Parliament washout: PM to 'stage' fast on Apr 12

Mumbai, Jul 3: In yet another move to keep Chinese technologies companies at bay, the Centre has cancelled the 4G upgradation tender for BSNL as it has decided to come up with fresh specifications for the upgrade process, sources said.

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is likely to issue a fresh tender in the next two weeks.

People in the know said that the fresh tender may not allow Chinese companies to participate and that the new tenders that will be floated in the next two weeks will emphasise on Make in India.

As the border tussle with China escalated last month and around 20 soldiers lost their lives, the government had last month asked both BSNL and MTNL not to use equipment of Chinese makers in their upgrading process to 4G facilities.

Huawei and ZTE are the major Chinese telecom equipment makers working with Indian telecom companies and they would be the hardest hit by the decision.

The impact may be felt in terms of the much-awaited 5G trials in the country. After much deliberation, the Centre last December decided to allow Huawei to take part in the 5G trials.

The cancellation of tender for BSNL's 4G upgradation comes after the Centre on Monday banned 59 Chinese apps including TikTok, WeChat and UC Browser.

A statement by the Ministry of Electronics and IT said that the decision was taken since "there is credible information that these apps are engaged in activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defence of India, security of state and public order".

New Delhi, Jul 18: India's national cybersecurity agency CERT-in, has warned people of credit card skimming spreading across the world through e-commerce platforms.

Attackers are typically targeting e-commerce sites because of their wide presence, popularity and the environment LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, and PHP), the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) said in a notice on Thursday.

Recently, attackers targeted sites which were hosted on Microsoft's IIS server running with the ASP.NET web application framework, it said.

Some of the sites affected by the attack were found to be running ASP.NET version 4.0.30319, which is no longer officially supported by Microsoft and may contain multiple vulnerabilities, CERT-In said.

The notice also included a list of best practices for website developers including the use of the latest version of ASP.NET web framework, IIS web server and database server.

The advisory is based on research by Malwarebytes which found that this skimming campaign likely began sometime in April this year.

Credit card skimming has become a popular activity for cybercriminals over the past few years, and the increase in online shopping during the pandemic means additional business for them, too, Malwarebytes said in a blog post, adding that attackers do not need to limit themselves to the most popular e-commerce platforms.

Researchers from global cybersecurity and anti-virus brand Kaspersky had warned in December last year that more cybercriminal groups will target online payment processing systems in 2020. 

It said that over the past couple of years, so-called JS-skimming (the method of stealing of payment card data from online stores), has gained immense popularity among attackers. 

Kaspersky researchers in their report said they are currently aware of at least 10 different actors involved in these type of attacks.

Their number will continue to grow during the next year, the report said, adding that the most dangerous attacks will be on companies that provide services such as e-commerce as-a-service, which will lead to the compromise of thousands of companies.

New Delhi, Jul 19: Indian equities will be driven by a host of factors like corporate earnings, coronavirus cases trend and geo-political developments this week, according to analysts.

Market participants will also keenly watch the progress of monsoon, with experts saying that the farm sector revival will play a key role in lifting the coronavirus-hit economy.

"With no major event, the ongoing earnings season and global cues will continue to dictate the market trend. Besides, the progress of monsoon will also be closely watched," Ajit Mishra, VP - Research, Religare Broking, said.

Globally, the rising coronavirus infections and geo-political tensions have created uncertainty on the economic recovery front.

With India's COVID-19 cases fast approaching the 11 lakh mark, the third-highest behind the US and Brazil, and the death toll nearing 27,000, participants are expected to tread cautiously going forward.

At global level, confirmed COVID-19 cases have crossed 1.4 crore and deaths totalled about 6 lakh.

Markets globally will closely follow developments on the trade and political level between the US and China, according to analysts.

"We would continue witnessing stock-specific action as the earnings season unfold. Though the near-term momentum looks positive, we would advise traders to be cautious, given flaring US-China trade relations, persistent rise in virus cases and implementation of fresh lockdowns in parts of the country," said Siddhartha Khemka, Head - Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services Ltd.

HDFC Bank will remain in focus on Monday after having announced its June quarter earnings on Saturday.

The lender reported 19.6 per cent rise in its standalone net profit at Rs 6,658.62 crore for April-June 2020; while its income rose to Rs 34,453.28 crore during the quarter.

Other major companies to announce their quarterly results this week are Axis Bank, Bajaj Finance, Hindustan Unilever Limited, Bajaj Auto and ITC.

"Going ahead market participants will closely track the development related to covid vaccine, the rising infection of coronavirus, development on economic activities, corporate earnings and US-China relationship," said Sumeet Bagadia, Executive Director, Choice Broking.

On weekly basis, the Sensex gathered 425.81 points or 1.16 per cent, and the Nifty gained 133.65 points or 1.24 per cent.