11158 - Drèze rakes up Aadhaar leak - The Telegraph

Drèze rakes up Aadhaar leak

OUR BUREAU

Ranchi, April 26: Right to food activists, led by economist Jean Drèze, have sought action against those responsible for an Aadhaar data leak from a Jharkhand government website allegedly detected a few days ago even though the state government has denied any such thing has ever happened. "It was an illegal act and those responsible for the leak must be punished," Dhiraj Kumar, a key functionary of NREGA Sahayata Kendra, demanded while addressing the media along with Drèze at XISS in Ranchi today. "If a centre that was found responsible for leaking the Aadhaar number of cricketer M.S. Dhoni could be blacklisted for 10 years, there's no reason why these people should be spared," he added. Details of over 14 lakh people, all beneficiaries of social security schemes like old-age pension, including their Aadhaar card and bank account numbers, were apparently visible to those accessing the website of the department of women and child welfare on the night of April 22. "In the course of doing a survey in Khunti block on April 21, I found lots of beneficiary details, like name, age, sex, category (SC, ST), bank details and also, surprisingly, Aadhaar card numbers," Kumar alleged, alluding to reports to this effect in a section of the press. The activists claimed they had screenshots of the website to prove that there was indeed a security breach that led to confidential data being made public. "Confidentiality is of utmost importance and public display of those details is prohibited," said Drèze, who is also a visiting professor at Ranchi University. "This leak may just be the tip of the iceberg as no one monitors government websites regularly," he said, adding that his suspicion was strengthened by reports of similar leaks from some government websites in Karnataka, Kerala, Mizoram and Chandigarh. The state women and child welfare department has all along denied there was any leak of Aadhaar data. Joint director Ram Pravesh Prasad, who handles the direct benefit transfer (DBT) system, described media reports alleging the April 22 breach as "falsified" but refused to elaborate any further. But another department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, explained that Aadhaar details were only visible to individuals who wanted to verify their bank or any other details. "So, for 16 lakh beneficiaries of different schemes, we made a provision of a search button where you can punch your name, village or post office to see those details. Only a bonafide beneficiary can see his or her details, which isn't legally wrong," he said, adding that on the dashboard of the website, the total number of beneficiaries is mentioned. But the official could not explain how the activists were able to site screenshots if there had been no data breach. A cyber security expert pointed out that the Aadhaar portal had a provision wherein a biometric card-holder could lock his/her details to prevent its misuse. "But beneficiaries of social security schemes, most of whom are not tech-savvy and had got themselves Aadhaar numbers only to ensure they continued to receive government benefits, are unlikely to be able to do this," explained Vineet Kumar, the founder of Cyber Peace Foundation.