New Delhi, July 3 : At least 15 per cent of the government IT budget should be earmarked for cybersecurity, Secretary of the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), S. Krishnan, said on Friday, saying that cybersecurity cannot be treated as an afterthought and must be built into digital systems by design.

Addressing the Cybersecurity 360 Summit organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), Krishnan said cybersecurity requires constant vigilance as organisations cannot afford to take cyber risks lightly.

He stressed that 'security by design' must become a core principle in technology development and deployment, while urging industry to invest an optimum level of resources in cybersecurity, support domestic cybersecurity products and promptly report cyber incidents to the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) to strengthen collective defence and information sharing.

"When the government spends on IT, at least 15 per cent of the IT budget should go towards cybersecurity," Krishnan said.

Speaking at the event, Dr Amit Sharma, Additional Director General and Advisor, Department of Defence, Ministry of Defence, said the global race towards Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) represents a significant geopolitical shift and called for a proactive national roadmap for developing frontier AI models.

He said the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has already issued a Request for Information (RFI) under its technology development programme for the creation of foundational AI models in the research domain.

Sharma also noted that the emergence of quantum computing would eventually render conventional cryptographic systems obsolete, making the transition to post-quantum cryptography a national priority.

Dr Gulshan Rai, Chairman of the CII Cybersecurity Task Force and former National Cyber Security Coordinator, said the rapid expansion of technologies such as 5G and the upcoming 6G networks has widened the cyberattack surface for both large enterprises and small businesses.

The summit -- organised by CII in partnership with MeitY and CERT- In -- brought together policymakers, industry leaders and cybersecurity experts to discuss strategies for strengthening India's digital resilience amid an evolving global threat landscape.

/IANS