The massive expose by ethical hacker Nisarga Adhikary about the CBSE’s flawed assessment and revaluation solution has shocked the nation, evoking strong reaction from the ecosystem. Cybersecurity experts have called for stricter, more transparent methods to continuously address vulnerabilities and protect the interests of lakhs of students.

Adhikary’s expose found a serious vulnerability in the On-Screen Marking system, developed by the Hyderabad-based Coempt Edu Teck, that could lead to the hacking of students’ answer sheets.

Mandir Patil, Executive Vice President of cybersecurity solutions company Cyble, said that the challenge lies in various gaps in accountability, as well as in the lack of transparency and in the implementation of systems that can affect a student’s future. 

“To close all evaluation and testing system gaps, institutions need to implement verification processes, use technology to support monitoring of evaluation and testing, conduct precise, open audits, and ensure precise, definitive accountability throughout the entire process,” he pointed out.

“It is critical that the evaluation and testing systems evolve to demonstrate fairness, integrity, and transparency, so that millions of students retain their confidence in those evaluation and testing systems,” he said.

Varun Grover, Business Unit Head at digital fraud detection solutions company mFilterIt, said these breaches indicate weak defenses and a dangerous underestimation of attackers. “Tokenless access via fake browser values proves our systems can be tricked with trivial methods. We cannot accept that students’ records, exams, and futures remain this exposed,” he said.

Institutions must strengthen their systems with robust authentication (token binding, multi-factor authentication, lockdown session handling, validating every input, and deploying real‑time anomaly detection. 

“This also requires vendors to meet security standards, run regular red‑team tests, and keep transparent audit trails and fast incident response. These steps aren’t optional; they are how we restore trust and protect generations to come,” he said.

Published on May 26, 2026