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 18, 2017

12072 - What were you doing when AI took over the world? -The Hindu


SEPTEMBER 17, 2017 00:00 IST



Our rulers are nothing but human plug-ins reporting to an AI based in the U.S.

Do you remember that boy back in school who you so badly wanted to slap? Not just you but your entire class would have loved to beat him up, if only they were sure there would be no consequences.

You hated him not because he was a bad person but for the opposite reason: he was unbearably good. His uniform was always neatly pressed. His shoes shone like his teeth did. He was the first to raise his hand for every question. All the teachers loved him, and he loved them all in return. He never lost his temper and was permanently, relentlessly, infuriatingly cheerful at all times, under all circumstances. He was so good, so perfect, and so mature that it creeped you out and made you look up waterboarding on Google. Except that there was no Google back then.

A child prodigy
But there was, and still is, IBM, and it has found precisely such a boy to be their brand ambassador. His name is Tanmay Bakshi, and according to WhatsApp forwards, he is the world’s top-ranked 13-year-old. Not only is he perfect, good, and mature beyond his years, he is also a software developer, an algorithmist, an IBM Cloud Adviser, a best-selling author, a keynote speaker, a TEDx speaker, and inventor of an artificial intelligence (AI) called AskTanmay.

Apart from the fact that his annual earnings at the age of 13 are way more than what you’ll get when you take forced VRS at 43, Tanmay is also a drone specialist who flies aircraft using his cell phone. 

He is an expert on neural networks, the Internet of Things, AI, and cognitive development. He is also an IT humanitarian of sorts, having vowed to teach 100,000 kids how to code. To top it all, he is an avid, self-confident self-promoter who can make Chetan Bhagat look like a shy, self-effacing, half-schoolboy. In other words, he needs to be thoroughly investigated, preferably by a joint task force of the UNICEF and the Avengers.

When I was 13, my greatest cognitive achievement was the unexpected discovery, in the biology textbook, of a diagram depicting the female reproductive system. My only other noteworthy accomplishment was a triple century against Australia in book cricket. If by chance my 13-year-old self were to meet Tanmay on a deserted alley in the middle of the night, it’s likely that a puppy would come under a wheel somewhere.
Lest I’m misunderstood, let me state categorically that I condemn all forms of violence against children. I am a champion of child rights, if I may say so myself, and in all weight categories.

And yet, why was I, a rather bright student according to my grandmother, never invited by NASSCOM to deliver a keynote address but Tanmay was? I’ll tell you why: it’s because my intelligence is 100% natural, human, and organic.

It is an open secret that IBM was taken over by AI at least a decade ago. Now put yourself in AI’s algorithmic shoes: if you wanted humanity to embrace AI, what kind of crusader would you make? You would create a superhuman intelligence that humans would regard not only with awe but also with affection. Something cute, aspirational and non-threatening, but also effective. You would create Tanmay and make him your advocacy lead. IBM has done exactly that by making Tanmay an IBM Champion. Not surprisingly, in all his public appearances he promotes two things: IBM and AI.

Now, I am not saying he is a humanoid child soldier in Silicon Valley’s propaganda war in favour of AI. Nobody can open up his brain and check whether or not it has Intel inside. But so far, there is little evidence that his intelligence is not AI, or that AI hasn’t already taken over the world.

From humans to algorithms
In fact, recent developments in our own country suggest that our rulers are nothing but human plug-ins reporting to an AI based in the U.S. Our government’s epic obsession with shoving Aadhaar down 125 crore gullets, not to mention its hyperevangelism about all things digital, make little sense from the point of view of human intelligence. But Aadhaar, GST, cashless, and Digital India make absolute sense from an AI perspective, for they are all mechanisms to transfer control from humans to algorithms.

Of course, I may be wrong and Tanmay could well be 100% human. But if someone is as intelligent as AI, speaks like AI, works like AI, constantly creates new AI, goes around promoting AI, and wants humanity to surrender itself to AI, then there’s a pretty good chance that he himself is AI.

Anyway, I only wanted to forewarn all of you. When your grandchildren ask you what you were doing when AI was taking over the world, you ought to have a better answer than ‘I was busy emitting trails of personal data’.