The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Thursday mandated that no classified information shall be handled through e-office, which means classified files shall not be processed in e-office during work from home.
As per reports, the National Informatics Centre (NIC) would evaluate the existing security protocol for remote access of classified files in consultation with MHA and come up with guidelines as well as standard operating procedures for handling classified information in e-office. Till then, classified files shall be processed on standalone computers only.
About 75 ministries/departments are actively using the e-office platform presently while 57 ministries/departments have achieved over 80% of their work in e-office.
MHA has also instructed the officials who have been given official laptops to ensure that they do the official work in those laptops only.
NIC will ensure that the devices are well protected against malware and malicious websites. Officials who are working on their personal computers have been asked to ensure installing regular updates, running antivirus scans, blocking malicious sites, etc. with the help of NIC to ensure the safety of their device against information theft.
Officers who are working from home shall be available on phone as per requirements and directions of their officers, the ministry instructed.
