BharOS: Many people around the world do not want such a system to succeed, Union Telecom minister says

Union Communications, Electronics and Information Technology Minister and Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Tuesday tested BharOS, a local operating system developed by the Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT). “Congratulations to everyone involved in the development of the system. When our Prime Minister Narendra Modiji first spoke about digital India 8 years ago, some of our friends ridiculed him, but today the country’s technocrats, innovators, industry and politics, and academia embraced his vision eight years later,” he said. .

The event was also attended by Union Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnav.

“There will be difficulties on this journey, and there are many people all over the world who will bring difficulties and will not want any such system to be successful,” Vaishnav said.

BharOS is a new mobile operating system focused on privacy and security. A mobile operating system is software that is the primary interface on a smartphone, similar to Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS.

BharOS is a project funded by the Government of India to develop a free and open source operating system (OS) for use in government and public systems. The project aims to reduce the dependence of smartphones on foreign operating systems and promote the use of locally developed technologies. This is a huge step forward for building a local ecosystem and a self-sustaining future.

BharOS services are currently provided to organizations that have strict privacy and security requirements and whose users handle sensitive information that requires sensitive communication in restricted applications on mobile devices. These users require access to private cloud services via private 5G networks.

BharOS was developed by JandK Operations Private Limited (JandKops), which was incubated by IIT Madras Pravartak Technologies Foundation, a Section 8 (non-profit) company established by IIT Madras. The Foundation is funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) of the Government of India through its National Mission for Interdisciplinary Cyber-Physical Systems (NMICPS). He seeks to put India on a par with the few countries that currently have such capabilities.

Speaking on January 19 at the press conference announcing this Indian mobile operating system, Prof. V. Kamakoti, Director of IIT Madras, said: “BharOS service is a trust-based mobile operating system with a focus on giving users more freedom , control and flexibility to select and use only those applications that suit their needs. This innovative system promises to revolutionize the way users think about security and privacy on their mobile devices.”

“IIT Madras looks forward to working closely with many other private enterprises, government agencies, strategic agencies and telecom service providers to increase the use and adoption of BharOS in our country,” he added.

BharOS comes with no default applications (NDA). This means that users are not required to use applications they may not be familiar with or trust. In addition, this approach allows users to have greater control over the permissions that apps have on their device, as they can only allow apps they trust to access certain features or data on their device.

According to Karthik Aiyar, director of startup JandK Operations Pvt Ltd., which developed the mobile operating system, “In addition, BharOS offers ‘Native Over The Air’ (NOTA) updates that can help keep devices secure. . NOTA updates are automatically downloaded and installed on the device without the user having to manually initiate the process. This ensures that the device is always running the latest version of the operating system, including the latest security patches and bug fixes. PASS and NOTA, BharOS ensures that Indian mobile phones are trustworthy.”

BharOS provides access to trusted apps from private app store services (PASS) for a specific organization. PASS gives you access to a curated list of apps that have been carefully reviewed to meet certain organizational security and privacy standards. This means users can be confident that the applications they install are safe to use and have been tested for potential security vulnerabilities or privacy risks.