Aadhaar: The Promise and Reality of the Surveillance State
Aadhaar makes pretty promises, but the reality of the implementation is very different and dangerous to citizen rights as well as personal freedoms.
Digital India is a Government of India campaign that claims to facilitate the delivery of Government services to citizens online or through other tech approaches. However, the project has been haphazard at best, plagued with security issues, data leaks and a less than responsible approach by the government toward securing the interests of citizens. The only people who are benefited from Digital India projects are big data players, digital banking organizations and those who create applications for the first two. Citizens are denied the right to privacy, government services and even food for the poorest citizens, if they don’t comply with the ambitious projects.
Additionally, many government initiatives, notably the Aadhaar and the demonetisation have resulted in considerable deprivation of citizens, for which there is no accountability. This has resulted in an ongoing and growing dissent by citizens of the country who are technologically literate. However, lacking adequate legal provisions to engage with the system and a government that ignores any information that could hinder their relentless rollout of “modernization”, there are few ways other than protest and in some instances, public interest litigation available to digital activists.
Aadhaar makes pretty promises, but the reality of the implementation is very different and dangerous to citizen rights as well as personal freedoms.
Guest post by @St_Hill examines some problems in the use of Aadhaar where the use of the UIDAI authentication goes beyond what it was designed for and compromises the privacy …
Problems with Aadhaar card – it can provide utility or security, not both Read More »
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While there is no denying that in a country like India, there is a need for identification that people can create easily and use nationwide, the Aadhaar card project goes …
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