Need to acknowledge sovereignty of data: Prasad

IT Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on Wednesday reiterated the importance of “data sovereignty” at the G20 Digital Economy Ministers virtual meeting, where he spoke in the presence of the Chinese IT minister.

“The digital platforms need to be responsive, accountable and sensitive to the concerns of sovereign nations as far as safety, defence and data privacy are concerned,” Prasad said in the meeting. “We understand the issue of data innovation and data cross flow but we also need to acknowledge the sovereignty of the data… we are very clear that data must belong to the sovereign nation concerned to protect the privacy of its people, to protect the digital concerns of its people. And obviously, giving good occasions for innovation… all has to have a proper balancing act.”