‘Aadhaar can’t be hacked even in a billion attempts’
PANAJI: Union minister for electronics and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad said on Sunday that even if you try a billion times, you will not succeed in hacking the Aadhaar database.
Displaying his unique identification card at a function to launch Goa’s IT policy, the Union minister said the Aadhaar data did not contain information that could be used by trolls. “It contains my photograph, (that) I’m a male and my permanent Patna address. What does it not contain? My religion, my income, my medical record, my caste, my community and my other private information by which I can be trolled,” he said.
“But the system contains my fingerprint and my iris (scan), kept in safe, secure condition which cannot be broken even with a billion efforts,” he said. “Aadhaar is a home-grown technology… and is completely safe and secure. Parliamentary approval of the law is so tough that even if I disclose my fingerprint and iris to unknown persons, except in case of national security, I can be prosecuted,” he said.
The minister’s comments come at a time when the Supreme Court has reserved its decision after a marathon hearing in May this year with rights activists alleging that making Aadhaar mandatory was a violation of the right to privacy.
Prasad, however, stressed that the government was trying “to bridge the divide between the digital haves and digital have-nots and bring in digital inclusion based on technology, which is inclusive and low-cost.”
“We opened 31 crore bank accounts of the poor who had no access to bank accounts through linking of Aadhaar with mobile, we started sending their welfare measures directly to their bank accounts. Close to ₹4 lakh crore we sent in the past four years and… saved ₹90,000 crore, which used to be pocketed by middlemen and fictitious claimants,” he said.
Speaking at the function, Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar aid: “We have got (technology) penetration everywhere. There are some drawbacks like fake news... People should realise that fake news can do more harm...”
Goa’s IT policy was launched with an aim to promote the state as a startup destination.