A day after the NTA overhaul was announced, a senior official from the agency said that it is tightening security around competitive exams, including by shortening subject experts’ tenure, amid concerns over organized attempts to compromise them.
Interacting with a media house, he described that the agency was dealing With big mafia seeking to compromise people involved in the examination process.As a part of the broader approach, the NTA is also restricting accesses to sensitive information on a strict need-to-know basis, dividing question paper preparation amongst separate teams and imposing multiple layers of physical and digital security.
So far, 600 experts have been fired and 22-25 officials over the next two weeks will be inducted. The changes are aimed at limiting who gets access to sensitive examination processes, for how long, and at which stage, as the NTA seeks to strengthen the integrity of the high-stakes examination and restore candidate confidence.
Besides, air-gapped computer system for sensitive operations will be incorporated. These systems will be completely isolated from unsecured external networks, including the public internet, making remote accesses considerably more difficult.
The Central Industrial Security Force, which specializes in security and frisking, is also being deployed to strengthen the security at key premises. Besides, a four-tier question paper checking system is under dialogue.