Centre for Internet and Society

Privacy concerns multiply for Aadhaar, India’s national biometric identity registry

praskrishna — 2017-03-22T14:38:52Z

The largest and most sophisticated biometric identity system of any country in the world, India’s Aadhaar, is sparking new fears that the personal data it stores on more than 1.1 billion people could be vulnerable to exploitation.

The article by Kaelyn Lowmaster was published by One World Identity on March 17, 2017, Sunil Abraham was quoted.

Aadhaar, which translates to “foundation” in Hindi, is a unique 12-digit code tied to citizens’ biometric data and personal information. The system was launched in 2009 in an effort to extend social services to India’s millions of unregistered citizens, and to cut down on welfare benefit “leakage” resulting from an opaque and often corrupt bureaucracy.

Constructing a centralized repository of biometric data on nearly a fifth of the world’s population has raised serious concerns among privacy advocates.

The government has also looked to Aadhaar data to underpin mobile payment transfer platforms, which have become crucial for cashless transactions during the country’s demonetization push over past year.

But constructing a centralized repository of biometric data on nearly a fifth of the world’s population has raised serious concerns among privacy advocates, who cite several vulnerabilities both with the Aadhaar system and the Modi administration’s planned expansion.

Despite this, recent metrics indicate that Aadhaar has been enormously successful in achieving those goals. Though the program is theoretically voluntary, more than 99% of Indian adults are now enrolled. Over three billion individual identity verifications have been conducted, and some reports indicate that the Indian government is saving a billion dollars per year now that welfare subsidies can be paid to citizens directly through Aadhaar-verified fund transfers.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has ambitions to broaden the system even further, seeking to use Aadhaar as the gateway for accessing government programs ranging from public education to subsidized cooking gas, as well as partnering with private companies to offer services facilitated by the Aadhaar database.

Concerns, however, remain. One primary worry is that India’s legal framework for information security is still weak and fragmented, despite government assurances that Aadhaar biometrics have never been misused or stolen.

“There are no regulations in India on safeguards over and procedures for the collection, processing, storage, retention, access, disclosure, destruction, and anonymization of sensitive personal information by any service provider,” according to a 2016 World Bank report.

A patchwork of rules outlining “reasonable security practices and procedures” for personal data has accumulated since Aadhaar was launched, but there is no codified law outlining how data in the system must be secured, or what penalties exist for potential leaks, fraud or misuse.

“Imagine a situation where the police (are) secretly capturing the iris data of protesters and then identifying them through their biometric records” – Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore

This regulatory gap poses a particularly acute risk now that the government has begun offering companies and app developers support for starting new businesses that use Aadhaar data. Through a new initiative called IndiaStack, the administration is providing open program interfaces for companies in fintech, healthcare, and other areas to integrate Aadhaar-based transactions into their business platforms. While IndiaStack’s terms of use explicitly state that user consent is required for any information sharing between service providers and the Aadhaar database, doubts remain about the integrity of the network infrastructure and the lack of clarity surrounding acceptable information sharing and storing protocols.

Another source of concern is the risk that Aadhaar information could be leveraged by the government itself for political purposes.

“Maintaining a central database is akin to getting the keys of every house in Delhi and storing them at a central police station,” Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society in Bangalore, told Reuters. “It is very easy to capture iris data of any individual with the use of next generation cameras. Imagine a situation where the police (are) secretly capturing the iris data of protesters and then identifying them through their biometric records.”

Further stoking fears of federal overreach, the Modi administration has attempted to make Aadhaar registration mandatory in certain sectors, violating a Supreme Court ruling from October 2015 that enrollment must remain voluntary.

Still, the benefits of building on the Aadhaar identity system appear to be outweighing the risks for now, and the system is gathering momentum worldwide. The World Bank is helping market the Aadhaar model abroad, and Russia, Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria have all expressed interest in instituting national biometric identity programs of their own. Microsoft is already on board, and Google is negotiating ways to get involved.

Aadhaar may indeed live up to is potential and become the global standard for universal legal identity, but until India can manage to create more robust mechanisms to protect citizens’ personal data, their security could remain uncertain.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/one-world-indentity-kaelyn-lowmaster-march-17-2017-privacy-concerns-multiply-for-aadhaar-indias-national-biometric-identity-registry

Review Meeting for the Pervasive Technologies Project

praskrishna — 2017-03-22T14:25:50Z

The Centre for Internet & Society in partnership with Beijing Normal University Institute for Internet Policy & Law organized a review meeting of the Pervasive Technologies project in Macau on February 20 - 21, 2017.

Sunil Abraham, Anubha Sinha, Rohini Lakshane and Vidushi Marda were speakers. Sunil introduced the participants to the Pervasive Technologies project. Anubha Sinha spoke on Intellectual Property in Mobile App Development in India. Vidushi Marda gave a talk on Competition Law and Standard Essential Patents. Rohini Lakshane gave a talk on Patent Landscaping in the Indian Mobile Device Marketplace. The agenda can be accessed here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/review-meeting-for-the-pervasive-technologies-project

Review Meeting for PT Project

praskrishna — 2017-03-22T14:24:41Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/files/review-meeting-pt-project.pdf

No ID, no benefits: thousands could lose lifeline under India’s biometric scheme

praskrishna — 2017-03-22T14:27:25Z

Controversial Aadhaar card restricts fundamental rights, argue critics, limiting access to free school meals and exposing 1 billion people to privacy risks.

The article was published in the Guardian on March 21, 2017. Sumandro Chattapadhyay was quoted.

An Aadhaar biometric identity card, which will be mandatory for Indians to access many essential government services and benefits. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

Hundreds of thousands of people in India could be left without essential government services and benefits – including free school meals and uniforms, food subsidies and pensions – under new rules that make access to more than three dozen state-funded schemes conditional on showing identification.

Over the past month, citizens have been notified that they have to prove their identity with a biometric ID, known as an Aadhaar card, to be eligible to use various services. Booking railway tickets online, applying for some jobs, and getting fuel subsidies will also be dependent on showing the controversial card.

Aadhaar cards were introduced by the Indian government in 2009, and rolled out by prime minister Narendra Modi in 2014. They record personal biometric data, including fingerprints and eye scans, which the government says allows it to ensure that welfare services are being delivered to those who really need them, and saving billions of rupees by reducing welfare fraud.

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), which oversees the Aadhaar programme, says that more than 1.13 billion people have been enrolled on an official database. But activists say that hundreds of thousands of Indians and migrants are still undocumented and could miss out on their fundamental rights because of the new rules.

“What if a Facebook account was necessary to log in to the internet, and what if Facebook was owned by the government of the US?” asked Sumandro Chattapadhyay, research director at the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), a thinktank with offices in Bangalore and Delhi. “We are building a system that will decide whether a child will eat or not on an afternoon based on [the] quality of internet connectivity and cleanliness of the child’s thumbprint.”

Chattapadhyay argued that Aadhaar, which is effectively being forced upon Indians, and which is used increasingly by private companies, exposed more than a billion people to huge privacy risks.

“The Aadhaar ID is being connected to digital communications via sim card registration, it is being connected to financial transactions via bank accounts, and all Indian citizens are being forced to enrol for it against the threat of losing out from welfare services,” he said.

“The potential of unmonitored and unregulated use of such linked data by the private sector is massive. It does not matter if the Indian state will finally go ahead with implementing this system or not. The fact that [it] is considering such a system is scary enough.”

Nanu Bhasin, spokesperson at the ministry of women and child development, confirmed that the order to link Aadhaar to government schemes had come directly from the Modi government. “There are leakages in the system,” she said. “This will plug leakages.”

Bhasin said Aadhaar was now mandatory: “You have to take it, it is necessary. You cannot take the right to a benefit if you don’t have the Aadhaar card.”

She said she did not know if those who did not want to enrol in the scheme because of potential privacy risks would still be able to receive benefits. “You have bank accounts, there you give all your details, everything. Why make a fuss [about privacy] for Aadhaar?” she said.

One of the most contentious new rules introduced this month, and coming into force in July, requires children to show Aadhaar cards to get free school meals. The notice led to a media storm in India, where malnutrition rates are high and nearly 60 million children are underweight.

On 7 March the government said alternative forms of ID would be accepted for free school meals where people did not yet have Aadhaar cards, and urged schools and childcare centres to enrol all attendees.

Activists argue that setting any barriers to free school meals is unethical and unconstitutional. Ambarish Rai, national convenor of the Right to Education Forum, said: “This is a very insensitive decision of the government. How can you make it mandatory? It is a clear-cut violation of the Right to Education Act 2009.”

Compulsory identification could deter school attendance if children struggle to get free school meals or uniforms, said Swati Narayan, visiting research scholar from the LSE and food activist. “India’s school meal programme covers almost 100 million children – the largest in the world. Instead of creating unnecessary barriers, the focus should be on how to improve these modest meals by adding eggs, fruit and nutritious foods to the menu.”

Glitches in the Aadhaar system have already led to reports of people being unfairly denied government subsidies. In February, the news website Scroll recorded a number of people in the state of Jharkhand being denied rice subsidies because of problems with Aadhaar card machines.

The constitutional validity of the government’s new orders is currently being debated in court, with questions raised as to whether the Indian parliament can restrict fundamental rights enshrined in the constitution, and whether the government has the power to force citizens to enrol.

In 2015, a supreme court order had ruled that the scheme was purely voluntary, and that it could not become mandatory with a court ruling. But in 2016, parliament passed the Aadhaar Act, which allowed the government to require identification for government services.

Khagesh Jha, a lawyer and activist, argued that the act was fundamentally unconstitutional. “Rescued children, children who have been trafficked or those who have been forced into child labour – [you] can’t expect them to hold an Aadhaar card or documents like a birth certificate. Right to education is a fundamental right, and is protected by the core of the constitution. It cannot be challenged by any other document.”

UIDAI, the agency overseeing Aadhaar, issued a statement saying the government had made savings of more than 490bn rupees (£6bn) in the past two and a half years, thanks to schemes linking government benefits to Aadhaar. It added that during the past seven years, there had been no report of a breach or leak of residents’ data.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-guardian-march-21-2017-no-id-no-benefits

Pervasive Technologies Project in Hong Kong

praskrishna — 2017-03-20T16:09:22Z

Digital Asia Hub and the United Nations University Institute on Computing and Society (UNU-CS) held a new networking initiative. Digital Asia Hub and the United Nations University Institute on Computing and Society co-hosted a series of events aimed at fostering engagement and knowledge sharing at the intersection of technology, society, law, policy and international development.

CIS shared its insights on the Pervasive Technologies project.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/pervasive-technologies-project-in-hong-kong

EVMs: How transparent is the Indian election process?

praskrishna — 2017-03-17T01:57:19Z

Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) have become a bone of contention after the results of the Assembly elections in five states were declared last Saturday and the BSP president Mayawati alleged tampering. The Congress party and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) have called for a probe into her allegation. Social media too is abuzz with messages and videos showing how the machines can be allegedly manipulated to sway the votes in favour of a particular candidate.

The article by Smriti Sharma Vasudeva was published in the Statesman on March 14, 2017. Pranesh Prakash was quoted.

Overnight, several videos on Whatsapp have surfaced wherein people can be seen explaining the "mechanism" on how to alter the votes polled for a candidate in another candidate's favour. Several similar posts and articles are doing the rounds on Facebook.

BBC added fuel to the fire when it shared a 2010 article on how 'US "Scientists" hack India Electronic Machines' . The article details how scientists at a US university say they have developed a technique to hack into Indian electronic voting machines. While the article was posted on the BBC website a day after the election results were declared, it drew considerable flak from users on Facebook who criticised the website for its 'irresponsible' act of sharing an article with a "click bait" headline just to grab eyeballs.

Amid all this frenzy, the Election Commission of India has issued statements clarifying how the entire process is transparent and fool proof and tampering with the EVMs is a far-fetched thing given the checks and balances in place. For instance, the EVMs undergo the process of randomisation wherein which machine will go to which constituency and to which booth is not known to anyone till the last moment. Similarly, before the polling starts, mock polling takes place in the presence of representatives of all the political parties and then each of these machines are tested and a satisfactory report is generated and only after that polling begins.

However, all these checks and balances still do not ensure a fool proof system if experts are to be believed.

Pranesh Prakash, Policy Director for The Centre for Internet and Society, a non-profit organisation that undertakes interdisciplinary research on internet and digital technologies from policy and academic perspectives, said: "The Electronic Voting Machines used in India are the simplest, with no large operating system requirements and are not networked. Thus, from a software design perspective, these are really good and the chances of these being tampered with are bleaker. However it doesn't mean these are fool proof. Most of the developed countries do not trust these machines and these are definitely not secure enough for democratic elections.

"While there are many advantages of using EVMs in the electoral process over the traditional ballot papers, still there are many ways in which one can tamper with these machines without any technical ingenuity. The best way is to make use of the EVMs and ensure that the Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) are effectively utilised to make it an overall effective system".

Recently, the Supreme Court had mandated that VVPAT machines should be used in all the polls and thus the Election Commission had installed VVPAT machines in several constituencies. However, not sure of the efficacy of this system, the Election Commission had itself raised apprehensions regarding performance of the paper-trail machine, which gives a receipt to the voter, verifying the vote went in favour of the candidate against whose name the button was pressed on the electronic voting machine.a

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/the-statesman-smriti-sharma-vasudeva-march-14-2017-evms-how-transparent-is-the-indian-election-process

Nasscom chief saying full data protection isn’t possible should wake us from our digital slumber

praskrishna — 2017-03-17T01:47:25Z

Considering India is rapidly moving towards a digital economy, the hurdles not withstanding, data and identity security are topics which have to be taken very seriously. Since the demonetisation, a large part of the population who would never bother with digital transactions has suddenly come online. But there is no such thing as complete security of personal data, according to Nasscom chief R Chandrashekhar.

This was published by First Post on March 16, 2017. Pranesh Prakash was quoted.

Attending the World Consumer Rights Day, R Chandrashekhar said that personal data of online consumers cannot be completely secure and stressed on the need to have strict enforcement of consumer protection laws. Speaking to PTI, Chandrashekhar said, “More than 3 million credit card data details were misused recently. Let us face it, these kind of security breaches will take place. There is nothing called fully perfect security in IT.”

It’s high time we call a spade, a spade

R Chandrashekhar, President Nasscom. Image: PIB

Coming from the head of Nasscom, this announcement pertaining to security is very important. According to Chandrashekhar one cannot expect complete cyber security, but there are definitely ways in which such attacks and incidents can be minimised. He very rightly said that that protecting the online consumer data, specially looking at how rapidly e-commerce is growing in the country, is of prime importance.

One cannot help but agree with Chandrashekhar, specially considering the fact India does not have a privacy law ecosystem that is present in countries such as the US and the UK, where online consumer protection is taken very seriously. Germany and other EU nations have always been at the forefront, when it comes to protecting data privacy, and it has ensured that consumer-facing technology companies do not run roughshod when it comes to protecting user data.

Chandrashekhar stated that there was no need for separate regulations for e-commerce sites, but the priority was ensuring means to enforce consumer laws in the digital world.

Lack of dedicated privacy laws

According to cyberlaw and cybersecurity expert, Pavan Duggal, “Going forward, there is an urgent need for India to take a strong view on privacy in terms of legislative frameworks. Unfortunately, at the time of writing, India does not have a dedicated law on privacy.”

Image: Foamy Media

Social media websites for instance have a lot of user data. But what happens when they suddenly change their privacy policies? For instance, a lot of users signed on to WhatsApp when it was an independent company. But post the Facebook acquisition, there have been a lot of instances where WhatsApp has updated its terms and conditions to suit its parent Facebook.

That’s not completely illegal one may say. Loss of privacy is a price you pay for free services. But what if, I as a consumer of WhatsApp do not want the app to share any of my data with Facebook? The only option I am left with is to delete WhatsApp. But then again, I do not know if my data is also deleted from WhatsApp servers or it has already been shared. Social media apps, only let you know what updates are being added. Consent is only required to update the app. You can stall that, up to a point. But there will come a time when you will have to update an app. Then by default you have given approval to all the terms and conditions associated with the app.

Two students had challenged WhatsApp’s revision to its privacy policy before Delhi High Court. The Court dismissed the petition insisting that users could opt out by deleting their accounts.

When a similar challenge was mounted before the authorities in UK, Facebook had to put a pause on their data sharing – and this was because of its strong data protection policy. Under the UK data protection law, the company has to inform the authority established under the Act of any changes in the use of user data. In the case of WhatsApp, the UK authority objected to such sharing.

Aadhaar – the 12-digit biometric storehouse

Aadhaar card is being used for many financial and non financial transactions. Also the Aadhaar number associated with an individual also holds a lot of personal and biometric data. So when recently, there was news about a possible Aadhaar data breach when UIDAI filed a police complaint against Axis Bank, business correspondent Suvidhaa Infoserve and e-sign provider eMudhra, it was naturally a shock to many.

Unlike a password which can be changed, with biometric information there is no scope to do that if it is compromised. Although UIDAI claims that there are multiple levels of security and firewalls to ensure there is no breach of Aadhaar information of an individual, one can only hope that it is robust enough to withstand any attack. Collection of biometric data by the government to form a database, for instance, was debated and ultimately not used in the UK.

Pranesh Prakash, policy director of the Centre for Internet and Society, expressed concern about the pace at which we are progressing when it comes to having a legal and regulatory framework when it comes to the Digital India push. “While the security architecture of Aadhaar Enabled Payment Systems (AEPS) might in itself be good, the idea of providing your fingerprints to merchants for financial transactions is a terrible idea since that is like asking you to give your bank password to a merchant, and the merchant can reuse that password, and you can’t ever change the password,” said Prakash.

Enforcing the correct processes

Last year, a malware affected the systems of Hitachi Payment Services, which provides back end services to ATM machines and Point of Sale nodes across India. As a result of this, around 32 lakh debit cards were compromised including those issued by SBI, HDFC, Yes Bank, Axis, BOB and ICICI. Security experts and consultants have pointed out various holes in the electronic transaction systems in place in India. Intel has also warned that ATM machines in India are vulnerable to malicious attacks. Intel points out that countries in the Asia Pacific region are developing and are particularly vulnerable because of old systems and machines being used.

Image: REUTERS/Amit Dave

According to Mahesh Patel, president and group CTO, AGS Transact Technologies this was more of a governance issue of the data centre than any technical error. “It is not about the software, but it is about the processes and procedures you put in place to ensure that the system is secure. Everything from physical security to computing security to admin management, etc should be process driven. So somewhere there could have been a weak link there. Cloud has to be secure and encrypted which suffices the use case of payments. This cloud is different from the ones used by e-commerce sites to display all their products,” said Patel.

We may have the best of software and security measures, but ensuring that they are implemented the right way is equally important. Plugging the loopholes in current regulations is also important.

Existing laws and regulations, not enough

According to Duggal, “The Information Technology Act, 2000 hardly has effective provisions to protect any data and personal privacy in the digital ecosystem. The Indian Government needs to come up with strong privacy law which can protect both personal privacy and data privacy in an effective manner.”

One may find it really shocking to hear the head of Nasscom saying something to the extent that full data protection for online consumers is not possible, but there is definitely truth to the matter. It will require concerted efforts from not only regulators, governments, digital wallet players and banking industry to come up with these privacy laws, but also you the consumer has to ensure that you are aware of the dangers lurking in the digital world. Educating oneself of the various ways in which your data can be compromised is a good way to protect your online self.

Because, let’s face it, for all practical purposes if you are online, your privacy is dead.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/first-post-march-16-nimish-sawant-nasscom-chief-saying-full-data-protection-isnt-possible-should-wake-us-from-our-digital-slumber

AI for Social Good

praskrishna — 2017-03-15T01:22:42Z

AI in Asia event was organised by the Digital Asia Hub on March 6 and 7, 2017 in Tokyo, Japan. The event partners were Waseda University, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, NICT, NTT and the Japan Society of Information and Communication Research. Udbhav Tiwari attended the event.

Udbhav Tiwari presented a small (2 minute) lighting talk on the Autonomous Weapons Design section as a part of the 'Interactive Exercise on Next Steps for the Academic Community session', with the IEEE Ethically Aligned Design document as a guiding note. Read the executive summary here. See the workshop agenda here.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/ai-for-social-good

AI in Asia, Tokyo - Agenda

praskrishna — 2017-03-15T01:21:42Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/files/ai-in-asia-tokyo-agenda

Executive Summary: AI in Asia Event

praskrishna — 2017-03-15T01:19:09Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/files/executive-summary-ai-in-asia-event

Workshop on Net Neutrality

praskrishna — 2017-03-15T00:49:40Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/files/workshop-on-net-neutrality

Essentials of building internet tools for inclusion

praskrishna — 2017-03-14T14:38:23Z

A talk jointly proposed by Chinmayi SK and Rohini Lakshané was selected for the Internet Freedom Festival held at Valencia, Spain from March 6 to 10, 2017. The talk held on March 6, 2017 was jointly organized by Random Hacks of Kindness, The Bachchao Project, and the Centre for Internet and Society.

For the full schedule of Internet Freedom Festival, click here. A manual titled Building Tech for Diversity and Inclusion 101 jointly authored by Chinmayi S.K., Rohini Lakshané and Willow Brugh was released during the event.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/events/essentials-of-building-internet-tools-for-inclusion

First Asia Pacific Workshop on Empirical Methods in Innovation, Intellectual Property and Competition

praskrishna — 2017-03-14T14:14:12Z

Rohini Lakshané took part in a workshop organized by Centre for Innovation Intellectual Property & Competition in New Delhi from March 9 to 11, 2017.

The workshop was open for legal academicians (who are working in the areas of intellectual property law and/or competition law) and regulators working with intellectual property law and competition law issues in the Asia-Pacific region. Click here for the Agenda. More details on Spicy IP Blog here

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/news/first-asia-pacific-workshop-on-empirical-methods-in-innovation-intellectual-property-and-competition

CIIPC Asia Pacific Workshop on Empirical Methods in Innovation IP and Competition

praskrishna — 2017-03-14T14:10:14Z

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/a2k/files/ciipc-asia-pacific-workshop-on-empirical-methods-in-innovation-ip-and-competition

The 12-digit conundrum

praskrishna — 2017-03-14T13:50:05Z

Even as the Centre plans to link as many as 500 schemes to Aadhaar, concerns over data safety are rising. Richa Mishra reports.

The article by Richa Mishra was published in the Hindu Businessline on March 13, 2017. Sunil Abraham was quoted.

The developments of last few weeks seem to have made real some of the worst fears about Aadhaar. In February, UIDAI (Unique Identification Authority of India) filed a police complaint alleging attempts of unauthorised authentication and impersonation of data related to Aadhaar. Since then, each and every machinery within the government has been trying to convince otherwise, that Aadhaar database is safe and secure, and that the data is protected both by the best available advanced technology as well as by the stringent legal provisions in the Aadhaar Act.

Not everyone is convinced. Critics say, biometrics only make the citizen transparent to the State, it does not make the State transparent to citizens. “We warned the government six years ago, but they ignored us,” said Sunil Abraham, Executive Director of Bengaluru-based research organisation, Centre for Internet and Society. According to him, the legislation implementing Aadhaar has almost no data protection guarantees for citizens. He also believes that by opting for biometrics instead of smart cards the government is using surveillance technology instead of e-governance technology.

“Biometrics is remote, covert and non-consensual identification technology. It is totally inappropriate for authentication. This has only increased the fragility of Indian cyber security,” he stresses.

However, officials associated with UIDAI dismiss these arguments. Collecting biometrics does not pose any threat to the right to privacy because people have been giving their thumb impression for ages, they say. “The biometrics are encrypted at source and kept safe and secure. Unauthorised sharing and leakage of the data does not happen. Fears related to collection of biometrics are not justified,” an official at the helm of affairs said. He requested anonymity.

“However, as and when we find that some suspicious activity or misuse is happening, we will strike at the very beginning itself. UIDAI has full authentication regulation under the Aadhaar Act that has to be followed. It specifies in what manner authorities can use Aadhaar,” the official pointed out.

On the ground

Even as the debate over data security rages, the aam aadmi seem to be little perturbed about the alleged risks involved. For Padmini, who works as a domestic help in East Delhi and is the sole bread earner for her family of four, the Aadhaar card meant access to all government benefits.

“Koi farak nahi padta, kaun dekhta hai mera card. Mujhko LPG cylinder ka paisa bank mein mil jata hai,” (It doesn’t matter to me who sees my card. The subsidy for LPG gets transferred to my account) she says. “Baccho ke school admission mein bhi zaroorat pada,” (I needed it to get my children’s admission in school), she added. Sukh, a cab driver also uses it to get the LPG subsidy.

While everyone BusinessLine talked to were convinced that Aadhaar was not a citizenship card, the more aware ones saw it as a door that gave access to government schemes.

While they had a point, government officials are careful to make it clear that Aadhaar is not mandatory. But the popular perception increasingly points to the opposite view, especially after it emerged that Aadhaar might be made mandatory for children to receive midday meals at schools.

Another senior government official said, “Aadhaar is not mandatory under any welfare scheme of the government and no one is being deprived of a service or benefit for the want of Aadhaar…it’s required for availing a service/subsidy/benefit that accrues through the Consolidated Fund of India.” He added that those who do not have the 12-digit number would be provided with the facility to enrol by the Requiring Agency. “And till the time Aadhaar is assigned, alternative IDs would be allowed,” he said.

If a school which has to get Aadhaar enrolment done for its students puts the Aadhaar numbers of its students on its site and the same is used by someone, you can’t blame us, the official argues. Then, who is accountable?

Pushing for Aadhaar, the UIDAI officials cite the example of Kerala’s Department of General Education (DGE), which has integrated Aadhaar with the student databases and has thereby optimised the teacher-student ratio and identified the schools with excess teachers. In a single academic year, 3,892 excess teacher posts were identified.

“Due to this exercise, no new posts have been sanctioned for the last two years, resulting in notional savings of ₹540 crore per annum,” said a UIDAI official. After student enrolment in the state was linked to Aadhaar since 2012-2013, the head count of pupils have fallen by 5 lakh. Similar trends have been reported in Haryana. Critics have also pointed out the possible security risk in using AadhaarPay, the Andriod-based app. Merchants can download the app in their phone and install a fingerprint scanner linked to the phone. Customers with Aadhaar numbers can use their fingerprints (like the secret PIN in case of debit cards) to do a transaction. While doubts have been raised about the safety of fingerprint data, officials in the know blame the controversy on the “card lobbies.”

“Thirty crore Indians have no mobiles. They find it difficult to handle password, pin or card, this is where AadhaarPay will come handy,” the official added. “They don’t need a smart phone or feature phone. They don’t need a debit card.

“Today more than 112 crore people have the Aadhaar card. Approximately, 52.95 crore people have linked their Aadhaar numbers to their bank accounts. We already have a system of Aadhaar authentication in place,” the official added.

Government officials are at pain to point out the larger benefits of Aadhaar, including savings of more than ₹49,000 crore by plugging leakages in government schemes like PDS. Government plans to increase the number of welfare schemes linked to Aadhaar from 36 to over 500. While the intent is good, concerns remain.

For more details visit http://editors.cis-india.org/internet-governance/news/richa-mishra-hindu-businessline-march-13-2017-the-12-digit-conundrum