Background: ENVIS Network is a decentralized System of Environmental Information Dissemination System for Policy Planners, Decision Makers, Scientists, Environmentalists, Researchers, Academicians and General Public. ENVIS Network is the central part of ENVIS Scheme of Government of India managed by Ministry of Environment & Forests. Presently, it consist of 76 Nodes (Called ENVIS Centers) spread all over India and these ENVIS Centers are hosted at India’s premier Institutes/Organizations working in their specialized thematic areas pertaining to Environment.
NIC Role: From its inception, ENVIS Scheme is employing modern technologies for achieving its objectives, such as Internet, as indicated in the Long Term Objectives of ENVIS Scheme. National Informatics Centre (NIC) is closely associated with this program of the Ministry of Environment & Forests, Govt. of India (MoEF) since 1995. NIC is providing complete ICT Support to ENVIS Network, be it Email Support, be it ENVIS Network Websites Hosting, be it ENVIS Network Emails Group, be it ENVIS Network SQL Database Support, be it NICNET VPN Connectivity for ENVIS Network Websites’ Maintenance and so on and so forth.
Challenges: Now-a-days, Cyber Attacks are frequently happening causing defacing of Websites, denial of Services and in worst cases crashing of Web Servers. Keeping that in mind and also the guidelines of Ministry of Home Affairs, Govt. of India pertaining to secured website hosting infrastructure, MoEF has decided to Restructuring and Security Audit of ENVIS Network Websites with the help of NICSI with an objective of uniformity in User Interfaces vis-à-vis the main objectives of ENVIS Scheme.
Event: To arrive at uniform User Interfaces of all ENVIS Centers Websites, a “Brainstorming Session on Restructuring & Security Audits of ENVIS Network Websites” was organized at New Delhi during May 4-5, 2011 with all stakeholders on boat. The outcome of this Session was quite useful for further developments in this endeavour. This has given NIC an opportunity to freeze the user requirements, which will help in delivering the products as per the aspiration of MoEF and ENVIS Network fraternity in particular and all other stake-holders in general.
