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Data privacy is becoming an infrastructure imperative
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For Indian enterprises, managing data privacy is rapidly becoming fundamental to infrastructure engineering and risk management. It is no longer advisable to relegate privacy to legal tick-boxes or compliance checklists. As organizations modernize digital estates across cloud, hybrid, and edge environments, privacy must be treated as part of the data lifecycle engineering constraint.
There is a demonstrable shift in attention. 72% of Indian organizations have elevated cyber risk investment as a strategic priority. This reflects recognition at leadership levels that data risk now carries direct business consequences. At the same time, preparedness remains uneven across core controls and execution layers.
Privacy, in this context, is no longer separable from infrastructure reliability. It intersects with identity management, data architecture, and incident response in ways that are difficult to isolate after deployment.
Experience Is Driving Behavior Change
Recent breach experience has begun to influence operating decisions. Nearly 25% of Indian organizations report that their most severe breach in the past three years resulted in losses exceeding one million dollars. Among larger enterprises, that exposure is even higher. These outcomes have shifted internal conversations from response to prevention.
Organizations that have experienced material incidents are responding in specific ways. Their response is now rarely limited to tactical fixes. They have increased investment in security, turn more often to managed services, and, in some cases, start questioning a more fundamental issue, i.e., how much data they actually need to hold at all.
AI Is Exposing Data Governance Gaps
As AI adoption accelerates, weak data discipline becomes harder to ignore. AI systems rely on large, persistent datasets, which means governance gaps scale quickly once models move into production.
In practice, governance maturity is uneven. While data classification is now relatively common, approaches such as data minimization and responsible AI adoption remain limited. The result is a gap between establishing baseline controls and embedding more forward-looking governance into how systems are designed and operated.
The implication is practical. Retained data that delivers limited value still carries full regulatory and operational risk. As AI workloads expand, enterprises without disciplined data lifecycle management will face growing friction between innovation and control.
Privacy Risk Extends Beyond the Enterprise
Data privacy risk is no longer concentrated within organizational boundaries. 18% of Indian organizations identify third-party breaches as the threat they feel least prepared to address. This is the highest ranked area of low preparedness.
Modern data environments depend on external platforms, service providers, and partners. Yet governance mechanisms often remain static while data flows are dynamic. Periodic vendor assessments struggle to keep pace with real-time access patterns and shared responsibility models.
Organizations that are adapting are extending privacy controls across ecosystems. This includes stronger access governance, clearer accountability for data handling, and improved visibility into external usage. The objective is not to eliminate risk, but to reduce uncertainty.
From Compliance to System Design
What is emerging is a reframing of data privacy. It is being treated less as a regulatory event and more as an operating constraint, similar to availability or resilience.
For technology leaders, the direction is straightforward. Privacy must be engineered into systems, not layered on afterward. Doing so simplifies compliance, supports AI adoption, and creates operational clarity at scale.
In data-driven enterprises, privacy is no longer a separate conversation. It is part of how infrastructure works.
The author is Amit Luthra, MD, Lenovo ISG India.
Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely of the author and ETCISO does not necessarily subscribe to it. ETCISO shall not be responsible for any damage caused to any person/organization directly or indirectly.
