‘State’s e-transactions largely handled by external agencies’

Despite being considered as possessing “the best e-governance infrastructure in India”,Gujarat’s Chief Information Officers (CIOs) are not technology or security experts and therefore much of the 11-crore plus annual e-transactions are largely handled by external agencies,a top government official said at an e-security conference on Saturday.

“CIOs in government departments are not technology experts or security experts. They are coordinators. We engage many agencies. Everywhere we are in the hands of agents,in the hands of third parties,” said Director of e-governance Neeta Shah during a talk at the “Securing e-governance: Ensuring data protection and privacy” conference.