Cash prizes amounting to ₹3.4 crore are being promised to developers who help create an indigenous Indian web browser “for the world”, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology announced on Wednesday. An important caveat is that browser ideas entered into this competition will have to trust the Controller of Certifying Authorities (CCA), the Indian government’s authority for digital signatures, including SSL (Security Sockets Layer) certificates.
SSL certificates are used to encrypt websites and to make sure that browsers know that a website is not being modified or impersonated by attackers. Browsers know to trust these certificates if they are issued by a certifying authority that is in turn trusted by a ‘root certifying authority’. India does not have a root certifying authority trusted by major browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Microsoft Edge.
This has led to a situation where the government operates a root certifying authority that is legally valid under Indian law — the Root Certifying Authority of India, set up in 2000 under the CCA — but the certificates issued under its purview are largely not recognised by web browsers, leading Indian government and private websites to purchase SSL certificates from foreign certifying authorities.
