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In today’s era of globalization, when everyone on earth feels quite integrated with each other thereby presuming a sense of security that if one is in trouble the other may come for his rescue, there has been a growing feeling of the breach in security. While the main driving force of globalization is the unprecedented innovation and expansion of technology intervention in every sphere of life, this technology has started to pose a serious threat to the human lives. The threats are severe to that extent that it has been termed as “blood less war” (Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce & Industries [FICCI], n.d). If we consider the need for the socio-economic development to be the most decisive factor for any systematic and continuous change in human initiatives that also include bringing advancement in science & technology, then it is the same human initiatives that also cause leakage in the stock of development. Today, we are in an era when Information Technology (IT) has reached zenith. While on the one side, access to information with the use of IT has made it possible for the very concept of globalization to experience success, on the other, gross misuse of IT and of the collected information may prove catastrophic for human existence. To survive under such a condition, the only way out is to resort to the same IT. As iron cuts iron, it is the Information Technology that has the ability to combat the ill effects generated out of mishandling of IT.
The very notion of development has been continuously experiencing paradigm shift over the years now. While, focussing on GDP growth marked the majority of the time span in the post world war II phase till the end of 1980s. It was only during the 1990s, issues related to cyberspace started to get recognized and were attached great importance. This man-made environment, driven by technological development, especially with the advent of Information Technology, has already assumed near worldwide scale and scope. (Choucri et al., 2013).
Innovation and expansion in technical knowhow, especially in Computer Science and Information Technology has removed all the barriers of communication. This communication has made it possible to have information disseminated at a faster rate, thereby ensuring that all the stakeholders in any production process have “perfect knowledge” about the system that helps his decision making to be nearly perfect1.
In the past decades, information and communications technology (ICT) has achieved global reach. During the recent past decades, both the developed and developing countries have embarked on the path of development by effectively utilizing the power of information and communications technology. The e-commerce, cyberspace etc have become the potential sphere for even cross-border conflict (Gorman & Barnes, 2011; Manjikian, 2010).
Since the globalized world is guided by the market dynamics, the structure of existing market plays a crucial role in efficient allocation of resources. In this sense, a market structure characterized by perfect competition is treated as the ideal one. The prerequisite of any perfectly competitive market is, besides other, possession of perfect information by all the stakeholders of the market. We know that nothing on this earth is perfect and same is true for knowledge sharing also. Dissemination of perfect information through technology intervention is often found to get disrupted by technology itself. The emergence and rampant occurrences of Cyber Crime bears its testimony.
Because of the fact that the Internet has become one of the essential means, along with food, shelter and cloth, for life, it is not difficult to imagine that unwanted elements of the society like the criminals, terrorist groups etc will use this means of life to destabilize the social consolidation and bonding. Unfortunately, from what is evident today, the potential for significant threats outweighs the institutional capabilities to combat these offences. There visibly exists a wide gap between the “demand” for security and the provision of effective “supply.” (Choucri et al., 2013).