A GoOgle Danger !!!

We all are aware of the recent news about Google threatening to quit China, one might as well be aware of the Google’s double policy over Arunachal Pradesh (it shows it as a part of China when search is made from China and as a part of India, when search is made from India). Now suppose that there arises some problems between India and Google over the issue, and the talks take a sour route with Google threatening to quit India as well (though with a very little possibility as India is a lucrative market), but let us assume it happens, then think of enormous amount of data stored in our Gmail inbox, pictures stored on Orkut & Picasa, Google Docs etc etc, ALL WILL BE LOST.

Over the years we have been increasingly dependent on Google for the online services and it has stuck the right chord with Indian consumers by providing it all for free. But we are overlooking the fact that there is inherent cross country risk and in this era, where information holds the key to success or failure, loss of vital information will be a big blow for those using these services. There is a possibility that US government puts some restrictions on India (may be for signing NPT or CTBT), and if they shut down these services, they can give a big jolt to India without using any weapons. (Remember that many of the hosting sites are US based).

So now is the time that the Indian companies make sure that they are not over dependent on foreign country sites for storing their vital information. The growth of ‘Cloud Computing’ (where all data will be stored online) will increase the danger.

One more possible threat will be the underwater optic cables which will hold the key to information transfer between the continents, so if the cables go down, we will be in a mess.

So the thing is that we look for more Indian companies for these type of services and with the IT power we have, this is very much possible.