনীতি আরো অসুবিধায় পড়বে?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : একটি দেশ বিশ্ব অর্থনীতিতে শক্তিশালী হিসাবে চিহ্নিত হয় তার প্রযুক্তি, আবিষ্কার ইত্যাদির ক্ষমতা অনুযায়ী। ভারতে মানব সম্পদের প্রতি কোনো গুরুত্বই আরোপ করা হয়নি, না সরকার শিক্ষার ব্যবস্থা করেছে, না বেসরকারি ক্ষেত্রকে সুযোগ দিয়েছে, এর ফল যা হওয়ার তাই হয়েছে, ভারত পিছিয়ে পড়েছে প্রযুক্তি, গবেষণা ও আবিষ্কারের ক্ষেত্রে। জাপান যেভাবে তার মানবসম্পদকে ব্যবহার করেছে তা শিক্ষণীয়। তবে ভারতে যেমন সুন্দর ভাবে লক ডাউনের মত বিশাল আদেশ পালন করানো গেছে, চিনে তা করানো যায়নি। কাজেই এ-কথা বলা যেতেই পারে, ভারতীয় মানবসম্পদের প্রচুর সম্ভাবনা আছে, তাদের তৈরি করে সুযোগ দিতে হবে।

আরও পড়ুন
দারিদ্র্যের সম্মুখীন হতে পারেন ১১ মিলিয়ন মানুষ, ওয়ার্ল্ড ব্যাঙ্কের রিপোর্টে চাঞ্চল্য

ভারতীয় সরকারের কাজ সম্পর্কে কী বলবেন?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : খুব সুন্দর ভাবে ধাপে ধাপে লক ডাউনের দিকে এগিয়েছে। থালা বাজানোর ফলে যে মানুষটি টিভি, রেডিও কখনও দেখেনি সেও করোনা সম্পর্কে জানতে পেরেছে, তৈরি হতে পেরেছে। ভারতের কোনো লুকোছাপা নেই করোনা মোকাবিলায়।

করোনা পরবর্তী সময়ে কি চিন মহাশক্তি হতে যাচ্ছে?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : চিন আগেও উৎপাদনের ভরকেন্দ্র ছিল, ভবিষ্যতেও থাকবে। ভিয়েতনাম, ফিলিপিন্স, ইন্দোনেশিয়া, ইতালি-এরা আগেও চিন-নির্ভর ছিল, এখনও তাই। যোগান শৃঙ্খল, সুবিধাজনক কর কাঠামো, সুলভ উৎপাদন ক্ষেত্র ও মানব সম্পদ যে দেশে থাকবে সে-ই ভাল উৎপাদক হতে পারে। এগুলি সব চিনের আছে, ভারতের থাকলে সে-ও পারবে। তবে আগামী দশকের মধ্যে চিনকে সরিয়ে ইন্দোনেশিয়া, ফিলিপিন্স ও ভিয়েতনাম উৎপাদন ক্ষেত্রে গুরুত্বপূর্ণ জায়গা নেবে।

আরও পড়ুন
পেশায় শ্রমিক, মাটি কাটছেন ভরদুপুরে, বিকল্প জীবিকার আর্জি ভাইরাল ‘চা-কাকু’র

ইউ এস-চিন সম্পর্ক নিয়ে কিছু বলবেন?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : এদের সম্পর্ক কখনওই খুব ভালো নয়। অনেক ধরণের জটিল রাজনীতি রয়েছে এর মধ্যে। এককথায়। চিনকে আমেরিকার ফ্রাঙ্কেনস্টাইন বলা যায়। দেশদুটি অর্থনৈতিক এক প্রকার যুদ্ধে রত।

আমাদের শেষ প্রশ্ন, আমরা দেখেছি মানুষ বারবার ঘুরে দাঁড়িয়েছে, এই অতিমারীর পরেও কি দাঁড়াবে? আপনার কী মনে হয়?

ডঃ জয়জিৎ ভট্টাচার্য : হ্যাঁ, দাঁড়াবে তো নিশ্চয়ই, তবে কীভাবে, তা কঠিন প্রশ্ন। আবার অন্য অতিমারী আসবে কিনা, কীভাবে আসবে সবটাই অনিশ্চিত। আমরা যে ভাবে সমস্ত বন্য পশুপ্রাণীকে পণ্যজাত করেছিলাম তা নিয়ে ভাবার সময় এসেছে, পুরোনো অভ্যাস, সুসংস্কারগুলি নিয়ে ভেবে প্রয়োজনানুযায়ী ফিরিয়ে আনার সময় হয়েছে বোধহয়।

Policy interventions for ushering the Future of Work

First published in ET Government on March 18, 2020
https://government.economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/technology/policy-interventions-for-ushering-the-future-of-work/74684063

Covid-19, popularly referred to as novel Coronavirus, is having deep unintended impact on changing how we live and how we work. Concepts of “social distancing” and “flattening the curve” have quickly become part of lingua franca as well as influencing how we are reorganizing work, albeit with the view that this is going to be a temporary arrangement. This has led to “WFH” or Work from Home coming back in fashion with a vengeance, after the epic dalliance with the concept by companies ranging from HP to Yahoo, with Yahoo famously abandoning the WFH concept in 2013, in a bombshell announcement by their then CEO, Marissa Mayer.

However, WFH has clearly come of age, with high bandwidth communication infrastructure becoming ubiquitous and affordable. Most homes of white collared workers in the metros have sufficient broadband to support acceptable quality on-demand video-conferencing on regular general-purpose laptops, PC’s and smartphones. WFH has tremendous potential to reduce traffic, thus significantly reducing air pollution and in general, improving work-life balance by cutting down on travel. It would therefore, also contribute to increasing national productivity by using the commute time more productively. In fact, in the age-old adage that there is a competition between communication and transportation, we could almost say that communication is winning, as it would substantially reduce work-related transportation. This is only going to become even more true, with the impending rollout of 5G connectivity.

However, for this change to make a permanent impact and not be ephemeral, there are substantial regulatory and policy issues that would need to be aligned. To begin with, one has to define liabilities more aggressively. What if there is a broadband outage at a tech worker’s home, that leads to failure of a mission critical system that was being monitored by the tech worker, that in turn leads to massive losses or death? Who would bear the liability of such an event? Or for even simpler cases where an organization ends up losing a deal because a key senior executive could not participate in a video conferencing due to broadband outage? What should be the Service Level Agreements and what should be the regulatory framework that would enable assurance to organizations whose key workers move to a WFH regime?

How does an organization manage confidentiality clauses and data protection clauses when the data is reaching to workers who are working from outside the premises of the company? There are of course security tools to ensure that the data cannot be taken away from the company issued laptops and devices, but what if the data is simply taken as pictures from the screen of the laptop and then an OCR is run on top of such pictures? How does an organization ensure that its employees are adhering to the contracts that the organization has signed up to. What would be the safe harbor provisions that an organization can enjoy under such situations where the employee, outside the premises of the organization, indulges in data related malpractices?

This would also imply that many of the existing contracts with customers and clients would need to undergo significant changes, especially on the data related clauses, where data would need to travel outside the office premises, to the homes of designated workers, if we need to transition to a WFH economy.

Both organizations and government would need to roll out incentives to support WFH, which not only saves precious dollars for the organization by reducing office real estate requirements, but also reduces national costs by increasing the use of existing assets (worker’s home), while reducing usage of precious imported petroleum. Hence, new frameworks need to be evolved where organizations compensate the worker for working from home and for additional expenses at home such as electricity usage, telecom usage, office supplies etc. It should be ensured that such compensation does not attract any kind of taxes, direct or indirect. It would also imply, that definition of residential zones would need to be fine-tuned to ensure that such work practices are not construed to be in violation of the local government’s zoning regulations.

WFH would lead to creation of new types of local industries that support WFH, such as services for local high-speed printers, local meeting rooms, services for delivering samples/ printouts from one WFH worker to another WFH worker etc. HR departments would need to evolve to manage the complexities arising out of such WFH practices. For example, how would HR notice abuse of power by managers? How would client interactions happen?

We have indeed been rapidly pushed into a bold new world by the advent of the unwelcome pandemic. We would need to now quickly work out the mechanisms to make this regime work in a much more stable and sustainable manner and the government regulatory framework and policies would either make India a leader in WFH or would leave the country gasping to catch up with the rest of the world.