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

Monday, September 11, 2017

12014 - What is the Indian government’s DigiLocker platform? - Open Gov Asia

What is the Indian government’s DigiLocker platform?

Though usage remains limited, increased integration with government services and uptake by citizens could make it a key driver in India’s shift to e-governance.

08/09/2017
By Priyankar Bhunia


Digital Locker ecosystem (Image credit: MeitY)
On September 7, the Indian government announced the integration of Driving Licenses (DL) & Vehicle Registration Certificates (RC) with its dedicated cloud storage space service, called Digital Locker or DigiLocker. Following this integration people will no longer need to carry around physical copies of their RCs and Driving Licences.
They can instead access digital copies of the same on their mobile phones via the DigiLocker mobile app. DL and RC documents can now be issued directly by the authorities to the DigiLockers of individuals in digital formats. These digital copies can be shared with other departments as identity and address proof.
They will also be used for on the spot verification through the citizens’ mobile, by various law enforcement authorities like the Traffic Police. In addition to boosting convenience, this will also result in assured authenticity of such documents and reduction of administrative overhead.
Education Boards have started issuing digitally signed copies of marksheets and graduation certificates to candidates into DigiLocker, in addition to the traditional hard copies. Banks (here and here) are integrating their digital banking systems with DigiLocker. Digital LPG subscription vouchers are available in DigiLocker through a partnership between the Ministry of Petroleum and public sector petroleum companies, such as Indian Oil Corp. Ltd., Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd. and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. Ltd.
So, what is DigiLocker?
In May this year,  NITI Aayog (National Institution for Transforming India), the premier policy ‘Think Tank’ of the Government of India, released its Three Year Action Agenda, 2017-18 to 2019-20. The Agenda identified three key enablers, to provide the backbone for digitisation of the government’s end-to-end service delivery. One is the by now well-known Aadhaar, a 12-digit unique national identity number, assigned by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI). Over 85% of India’s population had enrolled as of July 2017.
While Aadhaar is supposed to take care of the identity and authentication aspects, eSign and digital lockers are expected to provide two other crucial pieces of the e-governance jigsaw.
DigiLocker, which was officially launched in July 2015, provides a dedicated cloud storage space to Indian citizens who sign up for an account. It provides a platform for digital issuance and verification of documents & certificates, such as driving licenses, voter identification, school certificates etc. 

mage credit: MeitY
There are three primary stakeholders in the DigiLocker system: 1) Issuer: Entity issuing e-documents to individuals in a standard format and making them electronically available e.g. Education Bords, Registrar Office, Income Tax department, etc.; 2) Requester: Entity requesting secure access to a particular e-document stored within a repository (e.g. University, Passport Office, Regional Transport Office, etc.); and 3) Resident: An individual who uses the Digital Locker service based on Aadhaar number.
The main technology components of the DigiLocker system are the Repository (Collection of e-documents that is exposed via standard APIs for secure, real-time access); an Access Gateway (a secure online mechanism for requesters to access e-documents from various repositories in real-time using Uniform Resource Indicator or URI, a string of characters used to identify a resource) and the DigiLocker Portal.
Account creation
An account can be created by using a mobile number which is authenticated by sending an OTP (one-time password), followed by the selection of a username & password.
In January 2017, UIDAI was integrated with DigiLocker as a registered issuer. After the DigiLocker account is successfully created, the citizen can voluntarily provide their Aadhaar number to avail additional services. The Aadhaar authentication can be done either via an OTP sent to an Aadhaar registered mobile number or by using fingerprint.
Adding documents
Documents are added to DigiLocker via two routes. The first is a push mechanism, where the issuing authority’s database is seeded with the Aadhaar number of the citizen. Once a registered of the document issues an e-document for a particular Aadhaar number and the respective DigiLocker account already exists for that Aadhaar number, the URI for that document will be get pushed automatically into DigiLocker.
When the issuer database does not contain the seeded Aadhaar number but the issuer has a partnership with DigiLocker, citizens can log into DigiLocker and pull their record from the issuer database using some common search parameters. Once the record is fetched, a permanent link to it can be saved in the issued document section.
In both cases described above, the URI (link) is available in the issued documents section. This link directly fetches the document in real-time from the original data source.
Citizens can also upload scanned copies of their legacy documents in their accounts. These legacy documents can be electronically signed using the eSign facility.
The documents issued into DigiLocker do not exist in the form of a separate copy. Only a reference link to the original source is provided. Whereas, for the documents uploaded by the citizens can be accessed in a manner similar to Google Drive or DropBox. 1 GB of storage space is provided for the uploaded documents.
Benefits
The platform enables citizens to access their digital documents anytime, anywhere and share it online. It reduces the administrative overhead of government departments through an efficient, paperless process. It also makes it easier to validate the authenticity of documents as they are issued directly by the registered issuers. Self-uploaded documents can be digitally signed using the eSign facility (which is similar to the process of self-attestation).

DigiLocker mobile app screenshots (Image credit: MeitY)
Uptake
According to the latest statistics, as of August 2017, there were more than 8 million registered users in DigiLocker (around 0.6% of India’s population on a base of around 1.3 billion). There are 34 issuer organisations and 14 requestor organisations at the moment. The states of Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra had the highest number of Aadhaar-linked accounts at 316805, 270602 and 254457 respectively.
The complete list of documents, registered issuers and requesting authorities can be accessed under different tabs on the statistics page: https://digilocker.gov.in/public/dashboard.
In March 2017, the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) invited applications for licensing of Digital Locker Service Providers (DLSPs). Applicants will build their digital locker service in conformance to the Digital Locker Technology Framework and security and procedural guidelines published by the Digital Locker Authority.
Usage by citizens needs to increase significantly, which in turn would require more central and state government departments to come on board and start issuing documents digitally, before Digilocker can make a real difference. But if implemented correctly, DigiLocker could be a key component in a successful transition to e-governance. 

Priyankar Bhunia
Priyankar is based out of our Singapore office and is part of the editorial team. An engineer and MBA by education, he has prior experience in investment banking, media and tech startups. He spends his spare time reading and rambling.
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