India’s IIT Madras has developed an indigenous mobile operating system “BharOS” that makes smartphones secure, targeting the 100 crore Indian mobile users.
US-based Android, which then acquired by Google and Apple’s iOS dominate the entire smartphone’s operating system since its launch in 2003 (android) and 2007 (iOS). Though many firms and countries had attempted to develop their own mobile OS, none became recognizable and spread on the market, as the former two did. Well, Xiaomi now emerges with MIUI procuring 5.1% share of the mobile OS market.
In India, three alumni of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) – Bombay had launched the country’s first OS for mobiles called “Indus OS” in 2013. While Indus OS still in its development stage, another IIT-based startup launched another smartphone OS named “BharOS” that wants to make your smartphones more secure, the institute said. As India focuses on building its own product or service of everything under ‘Atmanirbhar’ meaning ‘self-reliance’, BharOS is one of the kind.
BharOS by IIT Madras – 6 Things to Know
JandK Operations Private Limited incubated by IIT Madras designed this “BharOS” claiming to provide secure environment to smartphone users and can be installed on commercial off-the-shelf handsets.
1. BharOS mobile operating system aims to provide users more freedom, control and flexibility to choose and use only the apps that fit their needs. “This innovative system promises to revolutionize the way users think about security and privacy on their mobile devices”, explains the developers.
2. The OS comes with No Default Apps (NDA) – meaning, there isn’t any inbuilt apps saving you lots of storage space, contrary to android which comes with Google apps like Chrome, YouTube, Drive, Maps and more as default apps. NDA thus proffers flexibility to users allowing to choose what they should have in their handset. It also saves much of the battery.
3. BharOS also will be receiving ‘Native Over the Air’ updates, likely as androids, which are automatically downloaded and installed on the device.
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4. Similar to android’s Play Store, this Indian made OS will offer Private App Store Services (PASS) which allows users to download organization-specific trusted apps. “A PASS provides access to a curated list of apps that have been thoroughly vetted and have met certain security and privacy standards of organizations. This means users can be confident that the apps they are installing are safe to use and have been checked for any potential security vulnerabilities or privacy concern,” the developers said.
5. However, BharOS is currently being provided to only those organizations that have stringent privacy and security requirements “whose users handle sensitive information that requires confidential communications on restricted apps on mobiles.”
6. “One of the things that we are aiming at is that we want to have an operating system which is agnostic to the underlying hardware”, Professor V Kamakoti, Director of IIT Madras said on question about the compatibility with phone manufacturers. “IIT Madras looks forward to working closely with many more private industries, government agencies, strategic agencies and telecom service providers to increase the usage and adoption of BharOS in our country,” he added.
Do you think BharOS will establish a strong base in mobile OS market of India?
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