‘Aadhaar data can’t be stolen’
POWERPOINT Data safe, but verification not foolproof, UIDAI chief tells apex court
Attempting to allay the safety and security concerns surrounding the biometric data collected by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) under the Aadhaar Act, the chief executive officer of UIDAI, Ajay Bhushan Pandey, told Supreme court on Thursday that the data collected is and encrypted and even “the fastest computer on earth will take more than the age of the universe” to break the encryption key.
Making a power point presentation to the five-judge bench that is hearing a challenge to the Aadhaar Act, the Pandey claimed that “identity data is fully secure and uses 2,048-bit encryption and it can be decrypted only by UIDAI.”
This was the first time that two screens were set up inside the courtroom of the Chief Justice of India and a power point presentation was made on a specific subject.
When hearing in the Aadhaar case resumed on Thursday, attorney general KK Venugopal sought permission to let the CEO make the presentation.
The court allowed the request, and in the afternoon Pandey addressed the to defend the government’s 12-digit identification project and security concerns that surround it.
Pandey told the court that even though UIDAI uses biometric matching software designed by three foreign companies, “it does not mean that we are sharing data with them. And we use the software offline.”
“The biometric matching software is like any software like Oracle or SAP – these are intellectual properties of the companies that made them and they do not give us the source code,” he said.
Interestingly, the CEO also
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