In 2009, I became extremely concerned with the concept of Unique Identity for various reasons. Connected with many like minded highly educated people who were all concerned.
On 18th May 2010, I started this Blog to capture anything and everything I came across on the topic. This blog with its million hits is a testament to my concerns about loss of privacy and fear of the ID being misused and possible Criminal activities it could lead to.
In 2017 the Supreme Court of India gave its verdict after one of the longest hearings on any issue. I did my bit and appealed to the Supreme Court Judges too through an On Line Petition.
In 2019 the Aadhaar Legislation has been revised and passed by the two houses of the Parliament of India making it Legal. I am no Legal Eagle so my Opinion carries no weight except with people opposed to the very concept.
In 2019, this Blog now just captures on a Daily Basis list of Articles Published on anything to do with Aadhaar as obtained from Daily Google Searches and nothing more. Cannot burn the midnight candle any longer.
"In Matters of Conscience, the Law of Majority has no place"- Mahatma Gandhi
Ram Krishnaswamy
Sydney, Australia.

Aadhaar

The UIDAI has taken two successive governments in India and the entire world for a ride. It identifies nothing. It is not unique. The entire UID data has never been verified and audited. The UID cannot be used for governance, financial databases or anything. It’s use is the biggest threat to national security since independence. – Anupam Saraph 2018

When I opposed Aadhaar in 2010 , I was called a BJP stooge. In 2016 I am still opposing Aadhaar for the same reasons and I am told I am a Congress die hard. No one wants to see why I oppose Aadhaar as it is too difficult. Plus Aadhaar is FREE so why not get one ? Ram Krishnaswamy

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.-Mahatma Gandhi

In matters of conscience, the law of the majority has no place.Mahatma Gandhi

“The invasion of privacy is of no consequence because privacy is not a fundamental right and has no meaning under Article 21. The right to privacy is not a guaranteed under the constitution, because privacy is not a fundamental right.” Article 21 of the Indian constitution refers to the right to life and liberty -Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi

“There is merit in the complaints. You are unwittingly allowing snooping, harassment and commercial exploitation. The information about an individual obtained by the UIDAI while issuing an Aadhaar card shall not be used for any other purpose, save as above, except as may be directed by a court for the purpose of criminal investigation.”-A three judge bench headed by Justice J Chelameswar said in an interim order.

Legal scholar Usha Ramanathan describes UID as an inverse of sunshine laws like the Right to Information. While the RTI makes the state transparent to the citizen, the UID does the inverse: it makes the citizen transparent to the state, she says.

Good idea gone bad
I have written earlier that UID/Aadhaar was a poorly designed, unreliable and expensive solution to the really good idea of providing national identification for over a billion Indians. My petition contends that UID in its current form violates the right to privacy of a citizen, guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution. This is because sensitive biometric and demographic information of citizens are with enrolment agencies, registrars and sub-registrars who have no legal liability for any misuse of this data. This petition has opened up the larger discussion on privacy rights for Indians. The current Article 21 interpretation by the Supreme Court was done decades ago, before the advent of internet and today’s technology and all the new privacy challenges that have arisen as a consequence.

Rajeev Chandrasekhar, MP Rajya Sabha

“What is Aadhaar? There is enormous confusion. That Aadhaar will identify people who are entitled for subsidy. No. Aadhaar doesn’t determine who is eligible and who isn’t,” Jairam Ramesh

But Aadhaar has been mythologised during the previous government by its creators into some technology super force that will transform governance in a miraculous manner. I even read an article recently that compared Aadhaar to some revolution and quoted a 1930s historian, Will Durant.Rajeev Chandrasekhar, Rajya Sabha MP

“I know you will say that it is not mandatory. But, it is compulsorily mandatorily voluntary,” Jairam Ramesh, Rajya Saba April 2017.

August 24, 2017: The nine-judge Constitution Bench rules that right to privacy is “intrinsic to life and liberty”and is inherently protected under the various fundamental freedoms enshrined under Part III of the Indian Constitution

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the World; indeed it's the only thing that ever has"

“Arguing that you don’t care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don’t care about free speech because you have nothing to say.” -Edward Snowden

In the Supreme Court, Meenakshi Arora, one of the senior counsel in the case, compared it to living under a general, perpetual, nation-wide criminal warrant.

Had never thought of it that way, but living in the Aadhaar universe is like living in a prison. All of us are treated like criminals with barely any rights or recourse and gatekeepers have absolute power on you and your life.

Announcing the launch of the # BreakAadhaarChainscampaign, culminating with events in multiple cities on 12th Jan. This is the last opportunity to make your voice heard before the Supreme Court hearings start on 17th Jan 2018. In collaboration with @no2uidand@rozi_roti.

UIDAI's security seems to be founded on four time tested pillars of security idiocy

1) Denial

2) Issue fiats and point finger

3) Shoot messenger

4) Bury head in sand.

God Save India

Tuesday, May 16, 2017

11408 - Aadhaar is completely secure; UIDAI chairman J Satyanarayana explains why - Financial Express


The question of data breach and security issue doesn’t arise at all in the government’s ambitious unique identity programme, stresses J Satyanarayana, chairman, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and advisor (IT), government of Andhra Pradesh.
By: Sudhir Chowdhary | New Delhi | Published: May 15, 2017 3:55 AM

The question of data breach and security issue doesn’t arise at all in the government’s ambitious unique identity programme, stresses J Satyanarayana, chairman, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and advisor (IT), government of Andhra Pradesh. Satyanarayana has been associated with the design and implementation of over 20 major e-government projects at the state and national levels; he is best known as the founder of eSeva, a one-stop-shop for citizen services in Andhra Pradesh. A key speaker at the Oracle Open World in New Delhi last week, Satyanarayana tells Sudhir Chowdhary that India’s digital transformation will significantly improve the quality of government services and increase transparency in its style of working. Excerpts:
The Digital India programme was announced in 2014. How is it keeping pace with an extremely dynamic technology world?
Digital India is more of an approach and a philosophy. It was sufficiently generic when it was originally designed. The very purpose of designing Digital India was deliberate so that it can be adaptive to technology. It is reasonably future-proof.
So, as some of these government projects are being put in place, they are designed in a manner to not only embrace the latest technology but also remain relevant for the next two to five years or even more. A case in point is the Aadhaar project conceptualised in 2009-2010; robust, scalable and future-proof largely. The Aadhaar cards and data are expected to last a citizen’s lifecycle. Technology progression and innovations should not be seen as potential threats to legacy applications and should be able to co-exist and adapt to each other.

What is e-Pragati project and what lessons can be drawn from it in the larger context of government of India?
E-Pragati is again a philosophy with the vision of creating ‘One’ government. It follows the approach of adopting enterprise architecture principles not only with the purpose of delivering services but good governance in particular. The sole purpose of ‘One’government is to streamline multiple departments and hundreds of agencies to work in tandem with each other for better governance of the state and the nation.
Translating this into reality is fairly simple and I would draw its analogy with the way and manner in which global multinationals function. A conglomerate can have multiple offices and an array of businesses but it follows similar processes, is bound by same principles and is identified by a common brand and set of brand values. The same blueprint can be applied to governance. E-Pragati is a step towards that at a state level. March 1 this year has been declared as the year of e-Pragati and gradually all government departments are expected to transcend towards convergence.
What is the status on e-Pragati currently?
We are currently in the process of submitting our recommendations for this project. It has been christened ‘IndEA—India Enterprise Architecture’ as the idea is to create resonance and value for this project within the citizens. We have designed different models and will be submitting our technology framework proposal to the government for a national rollout. While e-Pragati in in the process of being rolled out in Andhra Pradesh, it is currently still a concept at the national level and only at the stage of submission to the central government.
Is Aadhaar secure? What potential changes or additions can be done to improve its privacy and security?
It is completely secure. The moot point is that Aadhaar isn’t connected to the internet. Most people believe that your biometrics is taken, put on the internet and is visible and accessible to all. This is technologically not feasible, legally not permissible and organisationally not possible. So I would say it is 300% secure by nature. Data is captured, immediately encrypted and passed on to the data centre, where it is taken to our servers in UIDAI. UIDAI servers are not on the internet. There is a wall separating them from the SAs and infrastructure of UIDAI. It is a physical demarcation. Hence, the question of data breach and security issue doesn’t arise at all.
Coming to the second part of your question, improvement is an ongoing process. We have a professional unit in place managed by PwC to oversee and evaluate various security aspects and threat situations on a 24×7 basis. We have a significantly strong and large security operation centre based in Delhi, overseeing the infrastructure at Bengaluru and the disaster recovery at Manesar. We have deployed about 7,000 servers, accessible at our centre in Delhi round the clock.

Could you throw some light on how technology and Digital India will address employment, skill development, rural and agricultural growth in the country?
Digital India is not about e-governance; it isn’t about electronics, IT, servers or mobility. These are actually various components and definitely contribute towards Digital India and what it seeks to achieve. However, at the end of the day, if you have good governance, it yields results. So, in all these areas like agriculture, healthcare, and employment, the respective domain needs reform and re-engineering.
It is the government that needs to change and the change needs to be fast signifying re-engineered and re-imagined processes and freshly designed innovative services. Technology cannot overhaul things overnight. The lesson is to introspect first and then embrace the right technology and IT.