 "Govt seeks to put Aadhaar’s privacy fears to rest through legislative action")
In a move aimed at comprehensively dealing with the privacy issues surrounding Aadhaar, the Narendra Modi-led government might take legislative action to institutionalise stricter guidelines regarding, who could access the central Aadhaar database and who could not.
This might be done through changes in the yet-to-be-cleared National Identification Authority of India (NIDAI) Bill, or through amendments to the Information Technology Act, 2000, for stronger encryption of data, Business Standard has learnt.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court had refused to modify its earlier order on use of Aadhaar card restricted to foodgrain public distribution and LPG subsidies only. The government’s ambitious programme to link Aadhaar with the Digital India initiative and essential services like banking and telecom was opposed due to fears of privacy breaches and data leaks.
The legislative action being discussed among various ministries, including the finance ministry and the prime minister’s office, aimed to put to rest these fears, senior government officials said.
“This is something which has been discussed at a senior bureaucratic, as well as ministerial level,” said an official aware of the development.
The NIDAI Bill, introduced in the Rajya Sabha in December 2010 but stuck since, clearly states who can and who cannot access the Central Identity Data Repository, which will be maintained and protected by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
The Bill also lists several offences, such as unauthorised collection of information, impersonation, manipulation of biometric information, and unauthorised access or damage to the database. Penalties vary from three years imprisonment and a fine of Rs 10,000 to Rs 1 crore. Penalties have also been prescribed for offences committed outside India by a person of any nationality.
While the discussions regarding any changes in the bill are at a very early stage, officials say that the amendments could provide for stricter, more ‘waterproof’ list of those who can and cannot access the database, and also bigger penalties.
The same holds true for the IT act which provides the guidelines for encryption of the data collected by the government. Any planned amendment to the act will provide for better encryption, the sources added.
Also, there has been no decision on when these amendments will be tabled in either house of Parliament. With a heavy legislative agenda already on the cards for the centre, Winter Session can be ruled out, the officials said.
In fact, it were these solutions to the privacy issues which some of the central government departments wanted to present in front of the Supreme Court, the officials said. The Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi’s argument in the Apex Court, that a poor, starving man will shed his privacy rights for Aadhaar, may not have gone down well with everyone in the government.
“We wanted to move the debate away from the issue of privacy as a fundamental right and focus more on the additional measures being taken to strengthen the security of the central database,” said a second official from one of the departments involved with Aadhaar.
The person added that the centre will now wait for order from the bench constituted by the Apex Court to look into the matter.
