What is Maya OS, the new operating system that India’s defence ministry is migrating to?

Hackers beware. They may have to face Maya, the homemade Operating System (OS), if they decide to hack into the computer systems of India’s Ministry of Defence.

The news, first reported by The Hindu, comes amidst the rising tide of Chinese cyber and malware attacks targeting defence establishments and critical infrastructure nationwide.

The Hindu in its report stated that officials will deploy the indigenously-built software on computers in the South Block by 15 August.

We take a closer look at what is Maya and how it will protect Indian computers from hacking attempts.

What is Maya OS?

Currently, the computers being used by India’s defence ministry are all working on the Windows system. However, in an attempt to protect its systems, the Ministry of Defence floated the idea of its own operating system and the idea of Maya OS was born in 2021.

Maya has been worked on by a team of experts from various government agencies, including the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), and the National Informatics Centre (NIC). In addition, the help of private Indian software companies and academic institutions was also sought.

According to a CNBCTV18 report, sources said that the OS was developed in six months.

Officials have been quoted as saying that Maya OS is rooted in the open-source Ubuntu platform. For the unaware, Ubuntu is a free, open-source operating system based on Linux and allows anyone to use and modify it.

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People who worked in the development of Maya OS have said that Maya OS harnesses the power of free and publicly available software while offering a user interface and functionalities reminiscent of the familiar Windows OS. Moreover, it is safer as it inherits the renowned security of the Ubuntu platform.

Maya OS also comes with an added feature of Chakravyuh, an end-point anti-malware and antivirus software that creates a virtual layer between the user and the internet, blocking any malicious attempts to access or compromise the data. This makes this OS safer and more foolproof against hackers.

Officials told CNBCTV18 that the OS was easy to use and had a familiar interface, allowing for officials within the ministry to transfer seamlessly, with least amount of issues. It also supports various applications and software that are commonly used by the ministry, such as Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, AutoCAD, etc. Additionally, it offers features such as cloud storage, encryption, digital signature, biometric authentication, etc. that would enhance its security and functionality.

The OS Maya is being installed on the computers of the defence ministry only and not on the rest of the Services. But it added that the Services will soon adopt the operating system as the Navy has already cleared it and currently it is being evaluated by the Army and the Air Force.

Why the name Maya?

Officials explained that Maya in Hindi means illusion. They say that this means that hackers will be faced with maya or illusion when they try to hack into defence ministry computer systems.

Moreover, Chakravyuh, the antivirus software in the OS, is also in reference to the multi-layered defensive formation that was used in the epic Mahabharat.

Why the switch to Maya OS?

The switch to Maya OS comes at a time when incidents of cybercrime and cyber warfare are only rising. In fact, India witnessed 13.91 lakh cyber security incidents in 2022, according to official data revealed in Parliament.

Minister of State for Electronics and Information and Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar had then stated that these incidents only included information reported to and tracked by the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In).

There have been several incidents of cyber attacks in India, one of the major instances being reported in November last year. The Central Depository Services Limited (CSDL) had detected “malwares” in a few of its internal machines.

AIIMS, one of the most important critical health infrastructures also came under cyber attacks. The first was reported in January, with the second detected in June. According to media reports ransomware had affected outpatient and inpatient digital hospital services, including smart lab, billing, report generation, appointment schedule.

In January, the parent company of a private defence ministry contractor manufacturing explosives, Solar Industries Limited India, was also the target of a ransomware attack. A Hindustan Times report stated that a listing on the dark web by a group that calls itself Black Cat (Alphv) claimed to have stolen two terabytes of data.

Reacting to the incident, analyst Mandeep Bajwa had told the daily that the attack “could pose a major threat to national security. “When it comes to the security of defence contractors, the ministry and other agencies, such as the Intelligence Bureau are involved,” Bajwa said. “This lead to a compromise of sensitive data such as blueprints, value or quantum of orders, and technology, which may fall into the wrong hands.”

And, according to defence ministry officials, many of these attacks come from China. In fact, late Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat had warned that the cyber threat posed by the Dragon is significant. In an April 2021 speech, he had said: “China is capable of launching cyber attacks on us that can disrupt a large amount of our systems.”

US-based cybersecurity firm, Recorded Future, also said in the past, that India’s power sector has been on the radar of Chinese hackers. The most known example was the attack on the power grid in Mumbai in 2020. The chaos was allegedly caused by a new coalition of Chinese hackers dubbed ‘ Red Echo’.

Moreover, India and China’s ties have remained frosty since 2020 over the military standoff at the Line of Actual Control.

It is in light of this situation that India’s defence ministry is migrating to the new OS.

Also, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology launched the Indian Web Browser Development Challenge, a programme to support indigenously built web browsers that will compete with the likes of Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge etc. The primary objective is to create a homegrown web browser for global use, equipped with an integrated Controller of Certifying Authorities (CCA) India root certificate.

Arvind Kumar, the Controller of Certifying Authorities, in a Firstpost report was quoted as saying, “As the world’s fastest-growing economy, India should shift away from international browsers and reduce reliance on foreign technologies. The proposed browser will adhere to international standards and contribute to safeguarding personal data.”

With inputs from agencies