Sunday, July 3, 2011

The target of generating 600 mn unique ID cards by 2014 would be achieved, Nandan Nilekani , chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), has already claimed. In Karnataka, you may get Paid getting UID to kill your Individual sov

YouTube - Enrolment to UID as a byproduct to otherregistrations
	www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me8TvAqkjSo1 min - 2 Oct 2009 -Uploaded by pitstop4performers UID and its association with the financial, health and other private data of an ... Added to queue Examples of other countries with ...

More videos for UID in other countries »

NATO - UID of Items

International UID of Items provides a basis by which the global supply chain shares in multi-national logistics coordination ensuring delivery of the right and necessary item(s) to the right destination at the right time.

International support for UID is rapidly growing and industrial partners are improving their capabilities. Activities surrounding UID Standards in NATO Working Groups and member nations has increased. The NATO Standardization Agreements (STANAG), published by NATO, provides common military or technical procedures for NATO members. The NATO Standardization Agreement for UID, STANAG 2290 (Edition 1) was ratified by 19 NATO nations and promulgated in January 2009 by NATO. It includes the accepted structure for the implementation of UID of Items.

In March 2009, the Netherlands published a mandatory UID/AIT clause requiring UID on contracts. Other European nations are close behind with NATO exploring ways to help spread UID adoption.

More recently NATO released a guide titled NATO Guidance on Unique Identification (UID) of Items (July 2010). This provides detailed instructions for implementing UID across the independent member countries. This document includes proper marking of items that require UID and the exchange of UID data between organizations.

You can find the guide at http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/stanag.htm#auidp

Privacy India is inviting individuals to author short papers focused on Unique Identity (UID) and Privacy. Selected candidates will have their papers published on the CIS website, and their transportation and accommodation provided for the "Privacy Matters" conference being heldin Kolkata on 22 January 2010.

Topic

Privacy and the UID

Submission Deadline

By 15 January 2010 to admin@privacyindia.org

Word Length

3,000-5,000 words

Topic Summary

The Aadhaar scheme, or Unique Identity (UID) scheme is a plan to provide citizens identity cards that are tied to their unique biometric data – such as their fingerprints or retinal scans. Although the most frequently cited justification for this project is to ensure the secure delivery of relief to beneficiaries of government aid schemes, it is clear that the uses to which it will be put exceed this narrow mandate.

As India embarks on one of its most ambitious techno-administrative projects to date, there is surprisingly little clarity or introspection into the implications of having such a concentrated identity locked into a single card. Inparticular it appears that the grave threats to privacy the scheme poses have not received due attention. Although the final draft UID Bill circulated by the UIDAI in October 2010 contains some provisions that reference privacy, there seems to be a tacit assumption that privacy is an expendable or at least a less-desirable privilege that can be attended to fully once the scheme is in fully in place.

We invite individuals to author short inter-disciplinary papers that engage various topics on the theme of Privacy and the UID, including but not limited to the following:

Comparative studies on privacy and national identity card schemes in other countries

Privacy and the UID Bill

How will a project such as the UID change the relationship between the state, the individual, and the market?

Selected candidates will have their papers published on the CIS website, and their transportation and accommodation provided for the "Privacy Matters" conference being held in Kolkata on January 22nd 2010.

Who We Are

Privacy India was set up with the collaboration of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS) and Society in Action Group (SAG), under the auspices of the international organization 'Privacy International'. Privacy International is a non-profit group that provides assistance to civil society groups, governments, international and regional bodies, the media and the public in a number of countries (see www.privacyinternational.org). Privacy India's objective is to raise awareness, spark civil action and promoting democratic dialogue around privacy challenges and violations in India. In furtherance of this goal we aim to draft and promote an over-arching privacy legislation in India by drawing upon legal and academic resources and consultations with the public.

http://www.cis-india.org/advocacy/igov/privacy-india/privacy_callforpapers

The target of generating 600 mn unique ID cards by 2014 would be achieved, Nandan Nilekani , chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), has already claimed. In Karnataka, you may get Paid getting UID to kill your Individual sovereignty and Privacy as well!In Bengal, where most number of Doubtful Illegal Infilterators reside and Refugees belonging to SC OBC communities countrywide DEPRIVED of Citizenship, it is quite a RUSH for UID. My friends are rushing blind to get the Magic wand. For me, I am NOT interested as yet and my son Excalibur is away from Home.But it seems that there would be NO Way to live without UID. Next Generation Refoms means Deletion of Subsidy and DIRECT Cash Payment of Subsidy. Every Public service is linked to UID henceforth. Thus, you have the UID Number to get the benefit of your citizenship.In return, you have to Mortgage your PRIVACY for Survellience and to be USED by LPG Mafia for Strategic marketing!Andhra Pradesh tops in the project followed by Maharashtra and Karnataka. The UID project, when completed, will eliminate the need for multiple identification mechanisms. The permanent ID card will carry a unique number, photograph and biometric data.Registrars are typically government departments and public sector organisations. They in turn appoint the PRIVATE agency to collect data. Currently, over 200 such agencies have been named including Wipro , Comat Technologies, Alankit and Virgo Softech.

We have been writing and speaking on UID since the First day. But Public Awareness is at the mecry of Brahaminical Media which is controlled by Market Forces and Market dominating Communities. And UID proves to be the BEST Tool of EXCUSION as well as Ethnic Cleansing meant to sustain Zionist Manusmriti LPG Mafia Rule and Brahaminical Hegemony!

The Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) has appealed to citizens not to crowd the civic ward offices to register for the unique identification (UID) number as the drive to collect information will continue till all citizens are registered. The PMC has started the work of collecting information for the UID, where a 12-digit number would be allotted to each individual after the work of collection of information is completed.

For the registration, citizens will need to furnish documents pertaining to identity proof, birth date details and residential address proof. After filling the form, photocopies of the documents should be attached to the form and ask for the date and time for biometric test. Citizens should be present on the given date and time, with original documents.

The document for identity proof can be passport, pan card, ration card, voters identity card, driving licence, any identity card issued by the government or recognised educational institution, arms licence, an ATM card or credit card with photograph, photo card issued for pensioners or freedom fighters, cards issued under CGHS, Kisan photo passbook, identity card issued by the department of posts, or an identity certificate issued by a gazetted group A officer.

For residential address proof, besides any of the above documents, electricity bills, telephone bills, property tax bill (issued in last three months), letters issued by banks or educational institutions, vehicle registration certificate, or registered lease document will be valid. For birth date details, a birth certificate, or the secondary school leaving certificate, or passport will be required.

Each centre will have a verifier who would examine the documents. If any citizen does not have any document to establish his or her identity, the centre will have introducers appointed by the government. The letters issued by the introducers will be accepted as identity proof.

At each centre, a biometric scan will be conducted. The finger prints of hands, as well as the iris and photographs will be scanned. Children above the age of five years will also get their UID number. Children below the age of five years will get UID number in the names of either of their parents.

For the UID number programme, the government has appointed the municipal commissioner as the registrar, while the 14 zonal officers, deputy commissioner (special) and assistant census officers have been appointed as nodal officers.

With over 625,000 villages, rural India still dominates the country's landscape even as rapid urbanising is throwing up challenges for planners. To train people manage this massive social transformation and fill the critical human resource and knowledge gap, a group of eminent Indians is setting up a university.

One of them, Nandan Nilekani, a co-founder of India's IT bellwether Infosys who now spearheads the massive exercise of providing billion Indians a unique identification number, and his wife Rohini, have just gifted Rs. 50 crore to the proposed varsity.

Called the Indian Institute of Human Settlement, the institute is coming up near Bangalore and the people behind it are in talks with the government for recognition of its courses.

Besides Nilekani, other leading figures forming the board of directors of the venture are renowned industrialists and academicians like Xerxes Desai, Jamshyd Godrej, Cyrus Guzder, Renana Jhabvala, Vijay Kelkar, Keshub Mahindra, Kishore Mariwala, Rahul Mehrotra, Rakesh Mohan, Nasser Munjee, Deepak Parekh, Shirish Patel, Aromar Revi and Deepak Satwalekar.

The IIHS will offer "globally benchmarked bachelors, masters and doctoral degrees in urban practice based on a wide set of disciplines and practice areas central to India's urban transformation," Aromar Revi, its director, told IANS in an interview.

The Bachelors in Urban Practice (BUP) programme "will be a four-year course, after the plus-2 level of schooling. The MUP programme will be a two year course," said Revi, an alumnus of IIT-Delhi and the law and management schools of Delhi University .

The IIHS will begin by offering the masters programme first from July next year, provided the government gives regulatory clearances by that time, he said.

"Discussions are active with the government on getting the appropriate regulatory clearances," Revi said.

The "tentative fee structure for the MUP is in the range of Rs.300,000 and Rs.400,000 per annum," he said. The IIHS "is planning to offer up to 50 percent of its students' scholarships and financial assistance of varying degrees depending on need," he added.

Revi was confident that students passing out of this institute will have job opportunities since the "most serious constraint facing Indian cities today is not capital but the availability of suitably educated professionals, entrepreneurs and change makers who can act in the common good".

"We anticipate career opportunities across the public and private sectors as well as civil society and universities and knowledge enterprises. There is a large gap in the supply of urban practitioners and inter-disciplinary professionals as India and its urban areas grow," he said.

On the gift by the Nilekanis, he said "this is in keeping with their vision of building quality transformative institutions for India and a reinforcement of their past philanthropic commitments. Nandan Nilekani has been deeply involved with the IIHS from its conceptualisation".

Announcing the gift Tuesday, the Nilekanis said: "IIHS is at the convergence of both our interests in education, urbanisation and sustainability."

The IIHS is coming up on a 54-acre site in Kengeri, on the Bangalore outskirts. "Work on planning the first phase of the 42,000-sq metre campus has started. It will be executed in a phased manner over the next five to seven years," Revi told IANS.

On what prompted the setting up of this institute, he said there was a need to fill "a critical human resource and knowledge gap in addressing multiple challenges of urbanisation".

"The IIHS is conceived as an inter-disciplinary university born out of the realisation that a single academic programme within a university would not be able to offer the breadth and depth of inter-disciplinary academics and practice that are urgently required to solve the multiple dimensions of urbanisation challenges that the country is confronted with," he said.

The IIHS has tie-ups with several well-known institutions, including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), University College London (UCL), and The African Centre for Cities (ACC) of the University of Cape Town (UCT), Revi said.

Will Direct cash transfer be a better reform than fuel and fertiliser subsidy?

Economic Times - ‎19 hours ago‎
Later this month, Unique ID (UID) chief Nandan Nilekani will finalise a report to the government which could prove a turning point in India's 20-year, largely-failed attempt, to reform its bloated subsidy bill, currently weighing in at over `1,64000 ...

Nandan and Rohini Nilekani announce a gift of $11 mn to IIHS

Economic Times - ‎Jun 27, 2011‎
BANGALORE: UIDAI Chairman , Nandan Nilekani and his wife Rohini Nilekani have announced a gift of $11 million to the Indian Institute for Human Settlements (IIHS) to fund its School of Environment and Sustainability . The institute is the first in the ...
Nandan Nilekani donates Rs. 50 crore to Bangalore college Livemint
Nilekanis to give Rs 50 crore to institute Indian Express
Nilekanis donate Rs. 50 crore to IIHS The Hindu
Rediff - IBNLive.com
all 22 news articles »Email this story

The Hindu

Bouquets & brickbats: Nandan Nilekani decodes the UID

Moneycontrol.com - ‎Jun 25, 2011‎

UIDAI: Nandan Nilekani plans to create an 'Apple or Google-like' ecosystem for ... Economic Times

UIDAI targets 1 m enrolments a day The Hindu

Aadhar will reach target: Nilekani IBNLive.com

CIOL

all 64 news articles »

GOOG Email this story

Nilekani urges CM to link Aadhaar with services

Times of India - ‎Jun 17, 2011‎
RANCHI: Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) chairman Nandan Nilekani asked chief minister Arjun Munda to issue a notification declaring Aadhaar numbers as the basis of identity and residential proof of the Aadhaar number holder, ...
Unique ID project set to meet target: Nandan Nilekani Economic Times
UID can reform delivery system Nandan Nilekani Moneycontrol.com
UIDAI ropes in NSDC to train 300000 workers Business Standard
I Government - IBNLive.com
all 18 news articles »Email this story

Chandigarh Tribune

'We are building the electronic equivalent of roads for the country — soft ...

Chandigarh Tribune - Raj Chengappa - ‎9 hours ago‎

Two years ago, Nandan Nilekani, 55, gave up a highly successful career in the private sector and one that made him extraordinarily well-to-do to join the government and serve his country. In July 2009, he took over as the Chairman of the Unique ...

ICICI, State Bank of India First to Tap Largest Identity Store

Bloomberg - Andrew MacAskill, Bibhudatta Pradhan - ‎Jun 29, 2011‎
About 64 banks will open accounts in a few months based on details entered in the government's burgeoning biometric data store, the project's leader, billionaire entrepreneur Nandan Nilekani, 56, said. India initially aims to hand identification ...
BOM:500112

UID programme progressing well, says Nilekani

Economic Times - ‎Jun 22, 2011‎
BANGALORE: The Unique Identification Number (UID) programme was progressing well and the speed of enrollment was expected to go higher with the software and hardware upgrades, UID Chairman Nandan Nilekani said here today. "I am happy with the progress ...

Deccan Herald

12-digit pin to Nirvana, claims government

Deccan Herald - ‎22 hours ago‎

"This will prevent non-PDS card holders siphoning off foodgrains in the name of genuine beneficiaries," said Union Food Minister KV Thomas, who has been holding meetings with UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani to link ration cards with UID numbers. ...

UID number touch one crore

Hindustan Times - ‎Jun 30, 2011‎
This is yet another milestone, en-route to our goal of issuing 60 crore Aadhaar numbers by 2014" Nandan Nilekani, Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India said. Enrolments are in progress in more than 25 states and Union Territories by ...
Third UIDIA's Conference of Ecosystem Partners held Press Information Bureau (press release)
One crore Indians get their unique ID number iNewsO

AN APPEAL TO PARLIAMENTARIANS

- Reasons why you should oppose the UID Bill

The draft National Identification Authority of India (NIDAI) Bill will be placed before the Lok Sabha in the

current session. Touted by its promoters as a landmark initiative for "good governance", the concept and basic

premise of the Bill has been critiqued and challenged on multiple grounds by experts as well as ordinary

citizens.

Here are some reasons why you should oppose and vote against the bill when it is placed before the House.

1. False claims

The Government of India and Nandan Nilekani, Chairperson UIDAI, have been claiming that the UID scheme

will enable inclusive growth by providing each citizen with a verifiable identity, that it will facilitate delivery of

basic services, that it will plug leakages in public expenditure and that it will speed up achievement of targets

in social sector schemes.

These claims are false and unjustified. Exclusion and leakages are not caused by the inability to prove identity

– they are caused by the deliberate manipulation of the system by those who have the power to control the

flow of benefits.

For instance, BPL families who have valid ration cards are unable to get their quota of foodgrains – not

because the validity of the card is disputed, but because the ration shop owners exploit them and force them

to take less than their due.

Scholarships meant for them are denied to children from Dalit families – not because they cannot prove they

are Dalits but because teachers and school administrators pocket the money after forcing the parents to sign

on false receipts.

Women workers in NREGA are paid less than their due – not because they cannot prove that they have put in

the full quota of work, but because the supervisors and paymasters believe that women do not deserve the

same wage as men, and pocket the extra money.

None of these problems will be solved by the possession of a UID number. In fact, a confidential working

paper prepared by the UIDAI states that "the UIDAI is only in the identity business. The responsibility of

tracking beneficiaries and the governance of service delivery will continue to remain with the respective

agencies – the job of tracking distribution of food grains among BPL families for example, will remain with the

state PDS department. The adoption of the UID will only ensure that the uniqueness and singularity of each

resident is established and authenticated, thereby promoting equitable access to social services."

In other words, the possession of a UID card can at best serve only as proof of a "unique and singular" identity

and does not guarantee either citizenship or benefits. This being the case, it is strange that this scheme is

touted as a step for good governance.

2. Violation of privacy and civil liberties

The UID scheme violates the right to privacy. International law and India's domestic law have set clear

standards to protect an individual's privacy from unlawful invasion. Under the International Covenant on Civil

and Political Rights (ICCPR), ratified by India, an individual's right to privacy is protected from arbitrary or

unlawful interference by the state. The Supreme Court has also held the right to privacy to be implicit under

article 21 of the Indian Constitution (Rajagopal v. State of Tamil Nadu, 1994 and PUCL v. Union of India, 1996).

India has enacted a number of laws that provide some protection for privacy. For example the Hindu Marriage

Act, the Copyright Act, Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000, the Indian Contract Act

1and the Code of Criminal Procedure all place restrictions on the release of personal information.

Section 33 of the draft bill empowers NIDAI to disclose personal data on an order of a court or in case of

"national security" on directions of an officer not below the rank of joint secretary. This is a dilution of existing

provisions for protection of privacy under Supreme Court judgments (PUCL versus Union of India) and the IT

and Telegraph Acts, all three of which state that such orders can be passed only by the Union or State Home

Secretary. There is a high likelihood of this provision being misused by persons in power to access private

details for use in ways that may pose a risk to the life or security of the person concerned.

Personal and household data is being collected through the Census 2010 with a view to establishing a

National Population Register. It is proposed to make this information available to the UIDAI. This is in

contravention of Section 15 of the Census Act which categorically states that information given for the Census

is "not open to inspection nor admissible in evidence".

Moreover, although participation in the UID scheme is supposed to be voluntary and optional, Census

respondents are being told that it is mandatory to submit personal information for the National Population

details of "doubtful cases" who will then be subject to further investigation to determine whether they are

"genuine citizens". Enumerators are generally not able to explain the criteria for categorising a particular

individual or family as "doubtful".

3. "Functionality creep" and misuse of data

The centralised database where personal data will be stored can easily be linked with other databases, such

as the Employees' State Insurance Corporation and databases maintained by the police and intelligence

agencies. This raises the risk of "functionality creep", as for instance the use of the UID database for policing

and surveillance.

There is a serious concern that the biometric information collected as part of the UID project would be used for

policing purposes. The regular use of biometric data in policing can lead to a large number of human rights

violations, especially given the possibility of errors in fingerprint matching.

The proposed Bill does not contain any mechanisms for credible and independent oversight of the UIDAI. This

increases the risk of 'functionality creep' - the government may add features and additional data to the

database without informing or taking the consent of citizens and without re-evaluating the effects on privacy in

each instance.

There is no guarantee that the personal data collected and stored in a centralised database will not be

misused for purposes other than mere confirmation of identity. The several instances of the involvement of the

state in mass carnage (as in Delhi in 1984 and Gujarat in 2002), and the Government's support to and defence

of the widespread use of "encounter killings" and other extra-constitutional methods by the police and armed

forces, has already created an enabling environment for abuse of the UID database to serve undemocratic,

illegal and unethical purposes.

The Bill does not have any provisions to penalise misuse of data by authorised persons (eg UIDAI officials),

and therefore has an in-built potential for use of personal data to identify and eliminate "maoists", "terrorists",

"habitual offenders", political opponents and others who are perceived as threats by those in power.

4. Inappropriate and unproven technology

Instead of facilitating inclusion, around 150 million people are likely to be excluded from benefits because of

the UID scheme.

Millions of Indians working in agriculture, construction workers and other manual labourers have worn-out

fingers due to a lifetime of hard labour, resulting in what is technically referred to as 'low-quality' fingerprints.

These are precisely the people who are currently excluded from government records and welfare schemes.

This means an NREGA beneficiary with worn-out fingers may present his newly-issued UID number as a

conclusive proof of identity to claim payment, but could find the application rejected. The authentication

2process using a fingerprint scanner could classify the applicant's worn-out fingers as a so-called 'false

negative'. This is a serious concern, since NREGS has been listed as one of the pilot schemes where the UID

identification process will be introduced - the 30 million people currently holding NREGS job cards will be put

at risk of exclusion.

This limitation is well recognised by the UIDAI in its working paper, which states that fingerprint authentication

is not foolproof, since multiple factors (such as the degree and direction of the pressure applied while placing

the finger on the sensor, excessively greasy or dry skin, and distortions caused by rendering a threedimensional object into a flat plane) can result in "noise and inconsistencies" in the captured image. According

to the paper, these distortions result in impairing the system performance and consequently limiting the

widespread use of this technology".

The other biometric data to be collected by the UID are iris scans and photographs. An iris scan cannot be

done on people with corneal blindness, glaucoma or corneal scars. There are an estimated 6-8 million people

in India with corneal blindness, according to researchers at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New

Delhi. The number of people with corneal scars (caused by infections or injuries to the eyes) will be much

more. It is reported that Cabinet Secretary K.M.Chandrasekhar has opposed the collection of iris scans,

terming it a "waste of money."

5. Database security not assured

India does not have a robust legal framework or infrastructure for cybersecurity and has weak capabilities in

this area – several of our high-security databases have been hacked in the recent past. The huge amounts of

personal information collected in the UID database will most likely not be adequately protected and will be

vulnerable to hackers and identity thieves.

It is important to note that no country or organisation has successfully deployed a database (biometric

or otherwise) of the size envisioned for the UID project, and no technical or corporate body in the

world has the experience necessary to ensure its security.

The possibility of corruption and exploitation of data is far greater in a centralised database than when the

information is dispersed across different databases. There is also a high risk of errors in the collection of

information, recording of inaccurate data, corruption of data and unauthorised access.

Other countries with national identification systems have tried and failed to eliminate the risks of trading and

selling of information. India, which has no generally established data protection laws (like the U.S. Federal

Privacy Statute or the European Directive on Data Protection) is ill-equipped to deal with such problems.

The US - arguably the most surveillance-prone society in the world - passed a Federal law (the REAL ID Act,

2005) requiring the States to allow the Federal Department of Homeland Security to access State databases

such as drivers' licences and motor vehicle registration. As of 2008, not a single State has ratified this Act, and

25 States have passed legislations to exclude themselves from its purview.

Ironically, a confidential working paper titled "Creating a Unique Identity Number for Every Resident in India"

was recently posted on the transparency website Wikileaks. The leaked document admits that "the UID

database will be susceptible to attacks and leaks at various levels".

If they cannot protect their own confidential documents, we cannot trust the UIDAI to protect the data they

propose to collect from us.

6. Unjustifiable costs

The UID project has been launched without a feasibility study or cost-benefit analysis. The current costs are

estimated at Rs.45,000 crores. A budget provision of Rs. 1950/- Crores has been made for the current year, of

which over 200 crores has already been spent.

Nandan Nilekani claims that several thousand crores of rupees would be saved by the scheme, through

prevention of duplicate/fake IDs for claiming benefits under schemes such as the public distribution system

and the NREGS. This claim has not been supported with data, and is not substantiated by any studies so far.

3Operationalising the UID scheme on the ground for NREGA and the public distribution system would require

placing fingerprint readers at every panchayat office and every ration shop. The cost of a fingerprint reader at

this time is around USD 50. The total costs of placing fingerprint readers in each PDS outlet and in each of

India's 600,000 villages have not been taken into account in official cost calculations.

Verification of identity by the UIDAI will be charged at Rs.10 per query. This being the case, several private

agencies may bypass the UIDAI and give preference to other identity proofs.

7. Bypassing of Parliament and democratic processes

The UID Authority has been set up with considerable powers and resources, without any approval from

Parliament or discussion in the public domain about the necessity of such a scheme. In the absence of a

Constitutional provision or legal framework (such as that set out in the proposed Bill), all the actions of the

UIDAI are technically unconstitutional and illegal. There is no transparency either on decisions or on

expenditure, no oversight and no mechanisms for accountability in the functioning of the UIDAI.

Nandan Nilekani has been given sweeping powers, and is now demanding the right to select "good officers" to

serve under him, bypassing the usual procedures for deputation of officers.

Despite the continuing debate on public platforms, and being repeatedly questioned about the risks, costs and

benefits of the UID scheme, Nilekani and the Government of India have remained silent on the contested

aspects of the scheme.

8 Lessons from other countries

Several countries (including the USA, the UK, Australia, China, Canada and Germany) have tried such

projects and have given these up as impractical, unjustified and dangerous.

One of the first acts of the new government in UK after tasking office in June 2010, was to scrap the UID

project in that country. According to Theresa May, the UK Home Secretary, "The national identity card scheme

represents the worst of government. It is intrusive and bullying. It is ineffective and expensive. It is an assault

on individual liberty that does not promise a great good...The government will destroy all information held on

the national identity register, effectively dismantling it. The role of the identity commissioner, created in an

effort to prevent data blunders and leaks, will be terminated."

It is noteworthy that the reasons cited by the UK government for rejection of the UID scheme - higher costs,

impracticality and ungovernable breaches of privacy and civil liberties – are all valid in the Indian case as well.

In view of this, it is fair to expect UIDAI to present a comprehensive argument to justify why what was rejected

in the UK is good enough for India.

It seems clear that the public pronouncements on the UID scheme being a step towards good

governance and inclusive growth are red herrings to divert the attention of the public from the real

purpose of NIDAI – to strengthen India's e-surveillance capabilities!

The passage of the IT Act, 2008, was the first step to making India a country where "Big Brother" is

watching everyone, all the time – the NIDAI Act will be another great leap forward in this direction!

Please do not remain silent -

oppose the NIDAI Act

to defend democracy & protect human rights.

CONTACT: A CAMPAIGN FOR NO UID, C/o. INDIAN SOCIAL ACTION FORUM (INSAF),

A124/6 1st floor, Katwaria Sarai, New Delhi 110 016.

Tel: +91-11-26517814/ 65663958; Fax: 011-26517814; Email: insafdelhi@gmail.com

Alternative Law Forum, Citizen Action Forum, Delhi Forum, PEACE, People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) – Karnataka, Moving

Republic, Indian Social Action Forum (INSAF), National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), Slum Janandolana – Karnataka,

The Center for Internet and Society (CIS) and many other organisations and concerned individuals.

Eight reasons why you should oppose Unique Identification: Stop UID Campaign

OCTOBER 4, 2010

tags: Nandan Nilekani, UID

by Nivedita Menon

Drafted by KALYANI MENON-SEN for the Stop UID Campaign

AN APPEAL TO CITIZENS

The National Identification Authority of India Bill approved by the Union Cabinet on Friday has sidestepped critical privacy aspects relating to profiling and function creep — a term used to describe the way in which information is collected for one limited purpose but gradually gets used for other purposes.

Here are some reasons why you should oppose this Bill:

1. False claims

The Government of India and Nandan Nilekani, Chairperson UIDAI, have been claiming that the UID scheme will enable inclusive growth by providing each citizen with a verifiable identity, that it will facilitate delivery of basic services, that it will plug leakages in public expenditure and that it will speed up achievement of targets in social sector schemes.

These claims are false and unjustified. Exclusion and leakages are not caused by the inability to prove identity – they are caused by the deliberate manipulation of the system by those who have the power to control the flow of benefits.

For instance, BPL families who have valid ration cards are unable to get their quota of foodgrains – not because the validity of the card is disputed, but because the ration shop owners exploit them and force them to take less than their due.

Scholarships meant for them are denied to children from Dalit families – not because they cannot prove they are Dalits but because teachers and school administrators pocket the money after forcing the parents to sign on false receipts.

Women workers in NREGA are paid less than their due – not because they cannot prove that they have put in the full quota of work, but because the supervisors and paymasters believe that women do not deserve the same wage as men, and pocket the extra money.

None of these problems will be solved by the possession of a UID number. In fact, a confidential working paper prepared by the UIDAI states that "the UIDAI is only in the identity business. The responsibility of tracking beneficiaries and the governance of service delivery will continue to remain with the respective agencies – the job of tracking distribution of food grains among BPL families for example, will remain with the state PDS department. The adoption of the UID will only ensure that the uniqueness and singularity of each resident is established and authenticated, thereby promoting equitable access to social services."

In other words, the possession of a UID card can at best serve only as proof of a "unique and singular" identity and does not guarantee either citizenship or benefits. This being the case, it is strange that this scheme is touted as a step for good governance.

2. Violation of privacy and civil liberties

The UID scheme violates the right to privacy. International law and India's domestic law have set clear standards to protect an individual's privacy from unlawful invasion. Under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), ratified by India, an individual's right to privacy is protected from arbitrary or unlawful interference by the state. The Supreme Court has also held the right to privacy to be implicit under article 21 of the Indian Constitution (Rajagopal v. State of Tamil Nadu, 1994 and PUCL v. Union of India, 1996) has

India has enacted a number of laws that provide some protection for privacy. For example the Hindu Marriage Act, the Copyright Act, Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000, the Indian Contract Act and the Code of Criminal Procedure all place restrictions on the release of personal information.

Section 33 of the draft bill empowers NIDAI to disclose personal data on an order of a court or in case of "national security" on directions of an officer not below the rank of joint secretary. This is a dilution of existing provisions for protection of privacy under Supreme Court judgements (PUCL versus Union of India) and the IT and Telegraph Acts, all three of which state that such orders can be passed only by the Union or State Home Secretary. There is a high likelihood of this provision being misused by persons in power to access private details for use in ways that may pose a risk to the life or security of the person concerned.

Personal and household data is being collected through the Census 2010 with a view to establishing a National Population Register. It is proposed to make this information available to the UIDAI. This is in contravention of Section 15 of the Census Act which categorically states that information given for the Census is "not open to inspection nor admissible in evidence".

Moreover, although participation in the UID scheme is supposed to be voluntary and optional, Census respondents are being told that it is mandatory to submit personal information for the National Population Register. The enumerators who are collecting data for the Population Register have been instructed to flag the details of "doubtful cases" who will then be subject to further investigation to determine whether they are "genuine citizens". Enumerators are generally not able to explain the criteria for categorising a particular individual or family as "doubtful".

3."Functionality creep" and misuse of data

The centralised database where personal data will be stored can easily be linked with other databases, such as the Employees' State Insurance Corporation and databases maintained by the police and intelligence agencies. This raises the risk of "functionality creep", as for instance the use of the UID database for policing and surveillance.

There is a serious concern that the biometric information collected as part of the UID project would be used for policing purposes. The regular use of biometric data in policing can lead to a large number of human rights violations, especially given the possibility of errors in fingerprint matching.

The proposed Bill does not contain any mechanisms for credible and independent oversight of the UIDAI. This increases the risk of 'functionality creep' – the government may add features and additional data to the database without informing or taking the consent of citizens and without re-evaluating the effects on privacy in each instance.

There is no guarantee that the personal data collected and stored in a centralised database will not be misused for purposes other than mere confirmation of identity. The several instances of the involvement of the state in mass carnage (as in Delhi in 1984 and Gujarat in 2002), and the Government's support to and defence of the widespread use of "encounter killings" and other extra-constitutional methods by the police and armed forces, has already created an enabling environment for abuse of the UID database to serve undemocratic, illegal and unethical purposes.

The Bill does not have any provisions to penalise misuse of data by authorised persons (eg UIDAI officials), and therefore has an in-built potential for use of personal data to identify and eliminate "maoists", "terrorists", "habitual offenders", political opponents and others who are perceived as threats by those in power.

4. Inappropriate and unproven technology

Instead of facilitating inclusion, around 150 million people are likely to be excluded from benefits because of the UID scheme.

Millions of Indians working in agriculture, construction workers and other manual labourers have worn-out fingers due to a lifetime of hard labour, resulting in what is technically referred to as 'low-quality' fingerprints. These are precisely the people who are currently excluded from government records and welfare schemes.

This means an NREGA beneficiary with worn-out fingers may present his newly-issued UID number as a conclusive proof of identity to claim payment, but could find the application rejected. The authentication process using a fingerprint scanner could classify the applicant's worn-out fingers as a so-called 'false negative'. This is a serious concern, since NREGS has been listed as one of the pilot schemes where the UID identification process will be introduced – the 30 million people currently holding NREGS job cards will be put at risk of exclusion.

This limitation is well recognised by the UIDAI in its working paper, which states that fingerprint authentication is not foolproof, since multiple factors (such as the degree and direction of the pressure applied while placing the finger on the sensor, excessively greasy or dry skin, and distortions caused by rendering a three-dimensional object into a flat plane) can result in "noise and inconsistencies" in the captured image. According to the paper, these distortions result in impairing the system performance and consequently limiting the widespread use of this technology".

The other biometric data to be collected by the UID are iris scans and photographs. An iris scan cannot be done on people with corneal blindness, glaucoma or corneal scars. There are an estimated 6-8 million people in India with corneal blindness, according to researchers at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi. The number of people with corneal scars (caused by infections or injuries to the eyes) will be much more. It is reported that Cabinet Secretary K.M.Chandrasekhar has opposed the collection of iris scans, terming it a "waste of money."

What is more, both fingerprint scanners and iris scanners can be easily deceived and "spoofed" – false fingerprints can be created using latex and adhesives, and coloured contact lenses can blur and obscure iris patterns.

5. Database security not assured

India does not have a robust legal framework or infrastructure for cybersecurity and has weak capabilities in this area – several of our high-security databases have been hacked in the recent past. The huge amounts of personal information collected in the UID database will most likely not be adequately protected and will be vulnerable to hackers and identity thieves. Indeed, hacker networks have already assessed the security levels of the proposed UID database and pronounced it easy to crack.

It is important to note that no country or organisation has successfully deployed a database (biometric or otherwise) of the size envisioned for the UID project, and no technical or corporate body in the world has the experience necessary to ensure its security.

The possibility of corruption and exploitation of data is far greater in a centralised database than when the information is dispersed across different databases. There is also a high risk of errors in the collection of information, recording of inaccurate data, corruption of data and unauthorised access.

Other countries with national identification systems have tried and failed to eliminate the risks of trading and selling of information. India, which has no generally established data protection laws (like the U.S. Federal Privacy Statute or the European Directive on Data Protection) is ill-equipped to deal with such problems.

The US – arguably the most surveillance-prone society in the world – passed a Federal law (the REAL ID Act, 2005) requiring the States to allow the Federal Department of Homeland Security to access State databases such as drivers' licences and motor vehicle registration. As of 2008, not a single State has ratified this Act, and 25 States have passed legislations to exclude themselves from its purview.

Ironically, a confidential working paper titled "Creating a Unique Identity Number for Every Resident in India" was recently posted on the transparency website Wikileaks. The leaked document admits that "the UID database will be susceptible to attacks and leaks at various levels".

If they cannot protect their own confidential documents, we cannot trust the UIDAI to protect the data they propose to collect from us.

6. Unjustifiable costs

The UID project has been launched without a feasibility study or cost-benefit analysis. The pilot to test the technology is being rolled out in Andhra Pradesh in September 2010, well after the drafting of the Bill. The current costs are estimated at Rs.45,000 crores. A budget provision of Rs. 1950/- crores has been made for the current year, of which over 200 crores has already been spent.

Nandan Nilekani claims that several thousand crores of rupees would be saved by the scheme, through prevention of duplicate/fake IDs for claiming benefits under schemes such as the public distribution system and the NREGS. This claim has not been supported with data, and is not substantiated by any studies so far.

Operationalising the UID scheme on the ground for NREGA and the public distribution system would require placing fingerprint readers at every panchayat office and every ration shop. The cost of a fingerprint reader at this time is around USD 50. The total costs of placing fingerprint readers in each PDS outlet and in each of India's 600,000 villages have not been taken into account in official cost calculations.

Verification of identity by the UIDAI will be charged at Rs.10 per query. This being the case, several private agencies may bypass the UIDAI and give preference to other identity proofs.

7. Bypassing of Parliament and democratic processes

The UID Authority has been set up with considerable powers and resources, without any approval from Parliament or discussion in the public domain about the necessity of such a scheme. In the absence of a Constitutional provision or legal framework (such as that set out in the proposed Bill), all the actions of the UIDAI are technically unconstitutional and illegal. There is no transparency either on decisions or on expenditure, no oversight and no mechanisms for accountability in the functioning of the UIDAI.

Nandan Nilekani has been given sweeping powers, and is now demanding the right to select "good officers" to serve under him, bypassing the usual procedures for deputation of officers.

Despite the continuing debate on public platforms, and being repeatedly questioned about the risks, costs and benefits of the UID scheme, Nilekani and the Government of India have remained silent on the contested aspects of the scheme.

8. Lessons from other countries

Several countries (including the USA, the UK, Australia, China, Canada and Germany) have tried such projects and have given these up as impractical, unjustified and dangerous.

One of the first acts of the new government in UK after tasking office in June 2010, was to scrap the UID project in that country. According to Theresa May, the UK Home Secretary, "The national identity card scheme represents the worst of government. It is intrusive and bullying. It is ineffective and expensive. It is an assault on individual liberty that does not promise a great good…The government will destroy all information held on the national identity register, effectively dismantling it. The role of the identity commissioner, created in an effort to prevent data blunders and leaks, will be terminated."

It is noteworthy that the reasons cited by the UK government for rejection of the UID scheme – higher costs, impracticality and ungovernable breaches of privacy and civil liberties – are all valid in the Indian case as well. In view of this, it is fair to expect UIDAI to present a comprehensive argument to justify why what was rejected in the UK is good enough for India.

It seems clear that the public pronouncements on the UID scheme being a step towards good governance and inclusive growth are red herrings to divert the attention of the public from the real purpose of NIDAI – to strengthen India's e-surveillance capabilities.

The passage of the IT Act, 2008, was the first step to making India a country where "Big Brother" is watching everyone, all the time – the NIDAI Act will be another great leap forward in this direction.

Please do not remain silent – oppose the NIDAI Act to defend democracy and protect human rights.

Stop UID Campaign Secretariat:

INSAF (Indian Social Action Forum)

A-124/6, First Floor Katwaria Sarai,

New Delhi, India – 110 016

Tel. + 91.11.26517814

http://kafila.org/2010/10/04/eight-reasons-why-you-should-oppose-the-uid-stop-uid-campaign/

Nilekani admits that UID will be used for tracking people

DECEMBER 9TH, 2009

After many months, we now see the true colors of the Unique Identity (UID) number that Nilekani is so keen to foist on the Indian public. At a function organized by the Indo American Chamber of Commerce, he admitted that the real motivation for the UID was to track people. He also said that in time, if someone didn't have a UID, that would in itself be suspicious.

Long ago, it was feared that the UID will be used for mass surveillance. Nilekani goes so far as to say that all hotels might be required to demand a UID from those who stay there – not for purposes of credit or to ensure payment, but simply so that the government will be able to keep track of who is where.

Image Credit: Aquila

Mass surveillance around the corner with the UID

The obvious question is, where will this stop? If hotels demand a UID before you can stay in them, will it be long before a theater asks for it before you can watch a movie? Even worse, can a policeman randomly stop you on the road and ask for it as well? This isn't the same as being asked for a driver's license since not everyone should be allowed to drive if they're not qualified. But asking for an ID "just to check up on you" is an invasion of privacy. However, sinceprivacy is a legal right in India, I wonder how such procedures would stand up in court.

To assume that the government won't become more and more intrusive if it has the ability is stupid. Whenever governments get too much power, disaster ensues. We can rest assured that slowly, bit by bit, the uses of this UID will continue to increase and become more and more pervasive if technologically feasible. Most of us still don't realize how much the loss of privacy will hurt. They will learn once they do lose it. In that way, this whole experiment is a good thing. It'll be painful, but it might just be the start of an experience that will teach us the value of what we take for granted in a free country like India.

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Sorry, wrong number

The government's ambitious project to give a unique identification number to every Indian citizen is running woefully behind schedule. T.V. Jayan investigates the problems that beset the project

It was supposed to be a smooth, if mammoth, operation — one where a 12-digit unique identification (UID) or aadhaar number would be provided to every Indian citizen within a specified time frame. Yet less than a year after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and United Progressive Alliance chairperson Sonia Gandhi launched it with much fanfare in Maharashtra's Nandurbar district, the ambitious project seems mired in problems.
In Nandurbar itself, the pace of implementation has been agonisingly slow. As against the enrolment target of 2.6 lakh people by June end, only 1.17 lakh people have been enrolled so far.
And Nandurbar is just one case in point. In most districts and states, the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), the body that is overseeing the project, is struggling to meet its target. Only three states have crossed the one million mark in providing aadhaar numbers to their citizens. Andhra Pradesh leads the pack with nearly 3.5 million UIDs, followed by Karnataka (1.82 million) and Maharashtra (1.6 million). The total enrolment, according to the UIDAI website, stands at 9.5 million as on June 27. The plan, though, is to provide aadhaar numbers to 600 million people by 2014 — a target that will surely remain way out of reach if the UIDAI continues with its current pace of work.
Forget the debate on whether or not the UID project will compromise a citizen's right to privacy. Right now, the big issue facing it is that it's beset with a host of operational problems. "There are issues at all levels — conceptual, technology, logistics and at the implementation stages. Unless we resolve them fast, there could be inordinate delays. The project could even be derailed," says a senior manager at one of the biggest enrolment agencies empanelled with the UIDAI, on condition of anonymity.
The UID programme works something like this. The UIDAI has appointed a large number of registrars, which are either state or central government departments, or public sector banks and insurance companies. The registrars, in turn, have enlisted the services of private firms to enrol people and collect demographic and biometric data such as their finger prints, iris scans and so on. So far 209 firms have been enlisted as enrolment agencies (EAs). While most of them are information technology firms, stock broking companies, financial service companies and even printing presses have been commissioned to obtain the UID enrolment data.
Once the EAs collect the information, the data packets are sent to the respective registrar to be vetted and thence to the UIDAI's Central Identities Data Repository (CIDR) in Bangalore. The CIDR checks the data packets for authenticity and makes sure that there has been no duplication of data — in case an individual has been enrolled more than once. When all the processes are cleared, a UID number is generated against the person's name, which is delivered to him or her by post.
Incidentally, the government is yet to announce the cost of the entire project, although UIDAI director general Ram Sewak Sharma reveals that the cost of generating eachaadhaar number would be about Rs 150.
What is also slowing down the project is the process of "de-duplication" of data. UIDAI technology head Srikanth Nadhamuni admits that the biometric service providers who help the CIDR check duplication in biometric records now take a couple of minutes to process a single data packet. As a result, right now the UIDAI can issue fewer than 50,000 aadhaar numbers a day. And yet, it plans to generate one million numbers daily by October this year. To achieve this target the UIDAI should be processing 11 data packets per second during a 24-hour cycle.
UIDAI director general Sharma feels that these are niggling problems that will soon be resolved. "Kindly understand that the world has not seen this scale of de-duplication thus far," he exclaims. "The IT systems, both hardware and software, are continuously being tuned to scale up to these numbers."
UIDAI's chief technology architect Prashant Varma is also optimistic. "These things need not be done sequentially. If we have enough computing power it can be carried out in a parallel manner," he says, adding that more hardware is on its way to streamline the de-duplication process.
But others hold out a much bleaker view. "The de-duplication algorithm will get slower and slower as the size of the database grows. The authority has also not been transparent about the de-duplication process," says Sunil Abraham, executive director of the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), Bangalore.
Enrolment agencies too say that the problem is far more serious than what the UIDAI admits. "Currently, they are processing data packets that we had sent in April," says the state head of an EA working with the commissioner of civil supplies in Andhra Pradesh.
Again, the fact that the UIDAI is taking an inordinately long time to generate the aadhaarnumbers — about three to four months from the time of data collection, in place of a month as originally planned — is creating its own complications. Thanks to the time lag, a citizen who is unsure of his UID status may go to another enrolment agency associated with yet another registrar. So his data is collected again and sent to the CIDR for registration once more. This leads to duplication of data and hence, further increases the de-duplication workload.
What's more, it also hits the margins of enrolment agencies as the UIDAI pays only once for someone's data. So any EA that unwittingly collects the personal data of a citizen the second time will not be paid for its pains.
In fact, the EAs are beginning to realise that the work is barely financially viable for them. Having procured the enrolment job through competitive bidding, they are now finding out that the rates are abysmally low. "If one EA quotes a low price, others are asked to match it if they want to work with the same registrar," says an executive with an EA, who does not wish to reveal his or his agency's name.
"For instance, a Noida-based firm, which bagged the tender for 200 enrolment stations to be set up in Hyderabad from the commissioner of civil supplies in Andhra Pradesh, had quoted a figure of Rs 23 per enrolment. We all knew this was a ridiculously low amount as an ideal per capita enrolment cost should be between Rs 30 and 35. But others working in the Hyderabad area had no choice but to quote a figure very close to it," he says.
Then again, because enrolment agencies are paid only after their enrollees have received the UID numbers, and because these numbers are taking months to be generated, the EAs are not getting paid on time. "We are already working on tiny margins. So if the cash flow is tight, we find it difficult to pay salaries to people who work on the ground," says an enrolment agency official.
Admittedly, while the profitability of an EA need not be the UIDAI's concern, it certainly needs to check if enrolment is being affected because the EAs are cutting corners to stay within their budgets.
The EAs are also witnessing high attrition rates among enrolment operators. These operators, who have to clear a certification exam before they can enrol people, work for three or four months and leave if some other agency offers them more money, reveals Sudhanva Kimmane of Comat Technologies, a Bangalore-based EA. Since getting a new operator certified takes about 20 to 25 days, the deadline goes for a toss.
Sometimes, the unreasonable demands of state governments also lead to delays. Karnataka, for instance, has asked registrars working in the state to gather information on as many as 19 counts. "Filling out so many additional fields reduces the number of enrolments that an operator can complete in a day and thus makes our targets go awry," says an EA working in Karnataka.
Experts feel that one of the biggest flaws of the UID project is that it was launched all across the country without trial runs in small areas. "Whether in the private sector or the public sector, if a new project is being undertaken, it is usually tested in a small area before being launched on a large scale," says an IT expert who has been involved with launching e-governance programmes in Kerala. "This way you suss out the feasibility of the project. Also, it helps to resolve all possible problems that may be encountered during the full roll-out. Why didn't they first test the UID programme in a district, and then in a state before taking it pan India," he asks.
With so many problems bedevilling the project, many people are sceptical of its success. Asks R. Ramakumar, associate professor at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, "Will the benefits accruing from the project justify the huge expenses involved?" He points out that a similar project in the UK — that aimed to create a National Identity Register — was scrapped by the government in December. The London School of Economics, which analysed the proposal, found that the cost could end up being 10 times more than what was envisaged. "If the technologies involved are so infallible, why did a few developed countries which tried to use them drop them eventually," he asks.
Clearly, there are too many uncomfortable questions facing the UIDAI right now. It remains to be seen if it is merely experiencing teething troubles or if India's zillion-rupeeaadhaar number scheme will tie itself into knots even before it gets to the halfway mark.

GLITCHES GALORE

Slipping targets: Only three states have crossed the one million mark in providing aadhaar numbers to their citizens. Total enrolment stands at 9.5 million as on June 27. The goal is to provide aadhaar numbers to 600 million people by 2014.
Slow data crunching: Processing each data packet now takes a couple of minutes. To achieve the target of generating one million UID numbers daily by October this year, the UIDAI should be processing 11 data packets a second during a 24-hour cycle.
Devil is in duplication: Since the UIDAI is taking about three to four months to generate an aadhaar number, a citizen who is unsure of his UID status may go to another enrolment agency. So his data are collected again and sent to the CIDR for registration once more. This increases the de-duplication workload and slows down the entire process even more.
High attrition rates: Enrolment operators, who have to clear a certification exam before they can enrol people, work for three or four months and leave if some other agency offers them more money. Since getting a new operator certified takes about 20 to 25 days, the enrolment agency's target goes for a toss.

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110703/jsp/7days/story_14190879.jsp

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The UID will link a person's Passport Number, Driving License, PAN card, Bank Accounts, Address, Voter ID, etc. and all this information will be checked ...
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It's important to note that what the UID does not do is identify a person as poor or non-poor or large or small farmer. Indeed it collects no socioeconomic ...

Rush at GPO for UID cards

Times of India

Get UID number at post office soon

Times of India

Huge rush for Aadhaar card speaks of its success

Naveen Kumar, TNN Jun 15, 2011, 10.06pm IST
VARANASI: Waiting patiently for his turn to get registered for unique identification card (UID card), Jamal Akhthar, a resident of Madanpura, appeared a relieved man as he was one of the 50-odd people in the city who got registered for UID card, also known as 'Aadhaar card'.
To his utter surprise, all the formalities related to registration, including filling up of enrolment form and biometric verification that included finger impressions of all 10 fingers and iris capture, took less than 10 minutes and he was provided with the counterfoil of information details carrying his signature after proper verification. "If all formalities like proof of identity, address and date of birth are established with the help of original documents, it is a simple procedure that does not consume much time," he said after coming out of the building housing the office of Alankit Assignments Ltd (AAL), the firm that has been authorised by Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to start registrations for issuing Aadhaar cards in the city.

PATNA: Patnaites seem to be very keen on getting Unique Identification (UID) cards. The queue outside the UID card counter at the Patna GPO is growing longer with every passing day. Looking at the number of people turning up and to render superior service to them, the postal department on Thursday opened two more UID card counters at the GPO.
UID card registration work in Bihar was inaugurated at the GPO on June 24. "Earlier, we were able to cater to only 60-70 applicants per day, but now with two more counters, this number would increase to 200-225 per day," said Anil Kumar, marketing director, postal department.
Within a week of its launch, more than 11,000 UID card forms have been distributed, and out of these as many as 800 forms have been submitted at the registration counter.

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One crore register in Maharashtra under UID project

Published on Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 22:08 | Source : PTI
Updated at Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 22:10
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Maharashtra has registered around one crore of its population under the ambitious Aadhar project to issue Unique Identification Card (UID).
Altogether 4000 registration centres have been started at 1100 places in the state, an official release said.
Aadhar aims to provide a 12-digit number to citizens and is generated by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI).
The number will be stored in a centralised database and linked to the basic demographics and biometric information - photograph, fingerprints and iris - of each individual.
It is estimated that it would take between 12 and 18 months to complete registration process in the state and the process would continue if needed, the release said.
Tags: Aadhar project, Unique Identification Card, UID, UIDAI, registration process
http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/one-crore-registermaharashtra-under-uid-project_560604.html

12-digit pin to Nirvana, claims government
Ajith Athrady
In the season of corruption, pressure is mounting on the Government to plug the leakages in its welfare schemes.

*With an appalling over 65 per cent of the total money spent on welfare schemes meant for the poor not reaching them, the mandarins of the government are now looking at the magic number, "Aadhaar", or unique identity number issued by Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), as a quick fix solution. As the UIDAI is celebrating the successful issue of one crore Aadhaar numbers as on June 30, 2011, officials of various departments are knocking on the door of the Authority, seeking a linkage between UID numbers and welfare schemes rolled out by them. Though applying for an Aadhaar number is optional, the government is keen to bring all poor under its ambit to plug leakages in delivering benefits of welfare schemes. This means, a person eligible to draw subsidised foodgrains under Public Distribution System (PDS), must possess an UID number which will be linked to his ration card. When the ration card holder draws rice or wheat from the ration shop, he must provide his biometric data (unique physical traits collected while issuing UID) which can be cross checked with his biometrics stored in a central data depository (CDD) of the UIDAI. Only if the CDD gives the nod, the ration shop owner will issue foodgrains to the beneficiary. Plugging leakage "This will prevent non-PDS card holders siphoning off foodgrains in the name of genuine beneficiaries," said Union Food Minister K V Thomas, who has been holding meetings with UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani to link ration cards with UID numbers. With the Planning Commission considering direct cash transfer in place of foodgrain and fertiliser subsidy, government agencies may insist on beneficiaries opening a bank account by citing UID number. According to Nilekani, Aadhaar is working with Reserve Bank of India and Ministry of finance to ensure that banks can use UID to assist citizens even in the remotest parts of the country get financial inclusion. Sikkim and Tripura state governments have already started accepting UID as official identification. Thus, Aadhaar is taking centre stage as a means to deliver good governance and ensure financial inclusion of the poor, say officials. The UIDAI is already conducting a pilot disbursement of funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MNREGS) to Jharkhand through Union Bank, ICICI Bank and Bank of India branches, where micro-ATMs will be deployed for payments. Huge savings A McKinsey report on Inclusive Growth and Financial Security, published in October 2010 noted that an electronic platform for government payments will save the exchequer around Rs one lakh crore. The idea of issuing an Aadhaar number to every citizen was first mooted by the Planning Commission as an answer to plug leakages in welfare schemes. Around the same time, the Registrar General of India (RGI) was also involved in the process of creating a National Population Register and issuing Multipurpose National Identity cards to all citizens. In 2006, an Empowered Group of Ministers (EGoM) was constituted to collate two schemes — Population Register under the Citizenship Act, 1955 and the Unique Identification Number project. In January 2009, UIDAI under the Planning Commission was constituted to provide a 12-digit unique identification number dubbed as Aadhaar. The scheme was launched on September 29, 2010 by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at Thambali village of Nandurbar district in Maharashtra. The Authority has enrolled 3.5 crore people till June 30 and issued one crore numbers. Enrollments are in progress in more than 25 States and Union Territories by more than 30 registrars with the help of over 11,000 operators. Nilekani is confident of meeting the target of generating 60 crore UID numbers by 2014. "Enrollment will accelerate in the coming weeks as more registrars will be deployed, he said.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/173269/12-digit-pin-nirvana-claims.html

Union Budget 2011: Direct cash subsidy on fuel, fertilizers by Mar '12

PTI Feb 28, 2011, 12.43pm IST
NEW DELHI: Concerned over the misuse of subsidies provided under various schemes, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Monday said the government will provide a direct cash subsidy on kerosene and fertilisers to the poor from March next year.
"... To ensure greater cost efficiency and better delivery for both kerosene and fertilizer, the government will move toward direct transfer of cash subsidy for people below poverty line (BPL) in a phased manner," Mukherjee said during his presentation of the Budget 2011-12.
The system will be in place by March, 2012, he said. A task force headed by Nandan Nilekani is working out the modalities for the proposed system of direct transfer of subsidy for kerosene, LPG and fertilisers, he said.

he Government proposed to provide a direct cash subsidy on fuel and fertilizers to the poor from March, 2012.
"To ensure greater cost efficiency and better delivery of kerosene and fertilizers, the government will move toward direct transfer of cash subsidy for people below poverty line (BPL) in a phased manner. The system would be in place by March, 2012, he added.
A task force headed by the former chief of Infosys, Nandan Nilekani, who is nowUnique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) Chairman, is working out the modalities for the proposed system . It comprises Secretaries from the Ministries of Finance, Chemicals and Fertilizers, Agriculture, Food, Petroleum and Rural Development.

At present, the government provides kerosene at subsidised rates to BPL families through the Public Distribution System (PDS). Furthermore, LPG is provided at a subsidised rate to households.

As regards fertilizers, the government provides subsidy to companies so that farm inputs, which include urea and imported fertilizers, can be provided to farmers at cheaper rates.
Besides designing an IT framework, the task force will align the systems with the issuance of the UID numbers and suggest changes in the administration and supply chain management.
A new policy on providing subsidies on fertilizers on the basis of their nutrient composition could soon be extended to urea, one of the most widely used fertilizers. "Nutrient-based fertilizer policy for urea is under consideration."

The nutrient-based subsidy (NBS) regime is expected to promote balanced fertilization and consequently increase agriculture productivity in the country through higher usage of secondary and micro-nutrients.

Bangalore: Enrolment for Aadhaar Unique Identity (UID) has begun in Bangalore, with the General Post Office (GPO) launching the facility through 35 post offices in the city; one could also enrol for the number through seven post offices in Bangalore Rural.
Ashok Dalwai, deputy director general of the Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI), Vasumitra, post master general, Karnataka Circle, and P Raghavan, chief general manager of Karnataka Telecom Circle, launched the first enrolment in the city at the GPO on Friday.
Dalwai said that apart from the post offices, the enrolment would also occur through state registration agencies. This facility would be available in a month.
"The state has already floated tenders for finalising the agencies which would assist in the enrolment of people into Aadhaar. People could also walk into the nearest post office for this purpose.
The GPO is one of our main non-state registrars," Dalwai said, adding that details of 40 lakh people in the state had already been received, ahead of enrolment.
In Tumkur and Mysore districts, 18 lakh UIDs had already been delivered.
"We will next begin enrolment in Belgaum and Gulbarga divisions, and then come to Bangalore. After that, we could move on to complete Mysore," Dalwai said.
The GPO distributed a list of 236 post offices, spread across different taluks and in different districts, to assist people in enrolling for the UID. There are 35 post offices in the city — six in Bangalore East and South each, and 22 in Bangalore West.
Two agencies have been empanelled in Karnataka Circle for enrolment assistance — Team Life Care Company, Pampa Layout, Hebbal and Comat Technologies, Thimmaiah Road.
They will divide the work gathered by the 236 post offices and process the UIDs for the Karnataka Circle. Dalwai said the enrolling would begin in a phased manner once the state registrar agencies were finalised.
Dalwai said that people should be careful to spell their names correctly and give the correct addresses while giving details for UID enrolment.
"For the UID, we need four basic details — name, date of birth, address and gender. If a person does not have address proof or other government-approved identification details, we have means to go back and check the details, so people ought to provide us these four details correctly," Dalwai said.
By March 2012, the delivery of a substantial number of UIDs would be completed in Karnataka, as well as the rest of India.
"As our chairman has already announced, from October, we will deliver a million UIDs each day. We will have to push the process of enrolment so that we can achieve the target of covering one million UIDs per day," Dalwai said.
Asserting that there was no chance of the UID being misused, Dalwai said, "The UID is a dumb, unintelligent, 12-digit number. It does not reveal anything at all about the person, so the question of manipulating the UID card just does not arise."
Aadhaar can be used to receive welfare programmes of the government, and the number could be used to get the LPG connection or rations through the public distribution system. It can even help people in getting a scholarship to fund higher studies.
The Aadhaar will be based on biometric data. The fingerprints of all 10 fingers and iris mapping of both eyes will be done for each person enrolled.
With Aadhaar, one can also link a bank account, and get a refill of the LPG cylinder. It will also help in getting passport or other government work done.
UIDAI has partnered with 67 institutions and government bodies to collect details necessary for the UID. "So far, we have captured details of three crores of people, and delivered 98 lakh UIDs across the country. The GPO is our logistics partner. This association will go a long way," said Dalwai.

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"We will achieve the target of generating 600 million unique identity cards (UID) by 2014. Till now we have generated 95 lakh and enrolled around two crore people," Nilekani said at a press conference in ranchi, jharkhand. He was there in last June to review the progress of the unique ID card process in Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. He said the work is currently progressing in 11 states. 6.5 lakh unique cards have been generated and 20 lakh people have been enrolled in Jharkhand, Nilekani said.

Asked whether any parameters have been set in border areas of the country for generating unique ID cards, he said the cards "are proof of residency of a person and it is not a proof of nationality".

One million Indian residents are expected to enroll for unique identity (Aadhaar) number every day from this October, Chairman of Unique Identity and Development Authority of India Nandan M Nilekani , said in Bangalore on 23rd June last.

"As UIDAI scales up the systems both at the back-end by adding more technologies and at the front by adding more enrollment stations, it's confident of achieving this goal," he said.

Speaking at a conference with the theme "Next Generation Service Delivery - Enabled by Aadhaar", organised by NASSCOM and UIDAI, Nilakani said as of now 95 lakh (9.5 million) people have been issued with Aadhaar numbers.

Another UIDAI official said the figure is expected to cross one crore.

Nilekani said plans are on track to issue Aadhaar numbers to 600 million (60 crore) people in three to three-and-half years. He said the entire enrollment infrastructure would stabilise in the next few months, adding, UIDAI has built a massive biometrics-based capabilities.

"We are very comfortable that in the next few months, we will have critical mass of people around the country who will have Aadhaar numbers with them," he said.

He said UIDAI would create for the first time in the country a national devices' infrastructure, which is inter-operable.

Nilekani said devices compliant with Aadhaar standards, -- whether they are in bank branches, or kirana stores or post offices or in schools or public health centres or anywhere -- would be inter-operable.

How to get your Unique Identification number 'Aadhaar'

With a mammoth exercise on to issue an Aadhar number to each of India's 1.2 billion citizens and interested residents, here is the process for getting what will become a unique identity for people in India to access all public or private services.

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) - under the chairmanship of Nandan Nilekani - is the nodal agency, which had appointed registrars across the country to facilitate the enrolment process.

Nilekani was one of the co-founders and previously headed IT bellwether Infosys. He enjoys cabinet rank in his present status.

Registrars are typically government departments and public sector organisations. They in turn appoint the agency to collect data. Currently, over 200 such agencies have been named including Wipro , Comat Technologies, Alankit and Virgo Softech.

"Aadhaar guarantees uniqueness and a universal identity. At its core is a centralised online identity verification process," said Atul P. Anand, director at Virgo Softech , which is one of the enrolment agencies involved in the process.

"Biometric information like iris and fingerprints ensure this uniqueness. This is also embedded and hence tamper proof. The authority uses data de-duplication process, which also makes sure that only unique data is stored," Anand told media.

Officials explained the enrolment is done in four stages -- verification of documents including address proof, on-the-spot capture of photos, iris and fingerprint scanning -- after which people are given acknowledgment slips at the time of enrolment.

A 12-digit unique identification number is then delivered in 20-30 days at the person's address through speed post after verification of biometrics and demographic data. Data verification is done by the authority under a centralised system.

The system ensures duplicate data is deleted, leaving only one copy to be stored.

"If you try to enrol yourself for the second time by using some different demographic information or data, you cannot do it. That's also because you can't change your iris and fingerprint. So duplicate data automatically gets deleted," said Anand.

Bouquets & brickbats: Nandan Nilekani decodes the UID

Published on Sat, Jun 25, 2011 at 13:58 | Source : CNBC-TV18
Updated at Mon, Jun 27, 2011 at 09:46
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He believes in the power of technology and challenges, which is why Nandan Nilekani was appointed by the Prime Minister to lay the foundation for the world's largest and most ambitious identification program. Two years into his job as the chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), Nilekani delivered on his promise of rolling out the Aadhaar number.
The unique identification project like most innovations faces admiration and skepticism both alike. On CNBC-TV18's Young Turks, Nilekani decodes the UID, says with 9.2 million people on board, the critics can keep calm now.
Below is a transcript of Nandan Nilekani;s interview with CNBC-TV18. Also watch the accompanying video.
Q: How has life changed for you?
A: It has changed in many ways. I have left the private sector and joined the government. I went from a situation where I was leading a 100,000 person company to doing a start up all over again but a start up in government. It has been a great experience. I have learnt a lot in the last two years.
Q: How do you function? How have you been able to reorient yourself?
A: I have had an absolutely unhindered and unencumbered two years in the government. I was given a job and I also have guidance. We will do 600 million people by 2014. I am going to stick to the guidance. We had another guidance that we will launch within 18 months. We beat that guidance by launching in 14 months.
Q: What is the current status? How many numbers have you rolled out?
A: We have enrolled 9.2 million people. We have an online portal that is real time, which tells you the status every morning, therefore as of today it if 9.2 million people across 11 states.
Q: Confidentiality is one of the apprehensions that are being expressed. The UID is to become compulsory and not voluntary. What is your take?
A: UID gives an ID, it doesn't really give anything else and it gives an online ID that you to authenticate that ID in a mobile banking application or online web application. It is a very limited thing and it's designed for giving benefits to people. 9.2 million people have received a letter from us with a number. Many of them have never had an identity in their lives. Therefore, for the first time they are having an ID that enables them to open a bank account, to get a mobile connection and so on. People are seeing the value of this from the point of view of entitlements and benefits. A lot of the skepticism is therefore tapering off.
Q: The other apprehension is where or whom will this data eventually go to? Will it go to India or American business houses?
A: The database we have has your name, your sex, your address and your date of birth and on an optional basis your e-mail and mobile number if you want to be contacted. It's a black box. All that you can use it for is authentication. There is no question of sharing this data. This data is inside this black box. Only when XYZ comes to a point of service and says I want to confirm I am XYZ - you get some authentication token or a biometric and we will confirm that your are XCYZ — that's all.
Q: Besides the UID — who can access this data or who can the UID authorize to access this data? Can a government agency or individual ministry access this data?
A: The data base is only used for authentication. In the interest of national security which is there is there in any country — if there is a certain request under a due process which requires the government for reasons of finding a terrorist or whatever — they can access that data with a request which is also audited.
Q: How do you ensure the security of this data?
A: This database is behind a perimeter of partners. Therefore this database is not exposed to the world. It's only talking through trusted partners who in turn may have front end services where the use is only for authentication.

Tags: Nandan Nilekani, UIDAI, start-up

http://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/bouquetsbrickbats-nandan-nilekani-decodesuid_560218.html

Nandan Nilekani questioned over pitfalls in UID

TNN Feb 12, 2011, 11.04am IST

Tags:

NEW DELHI: The possibility of the voluntary nature of the unique identity number project becoming virtually a compulsion in the light of entitlements being linked to the scheme saw members of a parliamentary panel quiz UID chief Nandan Nilekani about its pitfalls.

At a meeting of the Public Accounts Committee on Friday , MPs told Nilekani that despite his claims that the UID is merely a number — not indicative of citizenship , caste or religion — it might be vital for beneficiaries of government schemes for the poor.

BJP MP Yashwant Sinha pointed out that once UID became a part of the PAN card issued by tax authorities or was used to identify beneficiaries of schemes like rural employment or cheap housing, it became a compulsion for users instead of being voluntary. MPs also highlighted concerns over UID being issued to persons who are "residents of India" .
While the UID rules provide for a UID to be issued on basis of a person being resident of an area for six months and a day, MPs wondered how migrant labour would access the scheme. Many such labour was keen on being recognized as residents of their home towns and villages rather than the cities they worked in.
It was also the case that migrant labour might be eligible to schemes like food security or urban housing while not wanting to give up their village addresses. Then some parties, not just the BJP, are concerned about the growth of illegal migrants from countries like Bangladesh. Once illegals accessed UID they might tap benefits meant for Indian nationals.
Members from states like Orissa and Andhra Pradesh were concerned about migrants being left out of the ambit of the UID scheme.
http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2011-02-12/news/28539649_1_uid-unique-identity-number-project-migrant-labour

Unique identity: the boon & the bane

TAJENDER SINGH LUTHRA

If we do not make the UID number mandatory for all residents, a sizable population, especially those who need

to be watched to control crime and fight terrorism, would happily like to be left out of its purview.

FILE PHOTO: NAGARA GOPAL

AN ID OF THEIR OWN:Fingerprint impressions being taken at a booth set up by the Unique Identification Authority of India at Patancheru in Medak district of Andhra Pradesh.

Right thinking tax authorities always crave for tearing apart one body having different names. But unearthing A's bank account even in a neighbouring city is a difficult job. Discovering B's immovable properties registered with a slight change of spellings, yet within the same city, is as hard as inventing a new wheel. Similarly, a policeman's simple need to instantly verify whether C's name and residence are as good as C claimed them to be is still a dream. Practically and legally, it is complex as well as cumbersome to detain somebody and wait for days to verify his name and address from a distant city.

Auditors could never unravel the mystery of fudged muster rolls. And, supposedly development funds continue to splurge on digging wells, constructing dirt roads and repairing schools that were never there. Illegal migrants from friendly and unfriendly neighbours enjoy the perks of our liberal democracy without adhering to the minimal requirements of being a good resident but we don't have a foolproof system to trace and send them back.

We are making world-class software to create the global-level services but only for export. Software architects long to create similar services for their own country but somehow they could not use their expertise at home. Though these tasks still remain a far cry, a good beginning has been made by ushering in the Unique Identity Number (UID) for every Indian.

UID would reveal the benami transactions in stocks and commodity exchanges. It would unearth benami holdings of agricultural land and real estate. The Election Commission would finally be able to issue identity-based card to all eligible voters. Banks, with the help of UID, would streamline their policy of "know your customer." Duplicate PAN cards, ration cards, below the poverty line yellow cards, driving licences and many such cards which are issued to cheat the government would become a thing of the past. Certainly, UID would increase the government's tax collection, boost enforcement of the law and stop pilferage of development funds.

In a way, where the Right to Information Act stops after providing just information and falls short of directly delivering anything for the good of common man, UID would act as a weapon to bring about tangible changes in the system whose benefits would be openly felt by the public. The potent but somewhat inactive warhead of the RTI would get an effective and far-reaching UID launcher to hit the offender where it hurts the most.

However, UID would not solve our problems on its own. Different departments would not only have to create their own infrastructure but also have to make it compatible with the UID software architecture to exchange the desired information in real time. Moreover, they would have to make the use of the UID number mandatory by their customers to detect any misuse. A passport officer would have to make the software in his office compatible with the main UID software architecture to know whether a person is trying to get a second passport on a different name and address.

Electronic voting machines would have to be tweaked to allow only genuine voters to vote. Banks would have to make it necessary for account holders to quote their UID numbers to detect duplicate accounts. In a rather similar way, the police would have to fine-tune their computers to know whether an accused is concealing his identity or not. Needless to say, the longer we take to prepare for and utilise the benefits of UID, the lesser we would realise its true potential.

But one of the big questions is who would get UID. Will only Indian citizens get it? Or anybody living on Indian soil can apply for and get a UID number? There is still some ambiguity about the eligibility to get the UID number. Another significant issue is whether getting an UID number would be compulsory or optional for an individual. Will obtaining UID become mandatory for all individuals? Or will it be impossible for a person to function without obtaining UID? For example, if we can't get our driving licence, PAN card or passport without having a UID number, more than a majority of us would be indirectly spurred to get a UID number.

But this indirect approach would still leave many illegal migrants, slum dwellers, beggars and poor rural residents uncovered as they hardly need any government issued document to survive. Therefore, the aim of covering all residents of the country would always be a dream. Moreover, illegal migrants and particularly those from unfriendly neighbours and with ulterior motives would have a "legal" option of avoiding the gaze of UID and thus dodge the law of the land. Obviously, law enforcement is one area that would be the most adversely affected, if the UID number is not made mandatory for all residents. Therefore, we should adopt a direct approach to coax all residents to be under the cover of UID. Besides making the network of UID faster, it would make it more pervasive too.

However, if not utilised with the right intention, the blessing of UID might become a bane. If we do not make the UID number mandatory for all residents, a sizable population, especially those who need to be watched to control crime and fight terrorism, would happily like to be left out of its purview. And if we make UID mandatory for all residents, then the important topic to consider is whether UID number would confer any right on the holders.

The lurking danger is that on the strength of holding the UID number for a few years (say 10 years), even those who aren't citizens might claim to be citizens and assert their privileges.

These people would organise themselves, first, into pressure groups and, later, metamorphose into attractive political constituencies to lure different opinionated parties. It would be very hard for political parties to ignore such a striking section as their prospective constituency and disregard their privileges as citizens, particularly, the right to vote.

We need to learn from the experience of Assam in 1972. It would be convenient for these pressure groups to force the government of the day to decide a cut-off date of holding a UID number to make illegal migrants legal. Further, on the strength of holding UID, they would fight tooth and nail to stay, be citizens and vote in elections in India. The problem of illegal migrants is as bad for us as for the western world. But heavens will not fall if we also subsume a section of illegal migrants on the strength of possession of UID, provided we have a foolproof system to sift out those who are risk to our country's security. And even countries like the U.S. have been announcing amnesty schemes to legalise illegal immigrants from time to time. Many of our friends and relatives have been the beneficiaries of such amnesty schemes in the western world. To some extent, the U.S. and other western countries do it for their own benefit as they need illegal migrants as cheap labour.

At the same time, though not foolproof, the U.S. has a far better system to trace and send back illegal migrants. We would need to have similar, if not a better system, to strain out our risks. If used positively, UID itself would become a forceful weapon to sieve undesirable security risks out of the system. Therefore, right in the beginning, we need to seriously mull over the potential benefits and misuses of UID and be prepared with remedy.

(The writer is an IPS officer. The views expressed are personal. His email id is: tajendraluthra@rediffmail. com)

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http://www.hindu.com/op/2011/03/20/stories/2011032050021400.htm

"Basic procedures not followed before UID project was launched"

SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

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As the Prime Minister hands out the first official AADHAAR numbers in the tribal district of Nandurbar on Wednesday, civil society activists in the capital are questioning the very basis of the ambitious Unique Identification (UID) scheme.

"Even basic procedures have not been followed before launching such a massive project," said Usha Ramanathan, an expert in law, poverty and civil rights. "The people of India, as well as Parliamentarians need to be informed, consulted and involved in a debate about a project that could have wide-ranging impacts. It should be halted before it goes any further," she said, during a meeting here on Tuesday.

The project, first called the UID Authority of India and then renamed AADHAAR, aims to create a database with a unique identity number for every resident of the country, authenticated by fingerprints and iris scans. Its supporters, led by UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani, claim it will benefit the poor and bring inclusivity and efficiency to government schemes. Its detractors, who are in the nascent stages of forming a campaign against it, warn that the project will allow the government to play Big Brother, and raise concerns of profiling and exclusion.

"No legal backing"

In a statement signed by eminent citizens, including retired Supreme Court judge V.R. Krishna Iyer, historian Romila Thapar and social justice campaigner Aruna Roy, activists questioned the undemocratic process behind the project. UIDAI was set up through a government notification as an attached office of the Planning Commission without any discussion in Parliament or civil society. Despite having no legal backing – a draft Bill was approved by the Cabinet last Friday – the Authority has signed contracts and agreements with States, banks and a large number of technology companies, said the statement.

"Historically, it has always been dangerous to issue a number or card to a population," says Ms. Ramanathan.

She raised issues such as the possibility of profiling, tracking and surveillance which could be increased by the converged information that a UID database would provide.

Apart from the dangers, activists also questioned the efficacy of the project. "Mr. Nilekani claims that UID will allow better delivery of public schemes such as PDS or NREGA. Yet, he intends to use the existing NREGA and PDS databases to enrol people for UID, so where does the 'inclusivity' aspect come in?" asked Reetika Khare, a developmental economist at the Delhi School of Economics.

"It is a myth that technology will promote inclusivity. All it means is that anyone left out will become disenfranchised for all purposes."

She added that while the UID might help prevent duplication of PDS beneficiaries, most of the leakage in the PDS system came from dealer fraud.

Activists asked why the government seemed to be steamrollering the project through without allowing time for public debate. Even while the pilot studies are still throwing up problems such as poor people without stable fingerprints or with iris scans affected by malnourishment-related cataracts, the Authority is rushing to formally launch the scheme.

The statement demands that a feasibility study be carried out, to demonstrate the benefits to social welfare schemes, examine the effects on privacy and detail who will have access to the UID database.

"Without guaranteed security against data theft, the wisdom of holding this in a central registry may need to be reviewed." With Rs. 45,000 crore planned to be spent on UID over the next four years, activists demanded a cost-benefit analysis to see what the final cost would be for the end user and cardholder.

Keywords: Unique Identification scheme, UID Authority of India, AADHAAR numbers, UID controversy

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article801252.ece

Leaked UID plan on Net fuels data theft fears

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Other UID projects implemented on a smaller scale in India can also ... This article's section called criticism needs additional citations for verification. ...

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What this criticism of the UID reveals

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3 JUL, 2011, 06.50AM IST, ULLEKH NP,ET BUREAU
'In India, to do well, don't talk about the poor'
Jean Dreze, until recently the intellectual driving force behind the National Advisory Council , is measured but unmistakable in his disenchantment with many current UPA welfare schemes. The economist who quit the Sonia Gandhi-led NAC in late June, won't comment on whether the UPA government has failed the NAC.

But, he tells Ullekh NP, there's not enough empathy in the Indian establishment for the poor. Programmes like NREGA, he says, attract the hostile attention of both employers and government officials.

Why did you not want Sonia Gandhi to extend your membership at the NAC? Has she replied to your letter?

I had agreed to join the NAC for a limited period of one year. Having done what I had agreed to do, I felt that the time had come to return to other commitments that are closer to my heart. Ms Gandhi has kindly agreed to release me.

What are your worries about the proposed Food Security Bill which sets aside a huge sum of money for the purpose of "feeding the poor"?

My main concern is that the proposed framework for the public distribution system (PDS) is confused, impractical and divisive. The whole framework is based on a division of the population into three groups (excluded, general and priority), without any clarity as to how these groups are to be identified. By default, the "priority group" is likely to be equated with the below the poverty line ( BPL) list. This is a major setback, because the NAC's work began with an almost unanimous rejection of the BPL approach.

Is India's "self-sufficiency" in food production a joke?

It is not quite a joke, but the apparent self-sufficiency certainly reflects low levels of food intake, in quantitative as well as qualitative terms. For Indians to eat like the Chinese, let alone the Germans or Canadians, there would have to be a lot more food around. For instance, vegetable consumption was recently estimated to be more than twice as high in China as in India , and meat consumption eight times as high. In the age group of 4-6, average nutrient intake as a proportion of the Indian Council of Medical Research's "recommended daily allowance" is only 16% for Vitamin A, 35% for iron and 45% for calcium.

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA; formerly called NREGA) has had many ups and downs in the past five years. What is your assessment of the future prospects?

NREGA is going through a phase of enhanced vulnerability, when workers' organisations to defend it are yet to be formed, while hostile forces are gaining strength. Among the hostile forces are employers' lobbies, concerned with the rising or allegedly rising cost of labour. In many states, the local administration is also turning hostile, because NREGA means extra work, more accountability, and no easy gravy.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/in-india-to-do-well-dont-talk-about-the-poor/articleshow/9080104.cms

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Can UID help to make card payment systems more secure and future proof?
June 08, 2011 06:25 PM

Yogesh Sapkale
According to a report published by the RBI, technically this is possible, but the acceptance of biometrics in payment authentication has not been proved anywhere else yet

Card present transactions at point of sales (POS) and automated teller machines (ATMs) constitute the major proportion of card-based transactions in India. However, the present operating systems using magnetic strip cards (MSDs) and personal identification numbers (PIN) may be replaced in the not too distant future, due to skimming and counterfeit frauds.
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According to a report of the "Working Group on Securing Card Present Transactions" of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), there is a need to put in place a series of measures to strengthen the payments infrastructure and ecosystem in the country. It says, inferences drawn from case studies clearly indicate the need to have a much stronger authentication mechanism and reiterate the need for a second factor (2FA) for cardpresent transactions. (Skimming is the illegal copying of information fromthe magnetic strip of a credit or debit card.)

The report discusses some systems like Europay, MasterCard and Visa (EMV), chip cards with PIN that has been adopted in many countries, and enhancing the existing MSD card system with the biometric identification.

The report says, "Aadhaar (issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India - UIDAI) authentication using biometrics provides a strong 'who you are' factor of authentication. This can be combined with a second 'what you have' or 'what you know' factor to achieve strong customer identification at the point of sale."

While technically, the option to use biometrics from the UIDAI database looks good, in practice, due to insufficient feasibility tests, it may not be a viable option.

"The working committee considered biometric or UID as the second factor in one of the solution sets; however the decision to adopt this would depend on various factors like number of UIDs issued to the population which transacts on cards, the error rates, authentication network capability to handle transaction volumes, network capability to handle enhanced transaction size and acquiring infrastructure," the report states.

It has been seen from international experience that EMV chip card and PIN migration typically takes more than five years, depending on the market size. In addition, the migration from MSD and PIN to a more secure EMV chip and PIN is costly, compared with MSD and biometrics, according tothe study.

solution set comparison

The RBI report states, "Magnetic Stripe Card and Biometric (Aadhaar finger print) protect against both domestic counterfeit (skimming) and lost and stolen card fraud. Biometric (finger print) captured by UIDAI can be used as authentication for protection against both domestic counterfeit and lost and stolen card fraud, as the cardholder has to be physically present at the POS terminal/ATM to authenticate the transaction. Even if the card is counterfeited, the fraudster will not be able to use the card as biometric of the customer would be required."
Bhavin Mody, Senior Product Manager, ElectraCard Services, said, "We need to wait and see how UID program is shaping up. Till such time MSD and PIN is a short term solution which can be implemented. If UID takes off successfully, MSD and biometric should be adopted. Else, the industry will have to shift to EMV chip & PIN mechanism. However, the chip and PINcards would surely be required for the international transactions."

However, biometric (fingerprint) identification is not foolproof. Especially in some merchant categories like fuel stations and restaurants, there are execution challenges in adopting PIN or biometric as an additional factor of authentication. In addition, it is well known that finger prints and irises can be faked, and one way to fix that problem could be to use finger-print readers that detect live finger prints, and iris readers that detect live irises.

According to JT D'Souza, who analysed the pilot study conducted by the UIDAI, given the well-known lacunae in our infrastructure and massive demographics, biometrics as an ID will be a guaranteed failure and result in denial of service. He said, "The sum of false acceptance rate and false rejection rate (EER) reveals only part of the problem, which is rejection or acceptance within a short duration of enrolment. The bigger problem is ageing, including health and environment factors, which causes sufficient change to make biometrics completely unusable and requires very frequent re-enrolment."

Therefore, on paper, the use of biometrics as 2FA may sound feasible, but its use would be limited at specific locations. In this situation, EMV chipcards and PIN look like the future proof system, despite the higher costs for the card-based transactions. Nevertheless, this may not be the last in payment transaction systems.

You may also want to read...

http://moneylife.in/article/can-uid-help-to-make-card-payment-systems-more-secure-and-future-proof/17115.html

3 JUL, 2011, 03.21AM IST, AVINASH CELESTINE,ET BUREAU
Will Direct cash transfer be a better reform than fuel and fertiliser subsidy?

Later this month, Unique ID (UID) chief Nandan Nilekani will finalise a report to the government which could prove a turning point in India's 20-year, largely-failed attempt, to reform its bloated subsidy bill, currently weighing in at over `1,64,000 crore. Nilekani's report will assess whether fuel and fertiliser subsidies can be replaced by a system where cash is transferred directly to beneficiaries.

Cash transfer as a reform finds strong support from, notably, Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia, and chief economic adviser Kaushik Basu. Basu has advocated the extension of cash transfers to food as well.

The reform has two simple yet radical ideas. One, cut out the bureaucracy, the red tape and the middlemen, who currently operate between the government and the ultimate consumer who is supposed to benefit from the subsidy. Two, instead of giving the consumer food, LPG, kerosene or even fertiliser (to farmers), give them cash or special coupons with which to buy what they need directly from the market.

The key link in this chain is Nilekani's own project: the Unique ID. It is through the unique ID that each beneficiary will be identified, recorded and finally given the cash. The Nilekani report will emphasise the gains. But it will be tested in terms of how it addresses the challenges.

Specifically, the incentive problem - the incentive for nonpoor to declare themselves poor may get bigger under the cash transfer system. The challenges are enormous and many are sceptical. "I don't see it happening," says former finance minister Yashwant Sinha , who drove a series of subsidy reform attempts in the late 90s. "If I ever get the chance to become FM again, I will not reform subsidies. The last time I tried, we lost the elections."

The Cash Transfer System

The UID project aims to collect the personal and biometric information of a large proportion of the population over a period of time. At the time of enrolment, each person is allotted a unique ID number, and also opens a bank account, to which that unique ID will be linked.

It's important to note that what the UID does not do is identify a person as poor or non-poor or large or small farmer. Indeed it collects no socioeconomic data about the person at all. Those tough decisions will be the job of other agencies.

Once a person has been tagged as poor or as otherwise deserving of a subsidy, the cash amount of the subsidy will be transferred to his/her account.

A below poverty line (BPL) family wishing to withdraw money will authenticate itself with the bank, and get the funds. Given the limited reach of many banks in rural areas, the aim is to use banking correspondents or agents to disburse funds and authenticate beneficiaries. Using the cash, the poor family can then buy the food (or kerosene) they need from the market - at market prices.

And since the BPL family can buy grain or kerosene from anywhere with cash, the entire system of fair price shops and the rationale for their existence disappears. Similarly, farmers can use the cash they receive to buy fertiliser from anywhere. The focus shifts from ensuring supply to creating demand.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/policy/will-direct-cash-transfer-be-a-better-reform-than-fuel-and-fertiliser-subsidy/articleshow/9082429.cms

Subsidy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

*	This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (November 2010)

A subsidy (also known as a subvention) is a form of financial assistance paid to a business or economic sector. Most subsidies are made by the government to producers or distributors in an industry to prevent the decline of that industry (e.g., as a result of continuous unprofitable operations) or an increase in the prices of its products or simply to encourage it to hire more labor (as in the case of a wage subsidy). Examples are subsidies to encourage the sale of exports; subsidies on some foods to keep down the cost of living, especially in urban areas; and subsidies to encourage the expansion of farm production and achieve self-reliance in food production.[1]
Subsidies can be regarded as a form of protectionism or trade barrier by making domestic goods and services artificially competitive against imports. Subsidies may distort markets, and can impose large economic costs.[2] Financial assistance in the form of a subsidy may come from one's government, but the term subsidy may also refer to assistance granted by others, such as individuals or non-governmental institutions.

[hide]

[edit]Overview

A subsidy is money given by a government to help support a business or person the market does not support.[3] In the United States, Congress can tax to provide for the general welfare. It also has the power to coin money and regulate its value.[4] An example of subsidy is from the middle ages. The British Parliament took away their king's authority to tax and gave him a tax-based subsidy to live on.[5]
In standard supply and demand curve diagrams, a subsidy will shift either the demand curve up or the supply curve down. A subsidy that increases the production will tend to result in a lower price, while a subsidy that increases demand will tend to result in an increase in price. Both cases result in a new economic equilibrium. Therefore it is essential to consider elasticity when estimating the total costs of a planned subsidy: it equals the subsidy per unit (difference between market price and subsidized price) times the new equilibrium quantity. One category of goods suffers less from this effect: Public goods are—once created—in ample supply and the total costs of subsidies remain constant regardless of the number of consumers; depending on the form of the subsidy, however, the number of producers on demanding their share of benefits may still rise and drive costs up.
The recipient of the subsidy may need to be distinguished from the beneficiary of the subsidy, and this analysis will depend on elasticity of supply and demand as well as other factors. For example, a subsidy for consumption of milk by consumers may appear to benefit consumers (or some may benefit and the consumer may derive no gain, as the higher prices for milk offset the subsidy). The net effect and identification of winners and losers is rarely straightforward, but subsidies generally result in a transfer of wealth from one group to another (or transfer between sub-groups).
Subsidy may also be used to refer to government actions which limit competition or raise the prices at which producers could sell their products, for example, by means of tariff protection. Although economics generally holds that subsidies may distort the market and produce inefficiencies, there are a number of recognized cases where subsidies may be the most efficient solution.[citation needed]
In many instances, economics may (somewhat counter-intuitively) suggest that direct subsidies are preferable to other forms of support, such as hidden subsidies or trade barriers; although subsidies may be inefficient, they are often less inefficient than other policy tools used to benefit certain groups. Direct subsidies may also be more transparent, which may allow the political process more opportunity to eliminate wasteful hidden subsidies. This problem—that hidden subsidies are more inefficient, but often favored precisely because they are non-transparent—is central to the political-economy of subsidies.
Examples of industries or sectors where subsidies are often found include utilities, gasoline in the United States, welfare, farm subsidies, and (in some countries) certain aspects of student loans.

[edit]Types of subsidies

There are many different ways to classify subsidies, such as the reason behind them, the recipients of the subsidy, the source of the funds (government, consumer, general tax revenues, etc.). In economics, one of the primary ways to classify subsidies is the means of distributing the subsidy.
In economics, the term subsidy may or may not have a negative connotation: that is, the use of the term may be prescriptive but descriptive. In economics, a subsidy may nonetheless be characterized as inefficient relative to no subsidies; inefficient relative to other means of producing the same results; "second-best", implying an inefficient but feasible solution (contrasted with an efficient but not feasible ideal), among other possible terminology. In other cases, a subsidy may be an efficient means of correcting a market failure.
For example, economic analysis may suggest that direct subsidies (cash benefits) would be more efficient than indirect subsidies (such as trade barriers); this does not necessarily imply that direct subsidies are bad, but that they may be more efficient or effective than other mechanisms to achieve the same (or better) results.
Insofar as they are inefficient, however, subsidies would generally be considered by economists to be bad, as economics is the study of efficient use of limited resources. Ultimately, however, the choice to enact a subsidy is a political choice. Note that subsidies are linked to the concept of economic transfers from one group to another.
Economics has also explicitly identified a number of areas where subsidies are entirely justified by economics, particularly in the area of provision of public goods.

[edit]Indirect subsidies

Indirect subsidy is a term sufficiently broad that it may cover most other forms of subsidy.[citation needed] The term would cover any form of subsidy that does not involve a direct transfer.

[edit]Labor subsidies

A labor subsidy is any form of subsidy where the recipients receive subsidies to pay for labor costs. Examples may include labor subsidies for workers in certain industries, such as the film and/or television industries. (see: Runaway production).

[edit]Infrastructure subsidies

In some cases, subsidy may refer to favoring one type of production or consumption over another, effectively reducing the competitiveness or retarding the development of potential substitutes. For example, it has been argued that the use of petroleum, and particularly gasoline, has been subsidized or favored by U.S. defense policy, reducing the use of alternative energy sources and delaying their commercial development. However, alternative energy sources have also been subsidized by the federal and state governments.
In other cases, the government may need to improve the public transport to ensure Pareto improvement is attanied and sustained. This can therefore be done by subsidising those transit agencies that provide the public services so that the services can be affordable for everyone. This is the best way of helping different groups of disabled and low income families in the society.

[edit]Trade protection (import restrictions)

Measures used to limit a given good than they would pay without the trade barrier; the protected industry has effectively received a subsidy. Such measures include import quotas, import tariffs, import bans, and others.

[edit]Export subsidies (trade promotion)

Various tax or other measures may be used to promote exports that constitute subsidies to the industries favored. In other cases, tax measures may be used to ensure that exports are treated "fairly" under the tax system. The determination of what constitutes a subsidy (or the size of that subsidy) may be complex. In many cases, export subsidies are justified as a means of compensating for the subsidies or protections provided by a foreign state to its own producers.

[edit]Procurement subsidies

Governments everywhere are relatively small consumers of various goods and services. Subsidies may occur in this process by choice of the products produced, the producer, the nature of the product itself, and by other means, including payment of higher-than-market prices for goods purchased.

[edit]Consumption subsidies

Governments everywhere provide consumption subsidies in a number of ways: by actually giving away a good or service, providing use of government assets, property, or services at lower than the cost of provision, or by providing economic incentives (cash subsidies) to purchase or use such goods. In most countries, consumption of education, health care, and infrastructure (such as roads) are heavily subsidized, and in many cases provided free of charge. In other cases, governments literally purchase or produce a good (such as bread, wheat, gasoline, or electricity) at a higher cost than the sales price to the public (which may require rationing to control the cost).
The provision of true public goods through consumption subsidies is an example of a type of subsidy that economics may recognize asefficient. In other cases, such subsidies may be reasonable second-best solutions; for example, while it may be theoretically efficient to charge for all use of public roads, in practice, the cost of implementing a system to charge for such use may be unworkable or unjustified.[citation needed]
In other cases, consumption subsidies may be targeted at a specific group of users, such as large utilities, residential home-owners, and others.

[edit]Subsidies due to the effect of debt guarantees

Another form of subsidy is due to the practice of a government guaranteeing a lender payment if a particular borrower defaults. This occurs in the United States, for example, in certain airline industry loans, in most student loans, in small business administration loans, in Ginnie Maemortgage-backed bonds, and is alleged to occur in the mortgage-backed bonds issued through Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. A government guarantee of payment lowers the risk of the loan for a lender, and since interest rates are primarily based on risk, the interest rate for the borrower lowers as well.

[edit]Controversy

One of the most controversial classes of subsidies, especially according to publications such as The Economist, are subsidies benefitingfarmers in first-world countries.
Human-rights based non-governmental organizations like Oxfam describe such subsidies as dumping millions of surplus commodities (like sugar) on world markets, destroying competition from farmers in undeveloped and poor countries, especially in Africa. For example, in the past EU spent €3.30 in subsidies to export sugar worth €1.[6] Another example of trade distorting subsidies is the Common Agricultural Policy of the European Union. It represents 48% of the entire EU's budget, €49.8 billion in 2006 (up from €48.5 billion in 2005).[7] These subsidies have remained in place even though many international accords have reduced other forms of subsidies or tariffs.
The Commitment to Development Index, published by the Center for Global Development, measures the effect that subsidies and trade barriers actually have on the undeveloped world. It uses trade along with six other components such as aid or investment to rank and evaluate developed countries on policies that affect the undeveloped world. It finds that the richest countries spend $106 billion per year subsidizing their own farmers - almost exactly as much as they spend on foreign aid.[8]
The Austrian School of economics and other advocates of free trade hold the view that subsidies generally do more harm than good by distorting economic signals.
Sometimes people believe profitable companies to be 'bullying' governments for subsidies and rescue packages, an example of rent-seekingbehaviour. For example, in the case with Australian rail operator Pacific National, the company threatened the Tasmanian Government with a pull-out of rail services unless a subsidization was made.[9]
It has been suggested that American government subsidies are contributing to the country's obesity crisis. So-called junk foods are made cheaper due to the subsidy programs, thus increasing consumption of such foods.[10]

[edit]Historical meaning

In the 16th century "subsidy" referred to taxation, for example the tax introduced in England by Thomas Wolsey in 1513 based on the ability to pay.[11]

[edit]See also

[edit]Notes

^ Todaro, Michael P.; Smith, Stephen C. (2009). Economic Development (10th ed.). Addison Wesley. p. 839. ISBN 978-0-321-48573-1.
^ "Economics A-Z – Economist.com". The Economist.
^ Gove, P.B. & others. 1961. Webster's Third New International Dictionary. Springfield, MA: G. & C. Merriam Company
^ p. 158, Funk & Wagnalls New Encyclopedia, Volume 7. Phillips, R. S. & others. 1983 USA: Funk & Wagnalls.
^ Ansley, C.F. & others. 1940. The Columbia Encyclopedia in One Volume. Morningside Heights, NY: Columbia University Press.
^ Oxfam International. Oxford, UK (2004). "A Sweeter Future? The potential for EU sugar reform to contribute to poverty reduction in southern Africa." Oxfam Briefing Paper No. 70. November 2004. pp. 39-40.
^ Financial Management in the European Union
^ Roodman Trade Component 2009
^ Pacific National Announces Plans to Dump Tasmanian Intermodal Services
^ Why are Americans so fat? - 7 Reasons
^ p30 - "The English Reformation: crown power and religious change, 1485-1558", Colin Pendrill, Heinemann, 2000. ISBN 0435327127

[edit]External links

Google - public data: GDP and Personal Income of the U.S. (annual): Subsidies
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Categories: Public finance | Subsidies | Taxation

23 JUN, 2011, 05.00AM IST,ET BUREAU
NAC's food bill entitles 70% to subsidised grain

NEW DELHI: The Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council , or NAC, finalised its draft of the food security bill on Wednesday. The draft bill proposes to give legal entitlement to highly subsidised foodgrain to 70% of the population or nearly 80 million people, with monthly entitlement of 7 kg for every member of families below the poverty line and 3 kg to each individual from "general households".

The proposed bill is expected to push the food subsidy tab up to Rs 75000 billion, taking the government's annual subsidy bill up to Rs 1.1 trillion. The draft, which will now be forwarded by Sonia Gandhi to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh , is likely to be adopted by the government. The NAC's food security bill classifies the target population eligible for discounted grain as "priority households" (those below the poverty line) and "general households" (consisting of lower middle class families).

Each member of priority households will be entitled to 7 kg of foodgrain and will have to pay Rs 3 per kg for rice, Rs 2 per kg for wheat and Rs 1 per kg for millets. Every member of the general households will have the right to 3 kg of foodgrain at a price not exceeding 50% of the minimum support price paid to farmers for each of the three grain. The food ministry estimates that roughly 80 million tonnes of foodgrain will be needed to meet the requirements of the food bill .

At present, the government diverts 52 million tonnes of foodgrain for the public distribution system. However, the projections of a sub-normal monsoon does put into question the government's ability to put aside more than 50 million tonnes every year for a large-scale food programme.

Till now, the government had been confident of meeting the foodgrain requirements of the Food Security Bill. Its confidence was based on record procurements following last year's monsoon and the expectations of a normal monsoon this year.

However, the "below normal" monsoon projection has forced economists like Ashok Gulati to suggest that the government should not go in for a food programme that requires a commitment of more than 50 million tonnes every year, as it would not be possible to guarantee. The government is likely to go ahead with this bill despite warnings that the NAC's version would add to subsidy burden, increase dependency on imports and distort the country's food economy.

Even projections of a sub-normal monsoon and its impact on farm production are unlikely to make the government reconsider. For the Congress, the monsoon session of Parliament is the most opportune moment to push forward this bill. A series of graft charges and its failure to cap spiraling food prices over the last two years have seriously dented the Congress-led government's 'aam aadmi' image.

The government's inability to convincingly address the issue of graft and the impasse over the Lokpal bill gives further credence to the perception that the Congress has lost its connect with the people. The crisis is further exacerbated with elections in the politically crucial state of Uttar Pradesh in early 2012. This makes it prudent for the government to push forward the food security bill.

Studies by organisations like the FAO and ADB suggest that high food prices will ensure that over the next few years at least 40 million people, who could have otherwise have improved their lot, will continue to remain below the poverty line.

Already, the last two years of high food prices have pushed 9 million people back below the poverty line. Though food prices may stabilise over the next decade, the short-term volatility can be expected. This would hurt the Congress even further. A food security law could help the UPA stem the tide of further criticism.

In the past, the UPA's rightsbased approach for rural employment, National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, has yielded rich dividends for the party. Despite glitches in implementation, the NREGA has had a salutary effect on the rural economy. Similarly, the Right to Education, another entitlement-based initiative has laid the groundwork for long-term improvement in the earning potential through basic education.

The proposed food security law could provide the Congress with a way out of the political morass it finds itself in. The proposed bill seeks to increase the reach of current food programmes, which targets just 30% of the population. The food law would provide the government with the much-needed cushion to pursue its economic reforms agenda. The government has been criticised for failing to push through the much-needed reforms.

While the Left's participation in UPA-I was seen as the main cause for the lack of economic reforms, in UPA-II there is no such ideological impediment. The safety net for the poor would allow the government to carry forward the reform agenda.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/NACs-food-bill-entitles-70-to-subsidised-grain/articleshow/8958122.cms

8 JUN, 2011, 03.05PM IST, M RAJSHEKHAR,ET BUREAU
India's welfare programmes are not very good at reaching the poorest of the poor: World Bank

DELHI: How effective are India's innumerable social security programmes at reaching out to the poorest of the poor? If a recent World Bank report is anything to go by, they are woefully inefficient. According to the report, titled "Social Protection for a Changing India", leakages and exclusion errors are endemic across the country.

For instance, just 27% of the PDS . beenficiaries are the poorest of the poor. The World Bank found that this was the predominant trend across all the welfare programmes it studied.

1. Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana: State-run employment programme that provided food and cash for work: 43.4%
2. Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana: Subsidised loans to groups of BPL people: 32.9%
3. Indira Gandhi National Old Age Pension: Monthly pension for BPL elderly: 32.8%
4. Annapurna: 10 kilos of food grains for destitutes who are not getting the old age pension: 51.9%
5. Widow pension: Monthly pension for BPL widows: 43.2%
6. Disabled pension: Monthly pension for the disabled: 30.7%
7. Indira Awas Yojana: Subsidy for BPL families for house construction: 28.6%
8. School stipends: Scholarships: 22.6%

This inefficiency is a problem across all Indian states. Take the PDS. Leakages range between 27% (Bengal) and 91.1% (Bihar).

It raises a question. Why does this exclusion take place? Partly because a steady mushrooming of welfare programmes linked to BPL cards has resulted in the village elite competing to get BPL cards. Given that every state has only so many BPL cards it can give out (in line with the Planning Commission's poverty estimates), this excludes the BPL.

That said, the problem goes well beyond targeting. Take MGNREGA. It is open to anyone willing to work below the market wage. However, the poorest of the poor do not turn to NREGA. The programme takes, in the best case scenario, 1-2 weeks to pay its wages. Stories about NREGA workers getting their wages months after working are legion. And the poorest of the poor, so destitute they need cash to eat, if not today then tomorrow, and so disempowered they cannot protest against the delays, instead turn away from NREGA itself.

That is the lesson here. Targeting on its own will be subverted. What is needed is something that reduces this voicelessness of the ultrapoor.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/economy/indicators/Indias-welfare-programmes-are-not-very-good-at-reaching-the-poorest-of-the-poor-World-Bank/articleshow/8773897.cms

10 JUN, 2011, 02.50PM IST, MATHANG SESHAGIRI,TNN
Get paid for getting your UID now

BANGALORE: Get paid for getting your unique ID (UID) now. To push up enrolment in the Aadhaar project, the state government will shell out Rs 100 to every poor pensioner and job-seeker under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.

The government will directly transfer Rs 100 into the bank accounts of beneficiaries of social security schemes, pensioners, physically disabled and widows, and those of rural employment guarantee scheme who are below poverty line after they produce relevant documents as proof at the time of enrolment.

"The process of registering BPL residents involves cost for both the beneficiaries and the state government. Since the beneficiaries will be forgoing a part of their daily wage by taking time off work to enrol for Aadhaar we want to incentivise them. Social security pension and job guarantee schemes are among the six services we have shortlisted to be Aadhaar-enabled," M N Vidyashankar, e-governance principal secretary, told TOI.

Centre for e-governance, the nodal agency to implement Aadhaar in Karnataka, will tie up with the departments of revenue and rural development and panchayat raj to work out the modalities. Besides demographic and biometric information, Karnataka will garner additional details from residents on seven services during enrolment.

To integrate UID numbers with various services offered, Karnataka Resident Data Hub will be set up in Bangalore. UID numbers will be seeded into various databases of departments providing welfare schemes to enable efficient delivery, tracking of services and address pilferage.

THE SERVICES TO BE LINKED WITH AADHAAR

Apart from Know Your Resident (KYR) info, Karnataka will collect additional info for KYR+ for select services. Residents seeking UID will have to furnish following KYR+ information.
Social security pension (sanction number and money order number).
Ration card number.
Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme card number.
Bond number in Bhagyalakshmi scheme (details of children).
IP pump set details.
Passbook number in milk cooperative society.
Customer card number for LPG connection.

A multi-purpose data centre opens

Ahost of e-governance initiatives such as unique ID, registration, transport, municipal administration and eprocurement have been brought under a single umbrella. The Rs 57-crore data centre designed to meet government requirements for the next decade was set up at Vikasa Soudha on Thursday. The centre will offer latest technologies, including virtualization and provide servers on demand to government departments.

Unique Identification Authority of India

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Unique Identification Authority of India
भारतीय विशिष्ट पहचान प्राधिकरण
*
UIDAI (Aadhaar UIDAI new logo)
Agency overview
Formed	February 2009
Jurisdiction	Government of India (Union Government)
Headquarters	New Delhi
Annual budget	*3,000 crore (US$669 million)(2010)
Agency executives	Nandan Nilekani, Chairman Ram Sewak Sharma, Director General and Mission Director
Website
uidai.gov.in

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The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) (Hindi: भारतीय विशिष्ट पहचान प्राधिकरण), is an agency of the Government of India responsible for implementing the envisioned AADHAAR aMultipurpose National Identity Card or Unique Identification card (UID Card) project in India. It was established in February 2009, and will own and operate the Unique Identification Number database.[1] The authority will aim at providing a unique number to all Indians, but not smart cards.[2] The authority would provide a database of residents containing very simple data in biometrics.[3]
The agency is headed by a chairman, who holds a cabinet rank. The UIDAI is part of thePlanning Commission of India.[1][4] Nandan Nilekani, a former co-chairman of Infosys Technologies, was appointed as the first Chairman of the authority in June 2009.[5] Ram Sewak Sharma, an IAS Officer of Jharkhand Government cadre has been appointed as the Director General and Mission Director of the Authority. He is known for his best effort in e-Governance project for Jharkhand State and working as an IT secretary he received a number of awards for best Information Technology Trends State in India.The UIDAI no. is a 12 digit number.[6]

[hide]

[edit]Launch

UIDAI launched AADHAAR program in the tribal village, Tembhli, in Shahada,[7][8] Nandurbar,Maharashtra on 29 September 2010. The program was inaugurated by Prime Minister, Manmohan Singhalong with UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi.[9] The first resident to receive an AADHAAR was Rajana Sonawane of Tembhli village.[10]

[edit]Coverage, goals and logistics

It is believed that Unique National IDs will help address the rigged state elections, widespread embezzlement that affects subsidies and poverty alleviation programs such as NREGA.[11] Addressingillegal immigration into India and terrorist threats is another goal of the program.[12]
Most reports suggest that the plan is for each Indian citizen to have a unique identification number with associated identifying biometric data and photographs by 2011.[13] However, other reports claim that obtaining a unique number would be voluntary, but those that opt to stay out of the system "will find it very inconvenient: they will not have access to facilities that require you to cite your ID number."[2]
Government issued IDs are fragmented by purpose and region in India, which results in widespread bribery, denial of public services and loss of income, especially afflicting poor citizens.[14] As the unique identity database comes into existence, the various identity databases (voter ID, passports, ration cards, licenses, fishing permits, border area id cards) that already exist in India are planned to be linked to it.[2]The Authority is liaising with various national, state and local government entities to begin this process. The Union Labor Ministry has offered its verified Employment Provident Fund (EPFO) database of 42 million citizens as the first database to be integrated into the unique ID system.[15]
Other UID projects implemented on a smaller scale in India can also facilitate in the development of the national project. An example is a project developed by Wolf Frameworks Cloud Computing vendor and Social Education and Development Society (SEDS) for profiling and generating Unique Identification for more than 40,000 members in the Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh.[16]
The UID will link a person's Passport Number, Driving License, PAN card, Bank Accounts, Address, Voter ID, etc. and all this information will be checked through a database. So, for example, if someone has different addresses on PAN and driving license, is liable to get caught. Those who will opt out of this program will have much inconvenience in doing business, operating bank accounts and other offices which will require a UID.
UIDAI has headquarters in Delhi and a technology centre in Bangalore. It also has 8 regional offices in Chandigarh, Delhi, Lucknow, Ranchi,Guwahati, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Bangalore.[17]

[edit]Name and logo

UID project is known as AADHAAR meaning 'support' or 'foundation', and its logo is a yellow sun with a fingerprint embedded in its centre.The logo was designed by Atul Sudhakar Rao Pande.[18]

[edit]Projected costs and business opportunities

One estimate of the cost to completely roll-out National IDs to all Indian residents above the age of 18 has been placed at

crore (US$33.45 billion).[19] A different estimate puts it at US$ 6 billion.[20] A sum of

crore (US$22.3 million) was approved in the 2009-2010 union budget to fund the agency for its first year of existence.[1] UID has received a huge boost with Dr Pranab Mukherjee, Minister of Finance, allocating Rs 1900 crore to the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) for 2010-11.
Initial estimates project that the initiative will create 1000 new jobs in the country, and business opportunities worth

crore (US$1.45 billion) in the first phase [13] of implementation.

[edit]Benefits

Great potential for not-so-privileged, poor and the marginalised people, mostly living in the rural areas
Clear proof of identity
Facilitate entry for poor and underprivileged residents into the formal banking system
Opportunity to avail services provided by the government and the private sector
Giving migrants mobility of identity
Financial inclusion with deeper penetration of banks, insurance and easy distribution of benefits of government schemes.
Once a person is on the Aadhaar database the person will be able to establish identity easily.
Aadhaar will become the single source of identity verification.
Residents would be spared the hassle of repeatedly providing supporting identity documents each time they wish to access services such as obtaining a bank account, passport, driving license and so on.
By providing a clear proof of identity, Aadhaar will also facilitate entry for poor and underprivileged residents into the formal banking system and the opportunity to avail services provided by the government and the private sector.
Aadhaar will also give migrants mobility of identity.

[edit]Risks

According to the UIDAI Model, Aadhaar is dependent on biometrics being reliable enough to guarantee that there is a one-for-one correspondence between real people and electronic identities on the CIDR (central ID repository). UIDAI face a risk. Suppose the biometrics let them down?
In December 2010, UIDAI published the report on their proof of concept trial designed to test, among other things, whether biometrics are reliable enough to guarantee that every entry on the CIDR is unique. UIDAI's figures published in the report suggest that no, the biometrics are not reliable enough, Aadhaar will drown in a sea of false positives.
Earlier, in March 2010, three academics published a paper, Fundamental issues in biometric performance testing: A modern statistical and philosophical framework for uncertainty assessment arguing that the level of uncertainty in biometrics is so great that tests tell you nothing, they cannot be used to predict how well biometrics technology will perform in the real world, they cannot support a valid argument to invest in biometrics. All three academics advise governments the world over. One of them, Antonio Possolo, is head of the statistical engineering division at the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an organisation that has advised UIDAI in the past. On this occasion, UIDAI have not followed NIST's advice that tests like their proof of concept trial are pointless.
With its academic support now withdrawn, the outlook for the global mass consumer biometrics industry has darkened, Throwing the towel in. At the same time, governments elsewhere are abandoning ship. NSTIC, the US National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace makes no mention of using biometrics. Neither does IdA, the UK plan for digital delivery identity assurance. And Holland has suspended its plan to develop a centralised population register including everyone's biometrics. India may find itself the last adherent of this receding faith.

[edit]Criticism

*	This article's section called criticism needs additional citations for verification. Please helpimprove this article by adding reliable references. Unsourced material may be challenged andremoved. (January 2011)

There are many potential privacy fallouts of this project, not the least of which is triggered by the Government's official plan to link the databases together.
Although there is sometimes a tension between individual privacy rights and national security, international law and India's domestic law expressly set a standard in tort law and through constitutional law to protect an individual's privacy from unlawful invasion. Under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), ratified by India, an individual's right to privacy is protected from arbitrary or unlawful interference by the state.
The Supreme Court also held the right to privacy to be implicit under article 21 of the Indian Constitution in Rajgopal v. State of Tamil Nadu. Moreover, India has enacted a number of laws that provide some protection for privacy. For example the Hindu Marriage Act, the Copyright Act, Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2000 and the Code of Criminal Procedure all place restrictions on the release of personal information. Privacy is a key concern with respect to the Multipurpose National Identity Card (MNIC) scheme as all of an individual's personal information will be stored in one database where the possibility of corruption and exploitation of data is far greater than when having the information disbursed.
Risks that arise from this centralization include possible errors in the collection of information, recording of inaccurate data, corruption of data from anonymous sources, and unauthorized access to or disclosure of personal information.Other countries with national identification systems have confronted numerous problems with similar risks such as trading and selling of information, and India, which has no generally established data protection laws such as the U.S. Federal Privacy Statute or the European Directive on Data Protection, is ill-equipped to deal with such problems. The centralized nature of data collection inherent in the MNIC proposal only heightens the risk of misuse of personal information and therefore potentially violates privacy rights. In consideration of the risks involved in the creation of a centralized database of personal information, it is imperative that such a programme not be established without the proper mechanisms to ensure the security of each individual privacy rights. Unfortunately, India's proposed MNIC programme lacks any provision for judicial review at the present time. Without credible and independent oversight, there is a risk of 'mission creep' for MNICs; the government may add features and additional data to the MNIC database bureaucratically and reflexively, without reevaluating the effects on privacy in each instance.

[edit]References

^ a b c "Rs.100 crore for Unique Identification Project", The Hindu(Chennai, India), 17 February 2009, retrieved 2009-06-26, "... The Unique Identification Authority of India is being established under the aegis of the Planning Commission for which a notification has been issued in January 2009. A provision of Rs.100 crore has been made in the annual Plan 2009-10 for this ..."
^ a b c "Nilekani to give numbers, ministries to issue cards", The Economic Times, 16 July 2009, retrieved 2009-07-18
^ "Nilekani takes charge, says first set of IDs in 12-18 months".The Times Of India. 2009-07-24.
^ "India gets Info czar in Nilekani", The Statesman, 25 June 2009, retrieved 2009-06-25, "... Nandan M Nilekani ... will be the chairman of the Unique Identification Database Authority of India under the aegis of the Planning Commission ... Mr Nilekani will have the rank and status of a Cabinet minister ..."[dead link]
^ "PIB Press Release". Pib.nic.in. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
^ http://www.iaadhaar.com/what-is-aadhaar/
^ http://news.rediff.com/slide-show/2010/sep/29/slide-show-1-tembhalis-open-letter-to-pm-sonia.htm
^ http://www.dnaindia.com/mumbai/report_in-time-warp-tembhali-village-leapfrogs-to-present_1444941
^ "Aadhar takes off: PM, Sonia launch UID in tribal village". Indianexpress.com. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
^ "Sonia is my ''Aadhaar'', says first UID recipient - NDTV Profit". Profit.ndtv.com. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
^ Bajaj, Vikas (25 June 2009), "India Undertakes Ambitious ID Card Plan", The New York Times, retrieved 2009-06-26, "... Policy makers see a national ID card as critical to improving the delivery of social services, subsidies and other government programs while also strengthening national security ... the majority of aid earmarked for the poor does not reach them, and it is hard for the government to detect embezzlement and misuse of funds ..."
^ "Nilekani first chief of Unique 'ID' project", The Assam Tribune, 25 June 2009, retrieved 2009-06-26, "... For long, national identity cards have been advocated to enhance national security, prevent potential terrorist attacks and stop illegal immigration, said officials ..."
^ a b "National ID card project", Indiatimes Infotech, 1 July 2009, retrieved 2009-07-01, "... Some estimates suggest that the project will create at least an 100,000 additional jobs in the country in the next three years ... According to the plan, govt proposes to issue a unique identification number to all citizens by 2011 ..."
^ "ID'ing the masses may solve Indian identity crisis",Associated Press, 17 July 2009, retrieved 2009-07-18, "... For long, national identity cards have been advocated to enhance national security, prevent potential terrorist attacks and stop illegal immigration, said officials ..."[dead link]
^ "Nilekani may get EPFO database for UID project", Indian Express, 18 July 2009, retrieved 2009-07-18, "... "This is an opportunity for us to get ID cards for the subscribers of EPFO and ESI. We would like the EPFO subscribers to be first beneficiaries of the Unique Identity Card (UID) project," a senior Labour Ministry official told The Indian Express ..."
^ By N Vasudevan. "A miniature UID project in AP". mydigitalfc.com. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
^ [1][dead link]
^ K. Balchand (2010-04-26). "The Hindu : News / National : UID number gets brand name, logo". Beta.thehindu.com. Retrieved 2010-10-01.
^ Citizen IDs to cost Rs 10,000 crore Template:GOVT. OF INDIA

^ "इंफोिसस से िवदा लेंगे नंदन नीलेकिण Nilekani will bid adieu to Infosys", OneIndia Hindi, 25 June 2009, retrieved 2009-06-26, "... इस महत्वाकांक्षी प्रोजेक्ट पर करीब छह अरब डालर का ख़र्च होगा (this ambitious project will cost about $2.5 billion) ... नीलेकिण को कैिबनेट मंत्री का दर्ज़ा िमलेगा (Nilekani will receive the rank of a cabinet minister) ..."

[show]v · d · e National identification numbers

[show]v · d · eNational identity cards in Asia

[edit]External links

Official Website of UIDAI

Categories: Government of India | Executive branch of the Indian government

5 APR, 2011, 04.42AM IST,ET BUREAU
All you need to know about Adhaar-enabled payment systems

What will be the role of Adhaar-enabled payment systems?

The Adhaar-enabled payment systems (AEPS) developed by NPCL is a bank-led model that facilitates financial inclusion by allowing transactions at Point of Sale or PoS (the micro ATM) through the business correspondent (BC) using the Aadhaar authentication number. The AEPS will now allow costumers to avail of banking facilities through banking correspondents across banks.

What types of banking transactions are facilitated through AEPS?

The four Aadhaar-enabled basic types of banking transactions are balance enquiry, cash withdrawal, cash deposit and Aadhaar to Aadhaar funds transfer Now all that a customer needs for availing of the AEPS services are an individual identification number (identifying the bank to which the customer is associated), an Aadhaar number and fingerprints captured during his/her enrolment.

What objectives does AEPS serve?

The objective is to empower a bank customer to use Aadhaar to access his/her Aadhaar-enabled bank account and perform basic banking transactions that are intra-bank or interbank in nature through a business correspondent. It serves another important goal of RBI in electronification of retail payments. It would enable banks to route the Aadhaar-initiated interbank transactions through a central switching and clearing agency. It would facilitate disbursements of government entitlements like NREGA, social security pension, handicapped old age pension, etc, of any central or state government bodies, using Aadhaar and authentication thereof as supported by UIDAI. Another important goal AEPS serves is to facilitate inter-operability across banks in a safe and secured manner.

What is the status of the implementation of AEPS?

The pilot project is being run in districts of Jharkhand (where the first unique identity, or UID, numbers have been issued) in association with three banks, ICICI Bank , Union Bank of India and Bank of India. The UID Authority is also planning to rope in Nabard to include rural account holders in the core banking fold. Successful implementation of AEPS is likely to reduce the dependence on cash and will lower costs for transactions. Once the general purpose of Aadhaar-enabled micropayments system is in place, a variety of other financial instruments such as microcredit , micro-insurance , micro-pensions and micro-mutual funds can also be implemented on top of this payments system.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/newsbyindustry/banking/finance/banking/All-you-need-to-know-about-Adhaar-enabled-payment-systems/articleshow/7870975.cms

24 JUN, 2011, 04.34AM IST, JAYADEVAN PK & INDU NANDAKUMAR,ET BUREAU
UIDAI: Nandan Nilekani plans to create an 'Apple or Google-like' ecosystem for Aadhaar
BANGALORE: Nandan Nilekani wants to do an Apple with Aadhaar - the world's biggest citizen database project that will provide a 12-digit unique identity number to each and every resident Indian.

Like Google and Apple, who opened up their platforms such as Android and iPhone , wooing developers to write software applications that enhanced user experience; Aadhaar's Holy Grail is to ensure that the unique numbers given to Indians translate into better citizen services. By opening up the core architecture forming Aadhaar database for third party developers, Nilekani plans to create an 'Apple or Google-like' ecosystem, wherein hundreds of user-friendly applications will help citizens and service providers tap into the real potential of a citizen database.

"People who have received these numbers will look for the benefits of the number. This is where the app ecosystem will come in. Different partners can build apps and provide benefits across different sectors like healthcare and banking," Nilekani said.

Nilekani, who co-founded India's second-biggest tech firm Infosys three decades ago, on Thursday opened the Aadhaar platform for thousands of software developers to build applications linking these unique identity numbers with different services. On its own, an Aadhaar number will be a mere 12-digit identity, but by linking it with services offered by mobile phone companies, ration shops and banks, the government plans to deliver citizen utilities faster and better.

"It's really up to the imagination and innovation of the people," Nilekani told dozens of software developers in Bangalore gathered for the UID conference. "In some sense we believe it will be game changing...we don't see this project just as giving someone an ID card. This will create a national-level online identity management platform," he added.

The government launched an application programming interface (API), which will allow developers write applications that can work with Aadhaar. These developers will earn money for every transaction conducted using their applications.

For Aadhaar to solve the identity crisis for millions of Indians, hundreds of applications will need to connect it with service providers across government departments and private sector firms. For instance, research firms and experts reckon that nearly 500 million Indians are out of the banking system and more than half of India's farmers do not have access to credit from formal banks.

Software applications can link these numbers with a bank's system and help it establish identity before offering a loan or opening a new savings account. Research firm CLSA estimates that the UID exercise can bring nearly 125 million people into the banking system over the next five years. These folks, according to CLSA, are primarily from poor, below the poverty line (BPL) families who otherwise will have no way to prove their identities.

Already, the Reserve Bank of India and the ministry of finance have issued guidelines to banks to use Aadhaar as an identifier. The telecommunications department and the oil ministry too have issued similar guidelines.

"In some way you are opening up all the products and services for people," said Nilekani.

Pilot applications are already being tested by companies such as Pune-based Persistent Systems and Feecounter Online Services.

Feecounter Online Services is a 350 employees start-up based out of Pune. Mitesh Ajmera, a former employee at the Citi Bank , is the company's CEO. The company offers an online portal for the payment of school fees. "With this initiative, school fees can be directly credited from the individual's bank account to the school's account. The idea is to eliminate transaction costs. Also, the whole idea of waiting in a queue for long hours can be skipped," said Ajmera. One of the potential applications being tested will build an entire payment gateway for Aadhaar-based transactions, said an official at a company writing that application.
http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/tech/ites/UIDAI-Nandan-Nilekani-plans-to-create-an-Apple-or-Google-like-ecosystem-for-Aadhaar/articleshow/8970580.cms

2 JUL, 2011, 10.11AM IST, ANANTHAKRISHAN G,TNN
Rs 50k cr worth treasure in Kerala temple

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The legend of El Dorado was definitely not set on the Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple . But the seven-member panel, which is drawing up a list of assets at the famed shrine here, had a feel of the lost city of gold as they set foot in one of the two secret vaults located inside the sprawling granite structure which gives the Kerala capital its name.

On Thursday, the team assisted by personnel from the fire services and archeology department opened the locks of vault A to find a narrow flight of stairs leading down to an underground granite cellar. Oxygen was pumped frequently into the chamber and artificial lighting provided to enable the observers to work inside.

What they saw inside was startling, sources said. Gold coins dating back thousands of years, gold necklaces as long as nine feet and weighing about 2.5 kg, about one tonne of the yellow metal in the shape of rice trinkets, sticks made of the yellow metal, sack full of diamonds, gold ropes, thousands of pieces of antique jewellery studded with diamonds and emeralds, crowns and other precious stones lay scattered in the chamber marked 'A'.

Friday threw up far more surprises in the form of 17 kg of gold coins dating back to the East India Company period, 18 coins from Napolean's era, precious stones wrapped in silk bundles besides over 1,000 kg of gold in the form of coins and trinkets and a small elephant made of the yellow metal, sources said.

There were also sovereigns bearing the 1772 seal indicating they were from the reign of the then native king Karthika Thirunal Rama Varma . There are a total of six vaults marked A to F in the shrine. The A and B cellars have never opened since 1872.

Reports said the value of the recoveries so far from vault A alone may exceed over Rs 50,000 crore. This doesn't take into account their antique value. With chamber B, yet to be opened, speculation was rife that the shrine would pip Tirupati Balaji, who too has been assessed at a little more than Rs 50,000 crore to a distant second. No official confirmation has been forthcoming on the value of the recoveries.

Retired Kerala high court judges - Justice M N Krishnan and Justice C S Rajan - appointed observers by the Supreme Court said, ''It's difficult to give an exact date about when the stock-taking would be completed. The B and E vaults remain to be opened. We think it may take another week.''

Asked about the value of the assets, Justice Krishnan said the committee was drawing up the inventory of items and were not determining their price. The panel had set out on the job on June 27 and opened three vaults marked C, D and F till Wednesday. Assets found in these chambers were estimated to be worth over Rs 1,000 crore.

The wealth discovery has raised questions on the shrine's security. As of now, the internal security is managed by the temple employees, but this may be inadequate in the light of the events.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/rs-50k-cr-worth-treasure-in-kerala-temple/articleshow/9073635.cms

3 JUL, 2011, 06.48AM IST, ANANTHAKRISHNAN G,TNN
Rs 75,000 cr and counting: More treasure tumbles out of Sree Padmanabha Swamy temple

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Treasure continued to tumble out of the Sree Padmanabha Swamy temple here on Saturday with a Supreme Court-appointed committee finding more gold idols, coins and other assets on the sixth day of inspection in the shrine's hidden vaults.

Among the notable discoveries was an ancient gold idol of Lord Vishnu studded with precious diamonds and emeralds. Sources said its value could not be assessed due to its antiquity. There were also human figurines made of pure gold, each weighing 1 kg as well as 18-foot-long jewelery weighing 35 kg used to adorn the deity. Bags of coins and precious stones were also found in the chamber marked A.

Unconfirmed reports said the total value of all assets recovered from the shrine could be worth Rs 75,000 crore.

The temple has six vaults marked A to F. On Saturday, the committee completed stock taking in vault A. They had already drawn up the inventory of items in C, D and F. The B chamber, which hasn't been unsealed after 1872, and the E vault remain to be opened. The inspection will continue on Monday.

The state police has decided to put in place a three-tier security for the shrine which has emerged as the richest in India. Additional Director General of Police Venugopal K Nair, who is given charge of the temple security, said "We have only begun the process. A detailed plan will be put in place soon."

At present, two platoons of special armed police have been deployed for the shrine's security.

Acting on a petition, the Kerala high court had in January asked the state government to take over the administration of the temple and also prepare aninvetory of its assets. The shrine is run by a trust constituted by the royal family. On appeal, the SC stayed the take over part but gave nod to stock-taking.

History has it that the shrine is inextricably linked to the Travancore royal family. The erstwhile ruler of Travancore Marthanda Varma had dedicated the state and all his wealth to the deity and ruled as 'Padmanabha Dasa (servant of Padmanabha), who consequently gained the status of nominal head or 'perumal.

According to legend, the Travancore kings had transferred loads of wealth, meant for use during famines to these secret chambers to protect them from the British.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics/nation/Rs-75000-cr-and-counting-More-treasure-tumbles-out-of-Sree-Padmanabha-Swamy-temple/articleshow/9083615.cms

Last post

July 23rd, 2009
As you may have heard, I've been appointed as the Chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India. I'm grateful for all your congratulations and best wishes.
In my new role, I can no longer comment on government policy. So this means the end of this blog. The blogging format was new to me, and I greatly enjoyed writing here and listening to your thoughts these past few months.
Many people have asked me why I accepted this appointment. I have long been a champion of a reform approach that is inclusive of the poor, and in my book, I described unique identity as one of the key steps for achieving this goal. Giving every individual in India a unique identification number can go a long way in enabling direct benefits, and fixing weak public delivery systems, giving the poor access to better healthcare, education, and welfare safety nets. When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh offered me the opportunity to head the UIDAI, I saw it as a chance to help enable ideas I have supported for a long time.
Since the UIDAI aims to enable a people-centric approach to governance, I will approach the rollout of the initiative in the same way. I've been overwhelmed in the last few weeks by offers of assistance and help from Indians around the world. The UIDAI will be setting up a website soon, which will chart out ways for people to volunteer and engage with the project. I hope that together, we will be able to make this initiative an enormous success.
Tags: India, UIDAI
Posted in About the book, UIDAI | 75 Comments »

Are we recovering?

June 17th, 2009
Or is this a temporary upswing in sentiment for much of the world economy?
Paul Swartz, from the Council of Foreign Relations, recently put up an interesting chart, comparing the recession's effect on world trade, compared to other downturns.

Tags: economy, recession, world trade
Posted in economy | 50 Comments »

Education reforms - I

June 5th, 2009

Are education reforms finally on the anvil? That's what the latest reports say. The approach, according to those in the corridors of power, will be along the lines of those proposed by the YashPal Committee and the Knowledge Commission.

I'll talk about the Knowledge Commission (which I was on) in my next post. The YashPal committee, if I recall, had suggested reforms that brought in more autonomy for institutes, and stopped the process of recognising institutes as 'deemed universities'. One of the things their report especially bemoaned was the 'loss of primacy' for Indian universities. The committee argued that universities ought to be made self-regulatory, and that our regulatory institutions right now - such as the UGC - had taken up too many of the university's functions.

It also recommended that courses be restructured so that undergraduate studentshave access to all disciplines. If this comes through - I'd written about it in an earlier post - it would be an enormous step for innovation and quality in our education system.

Such reforms are not going to be easy. Now that the planned steps have been made public, there will be plenty of lobby groups readying for protest. People and groups in power don't like to lose control, and these reforms are ambitious - task committees have been recommending similar steps since the Kothari Commission in the 1960s, all of which were quickly gutted by university groups, bureaucrats and politicians.
Will we be fortunate this time?
Tags: education reform, YashPal
Posted in Opinion, education | 35 Comments »

After the election

May 28th, 2009

When the results were out, there were many people around the country who heaved a sigh of relief.
A few months before the elections, when I asked people I knew who was likely to win - the people I questioned included elected officials, writers, NGO workers, political scientists - a good majority of them were pessimistic about seeing a strong government in power, and especially a Congress or BJP-led one. 'Our days are numbered', is how one Congress worker put it. A large number of people suggested (and this was a popular expectation in our media) that caste-based and regional parties would have a bigger clout post-election. 'The next government will be a hodge-podge, and they'll move quite sharply to the left,' one senior policy planner guessed.
The Congress' win is forcing a re-evaluation. Were the compelling factors for the victory the Employment Guarantee Program, concern about defense, a desire for a more empowered government, or dynastic appeal? People seemed to have voted for stable, equitable development. Its been pointed out that the Congress and its allies did well in places where the NREG Program and the rural electrification scheme were implemented effectively. The win/loss pattern across states is also telling: the UPA did badly in states where the opposition governments have been effective in bringing about development and growth - this included Bihar, Chhattisgarh and Gujarat.
Does this mean that the hand-wringing over voters' preferences for caste and regional alliances was misplaced? I think so. The rise of markets means that there is much more at stake for voters today - good governance and better access to the economy can bring about substantial improvements in jobs, income, and education for children. This wasn't the case pre-1980, when opportunities were much fewer. Voters are therefore far more demanding of their leaders, and and a failure in governance makes them far less sympathetic to the fact that a certain party is supposed to represent their religion, or caste.
So what will the government do with its expanded mandate? Will we get to see a smart mix of reforms and welfare policy? Will the government finally, attempt to tackle our broken subsidy systems and education reform? The next few years are going to be very interesting.
Tags: Congress, Election, Government
Posted in Opinion, politics | 9 Comments »

Awaiting Enlightenment - II

May 21st, 2009

A few years ago, I visited my alma mater IIT Bombay, my first visit in decades. I walked around the campus and was astonished and saddened by its collapse - the buildings were in disrepair, the hostels grimy and stained, the infrastructure was crumbling: the place, it seemed, was falling apart.

This began my efforts to get the campus back to the green, beautiful, well-tended place I remembered, and I funded various initiatives, with the help of the incredibly engaged director, Dr. Ashok Misra. I funded the renovation of my old Hostel 8, the setting up of a school for IT and a new IT incubation lab. The IIT management and I also co-funded a brand new pair of hostels to expand the cramped residential spaces, and these were built in record time—in less than two years.

The result? Annoyance in the HRD Ministry, and questions from the then HRD minister on why such 'lavish' buildings were built. Our top colleges and universities suffer tremendously from this perpetual second-guessing from the government and the bureaucracy, which demand permissions for the most mundane operations. Dr. Nayyar, the former vice-chancellor of Delhi University, often bemoans the complete loss of independence for the faculty, deans and senior management at universities. 'Their actions hang on the utterances of our politicians. Everything is political.' And in the midst of all this, the very purpose of the university, educating the student, has been entirely forgotten.

In recent years, Indian universities have seen a growth of funds from budget allocations, but they need much more than that for things to change. Simply providing our universities with more money is rather like buying new furniture for a condemned building. Unless the government takes to more serious reforms - appointing a super-regulator to replace the present, confusing array of bodies from the AICTE to the UGC, encouraging more private investment on colleges and loosening the red tape on their entry, bringing in more transparency to standards and college administration, and giving government-aided institutions much more independence - the decay will go on, without pause.

Tags: Hostel 8, IIT Bombay, IT
Posted in Opinion, education | 21 Comments »

Awaiting enlightenment

May 8th, 2009

In Cry for Freedom, former Wuhan University President Liu Daoyu is talking about the Chinese education system, but much of what he says about the early education crisis in China could have been said verbatim, for the present challenges in India's higher education system.

Particularly, this:

"we must lift the screws on people's minds and tap into their initiative and enthusiasm."

Most of us have noticed the gradual politicisation of India's colleges over the last few decades, but we rarely debate how insidious the effects of this are on innovation in higher education. The lack of independence for our vice-chancellors and deans, the politicisation of student unions, the dependence on the government for budget and spending approvals - all these make our universities risk-averse, dogmatic, and finally unable to fulfil their main function: equipping their students to function effectively, and productively, in the economy.

Consider how rigid our colleges are: in India, we have still not embraced the concept of cross-disciplines. An Indian student from year one in college, can either do an engineering or a commerce degree. In fact, he does not attend a university in the true sense; he has to function within the narrow confines of a specific department. Universities in Europe, US and increasingly in China on the other hand, allow students the flexibility to choose their subjects, even switch between majors if they find that their interests have shifted to say, marine biology rather than medicine by the second year.

The rigid system that our colleges now use do students a disservice. How for example, can a student be certain that she wants to become a software engineer unless she first takes a few courses? Perhaps, the student might discover a bent for research, or for computer graphics. Its unreasonable to lock someone in at the age of eighteen, right out of school, onto a particular career path.

(This is the first of some higher education posts. I'll follow up with more thoughts.)

Tags: challenges, Cry for freedom, higher education, Liu Daoyu, Wuhan University
Posted in education | 18 Comments »

On the road, again

April 20th, 2009

I spent the last month traveling in the US, promoting the book. I did some TV shows, spoke to newspapers and did so many radio interviews that eventually it felt like one long period of time spent talking. It was interesting to meet so many people, and get the perspective of so many readers. (I am also grateful for the exposure I got - its not easy for writers to get media coverage for their work, and I was very fortunate).

Used as I am to traveling though, I think this is one of the shorter breaks I've had back home in Bangalore before its time for another long trip. This time, I'm off to the UK for three weeks, in part to promote the book, but also on work. But I will keep updating here.

Tags: Traveling, US
Posted in Travel | 6 Comments »

With reservations

April 17th, 2009

Reservations for backward castes in our jobs and colleges have become a seemingly indispensable part of our politics, and I think the big reason for this has been the process of inclusion of India's backward communities into our mainstream. Indian political scientists such as Ashutosh Varshney have pointed out that as the Industrial Revolution took off in the West, backward communities were rapidly absorbed into the growing economy and the expanding factory system. The right to vote and political clout came later, after decades of urbanized living and jobs.
But in India, our progress has been the other way round. In a country where growth stagnated for decades, and development has only recently begun to make inroads into the rural countryside, backward communities have had access to political power before economic power. Hence the demand for reservations - the Dalit voters who support the Bahujan Samaj party for instance, see political power as 'the master key' that will open all doors.
Had economic access come first, we would have probably followed the pattern of other countries that had caste hierarchies - Japan for example, had a fairly rigid caste system, and the most backward group, the burakumin, were highly ostracized. Development and urbanization however, helped absorb these caste groups into the general population (although the Japanese burakumin still face some discrimination). The rise of cities in fact, have been particularly powerful in dissolving caste barriers, as it becomes impossible to observe the silly notions of purity and untouchability in the anonymous, crowded city.
This has made our struggle in India with caste and backwardness fairly unique. And as our politicians balance the questions of better access for all versus more reservations, we are likely to see many more twists and turns on this issue.
Tags: Caste system, creating access, Reservations
Posted in Opinion | 16 Comments »

Seeing the bottom?

April 10th, 2009
The meme that the global recession might finally have bottomed out could be a little premature. Markets, including in India, have revived somewhat, but many are sceptical that this rally will last.
Also, if the steps taken in the US to deal with the financial crisis are not ambitious enough - and it looks increasingly likely that this is the case - we will see the financial crisis deepen a lot more before world markets recover.
Tags: global financial crisis
Posted in Opinion | 4 Comments »

A meeting and its results

April 6th, 2009

Observers of the G-20 summit - whose tagline 'stability, growth, jobs' acknowledged our ongoing global slowdown - didn't expect much to come out of the meeting. Since it ended however, a wave of positive press has followed. One good thing that has come out of it is that the IMF is likely to change its composition to reflect the power of emerging countries like India, China and Brazil. There is also some applause surrounding the fact that leaders have pledged around $1.1 trillion towards fighting the recession, but of this, $500 billion is through the IMF, and half of that money was in the works before the meeting.

Another big question is how exactly will such a money stimulus boost global growth. I'm somewhat sceptical of the ability of state-provided funds to drive extended growth in markets, if they are not accompanied by policy changes. Money flowing into an inefficient, badly regulated market system only strengthens entrenched interests and makes existing lobbying groups stronger and better-funded.

The Indian government for instance, has already funnelled stimulus money into the economy in 2008-09. without adding in policy corrections, and much of this cash has been aimed at extended credit through already existing farm schemes (which typically favour farmers who own mid to large landholdings) and financing for existing SMEs and industry groups, while doing nothing to make business easier for new or innovative firms who struggle even more for capital and against red tape in a weaker economy. Downturns and growth slowdowns cannot be patched with notes of cash alone - these will only drive cycles of boom and bust.

Tags: G-20 summit, stimulus package
Posted in Opinion | 6 Comments »
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Unique chaos for cards

PIYUSH KUMAR TRIPATHI

Applicants queue up in front of the registration counters at GPO in Patna on Monday. Picture by Nagendra Kumar Singh

Patna, June 27: Get mentally prepared for a long haul while applying for unique identification (UID) card. The process of collecting and submitting its forms at the General Post Office (GPO) can test your nerves and stretch your patience.
Residents turning up at the GPO since June 25, when the registration process began, hardly expected this. For, corporate guru Nandan Nilekani, the co-founder of Infosys Technologies Limited, is the chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India — the agency responsible for issuing UID cards.
Unlike corporate efficiency, the applicants from across the state at the GPO have to face hurdles and confusion at every step — from collection of the application forms to the verification and the submission of documents. Many have had their application rejected, amid all the chaos.
Problems are aplenty. Forms — supposed to be made available free of cost — are being black-marketed. There are only three counters at the GPO for the registration. Long queues at these counters are putting off the applicants. The queues are mismanaged and lead to frequent altercation among the applicants. There is no separate queue for women or senior citizens. The processing of forms is also too slow.
"First of all, the forms, which are supposed to be made available free of cost to the citizens, are not available at the counters. The employees at the counters ask the applicants to buy the forms from black-marketers, who sell these at the entrance to the GPO," Amit Kumar Singh, a student of Patna Science College, said.
The youth, who had turned up to pick a form today, added: "There are only three counters at the GPO though this is the only place for submitting UID applications. The long queues are not managed properly and this leads to altercations among the residents. Though there is such a rush at the counters, the processing of the forms is really slow."
Several applicants complained against the absence of separate counters for women and senior citizens.
"It is complete anarchy out here. There is no separate counter for women," Vijay Nagar resident Roshni Sinha said.
For many, standing for hours in the queue only results in disappointment.
"Even after standing in the queue for hours, my application got rejected as I could not produce an address proof. I had attached the electricity bill of my house, which is in my husband's name. How can I get a proof of residence when most of the property is in my husband's name?" asked Sinha.
Fathua resident Chandan Kumar, too, returned disappointed.
He said: "I left my home at 7am and reached the GPO at 9am. I stood in the queue for three hours, only to get my application rejected on the grounds of absence of birth certificate. This happened even when I had both the original and the photocopy of my Class X registration certificate with my date of birth mentioned on them. The employee at the counter told me that only a marksheet or pass certificate is valid."
A facilitation centre could solve such problems but there is no such facility at the GPO.
The authorities, too, accept the problems but they can only offer scant hope.
"At present, we only have three counters. We were able to register around 80 applications each day. Thus, around 150 registrations have been completed since Saturday. We only have one biometric station. This is slowing down the process. We plan to start three more biometric stations within a fortnight. We expect to start three more UID registration stations here and 40 new UID registration centres in the state by July 15," said Anil Kumar, director, business development, technology and marketing, GPO, Patna.

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1110628/jsp/bihar/story_14169251.jsp

Nandan Nilekani

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Nandan Manohar Nilekani नंदन मनोहर नीलेकणी
Nandan M Nilekani at the World Economic Forum in Davos, 2007
Born	2 June 1955 (age 56) Bangalore, Karnataka, India
Residence	Bangalore
Nationality	Indian
Alma mater	Indian Institute of Technology
Occupation	Chairman of Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI)
Net worth	$1.8 billion (2011)^[1]
Religion	Hinduism

Nandan Nilekani (Konkani: नंदन नीलेकणी, Kannada: ನಂದನ್ ನಿಲೇಕಣಿ) born (June 2, 1955) is an Indian entrepreneur. He currently serves as the Chairman of the new Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), after a successful career at Infosys Technologies Ltd. He is also now heading Government of India's technology committee, TAGUP.

[hide]

[edit]Early life

Nandan Manohar Nilekani was born in Sirsi town in Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka, as the younger son of Durga and Mohan Rao Nilekani in a Chitrapur Saraswat Brahmin family.^[2] His father worked as a General Manager of Mysore and Minerva Mills. His father, who subscribed toFabian Socialist ideals, had an influence on Nandan during his early years. He has an elder brother, Vijay, who works in the Nuclear Energy Institute.^[3]

He studied at St. Joseph's High School Dharwad, and later in Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai where he graduated with a B.Tech in Electrical Engineering in 1978.^[4] His early years were marked by his father's job transfers and re-locations. He spent the first twelve years at Bangalore, and then moved in with his uncle's family in Dharwad, after his father had been transferred.

[edit]Career

Nandan Nilekani, after graduating from IIT Bombay in 1978, joined Mumbai-based Patni Computer Systems where he was interviewed by N.R. Narayana Murthy. Three years later, in 1981, Murthy walked out of Patni following a disagreement with one of the Patni brothers. His entire division walked out with him. The defectors decided to start their own company, Infosys.

Nilekani became the Chief Executive Officer of Infosys in March 2002, taking over from Murthy. Nilekani served as CEO of the company from March 2002 to April 2007, when he relinquished his position to his colleague Kris Gopalakrishnan, becoming Co-Chairman. He left Infosys on 9 July 2009 to serve as the chairperson of the Unique Identification Authority of India, in the rank of a cabinet minister under invitation from the Prime Minister of India, Dr. Manmohan Singh.

He co-founded India's National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) as well as the Bangalore Chapter of The IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiE).

He appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart on March 18, 2009^[5] to promote his book "Imagining India." He has been a speaker at the prestigious TED conference where he talked about his ideas for India's future.

He has an estimated net worth of the Indian rupee equivalent of US$1.3 billion.^[6] In 2009, Time magazine placed Nilekani in the Time 100 list of 'World's Most Influential People' ^[7]

Nilekani has been extensively quoted in Thomas Friedman's book The World is Flat.^[8]

[edit]Personal life

Nandan Nilekani is married to Rohini, whom he met at a quizzing event at IIT.^[9] They have two children Nihar and Janhavi, both studying atYale University.^[10]

[edit]Honours and awards

One of the youngest entrepreneurs to join 20 global leaders on the prestigious World Economic Forum (WEF) Foundation Board in January 2006.
Member of the Board of Governors of the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi
Member of the review committee of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission.
Forbes "Businessman of the Year" for Asia in 2007.
He, along with Infosys founder (and currently non-executive chairman) N. R. Narayana Murthy, also received Fortune magazine's 'Asia's Businessmen of the Year 2003' award.
Named among the 'World's most respected business leaders' in 2002 and 2003, according to a global survey by Financial Times and PricewaterhouseCoopers.
Awarded the Corporate Citizen of the Year award at the Asia Business Leader Awards (2004) organized by CNBC.
Joseph Schumpeter Prize for innovative services in economy, economic sciences and politics - 2005.^[11]
Padma Bhushan, one of the highest civilian honors awarded by the Government of India - 2006.
Was presented the 'Legend in Leadership Award' by the Yale University in November 2009. He is the first Indian to receive the top honour.
Was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree by the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto on the 31st of May, 2011.

[edit]Bibliography

Nandan Nilekani. Imagining India: The Idea of a Renewed Nation (March 19, 2009 ed.). Penguin Press HC. p. 528. ISBN 1594202044.

In this book, Nandan discusses topics such as the future of India, its recent history, the ideas and attitudes that evolved with the times and contributed to the country's progress, India's early socialist policies, its young population, Information Technology, caste politics, labour reform, infrastructure, higher education, and the English language in India.

[edit]References

^ Forbes. http://www.forbes.com/profile/Nandan-Nilekani.
^ http://www.dnaindia.com/bangalore/report_changing-with-times-and-bangalore_1427399
^ http://imaginingindia.com/about-nandan/childhood/
^ Infosys Technologies Limited (2007-06-22). "About Infosys | Management Profiles | Nandan M. Nilekani". Infosys. Retrieved 2009-06-28.^{[dead link]}
^ "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Official Website | Current Events & Pop Culture, Comedy & Fake News | Comedy Central". Thedailyshow.com. Retrieved 2009-06-28.
^ "#754 Nandan Nilekani - Forbes.com". Forbes.
^ The 2009 TIME 100 - Nandan Nilekani TIME.
^ http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.05/friedman.html
^ "School and IIT". Imagining India. Retrieved 2009-06-28.
^ The Hindu (Chennai, India). 2009-09-06. http://www.hindu.com/2009/09/06/01hdline.htm.
^ "The story continues". Imagining India. Retrieved 2009-06-28.

[edit]External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Nandan Nilekani

List of national identity card policies by country

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is a list of identity card policies by country.

[hide]

[edit]Identity card policies by country

[edit]Countries with compulsory identity cards

According to Privacy International, as of 1996, around 100 countries had compulsory identity cards^[1]. They also stated that "virtually nocommon law country has a card"^[1].

The term "compulsory" may have different meanings and implications in different countries. The compulsory character may apply only after a certain age. Often, a ticket can be given for being found without one's identification document, or in some cases a person may even be detained until the identity is ascertained. In practice, random controls are rare, except in police states.

Country	English name	Local name	short description	more
Albania	Identity Card	Letërnjoftimi	Albanian Identity Card Letërnjoftimi, is a electronic biometric ID card, compulsory upon 16 years old and costs 1200 lek (€10).	more
Argentina	National Identity Card	Documento Nacional de Identidad		more
Belarus	none		Passport (Belarusian: Пашпарт). Compulsory at 16. Reissued at 25, 45 and 100. Can be used to travel to other countries. Could be issued before 16 for travelling purposes.
Belgium	ID Card		State Registry (in Dutch, French and German). The card is first issued at age 12, compulsory by 15. Since the beginning of 2005 the eID (electronic IDentity-card) has been issued to Belgian citizens who apply for a new identity card. Apart from being a form of identification, the card also is used for authentication purposes. Future usages include using the eID as a library card, keycard for restricted areas or chatrooms and the digital signing of documents. It is expected that in 2009 all Belgians will have an eID card.^[2]. The identity cards for Belgians living abroad are not electronic cards like those issued in Belgium. They are, however, equally valid and are accepted and used in the same way as the electronic identity card.^[3].	more
Bolivia		Cédula de identidad	is compulsory at 18. Rarely required by police.
Bosnia and Herzegovina			"Lična karta / Osobna iskaznica / Лична Карта", compulsory at 16.	more
Brazil		Carteira de identidade	Compulsory to be issued and carried since the age of 18 (though it can be substituted by a series of equivalent documents, see below). It is usually issued, for civilians, by each state's Public Safety Secretary, but other state departments — including the Armed Forces, the Police and some professional councils — can issue alternate identity cards too. There is a national standard, but each state can include minor differences (usually numbering scheme, font, printed seal and background pattern. The front has a picture (with an electronic stamp on it), right thumb print and signature (for illiterate people the phrase "não assina" — cannot sign — is printed in its place). The verse has the unique number (RG, registro geral), expedition date, full name of the person, name of the parents, place (town, state) and date of birth, CPF number and other optional information. It is green and plastified, officially 102 × 68 mm^[4], but lamination tends to make it slightly larger than the ISO/IEC 7810 ID-2 standard of 105 × 74 mm, resulting in a tight fit in most wallets. Only recently the driver's licence received the same legal status of an identity card in Brazil. There are also a few other documents, such as cards issued by the national councils of some professions (doctors, accountants, dentists, engineers, lawyers etc.), which are considered equivalent to the national identity card for most purposes.	more
Bulgaria	лична карта / "lichna karta"	identity card	first issued and is compulsory after turning the age of 14. The new Bulgarian ID cards were introduced in 1999. They follow the general pattern in the EU and replaced the old, Soviet-style "internal passports", also known as "green passports". During the socialism period (1945–1989), to receive an "international passport", especially one allowing to travel to a Western country, was considered an achievement. Not all Bulgarian citizens had the right to travel abroad, and those who travelled outside the Soviet bloc underwent strict investigation for possible links with political enemies of the regime. Since January 1, 2007, the Bulgarian identity card can be used to travel within the European Union. Since 29 March 2010^[5] new Bulgarian identity cards were introduced with embedded chip with personal data.	more
Chile		Cédula de identidad	First issued at age 2 or 3, it is compulsory at 18.
Colombia		Tarjeta de identidad /Cédula de Ciudadanía	Tarjeta - First issued at age 2 or 3, then it's changed at 18 for another identity card called Cédula de Ciudadanía. It is only renewed afterwards if stolen or lost.
Cuba		Carné de identidad
Czech Republic		Občanský průkaz	compulsory at 15.
Egypt	Personality Verification Card	(بطاقة تحقيق الشخصية)	is compulsory to issue at the age of 16. Issued by the Civil Registry Office which is subordinate to the Ministry of Interior. Not carrying the ID card is only penalised by fine not exceeding 200 EGP.
Germany	Identity Card	Personalausweis	compulsory for all German citizens age 16 or older to possess either a "Personalausweis" (identity card) or a passport, but not to carry it. While police officers and some other officials have a right to demand to see one of those documents, the law does not state that one is obliged to submit the document at that very moment. Fines may only be applied if an identity card or passport is not possessed at all, if the document is expired or if one explicitly refuses to show ID to the police. If one is unable to produce an ID card or passport (or any other form of credible identification) during a police control, one can (in theory) be brought to the next police post and detained for max. 12 hours, or until positive identification is possible. However, this measure is only applied if the police have reasonable grounds to believe the person detained has committed an offense. As driver's licences are not legally accepted forms of identification in Germany, most persons actually carry their "Personalausweis" with them.^[6].	more
Republic of China(Taiwan)	Republic of China National Identification Card	Guomin Shenfenzheng/國民身份證.		more
Sri Lanka	National Identity Card (NIC)	ජාතික හැඳුනුම්පත(Jaathika Hendunum-patha)	All citizens over the age of 16 need to apply for a National Identity Card (NIC). Each NIC has a unique 10 digit number, in the format 000000000A (where 0 is a digit and A is a letter). The first two digits of the number are your year of birth (e.g.: 88xxxxxxxx for someone born in 1988). The final letter is generally a 'V' or 'X'. An NIC number is required to apply for a passport (over 16), driving license (over 18) and to vote (over 18). In addition, all citizens are required to carry their NIC on them at all times as proof of identity, given the security situation in the country. NICs are not issued to non-citizens, but they too are required to carry some form of photo identification (such as a photocopy of their passport or foreign driving license) at all times^[7]. In addition the Department of Post may issue identity an card with a validity of five years, this may be gained in lure of an NIC if the later is unable to be issued.	more

People's Republic of China: First issued at school age, the Resident Identity Card (PRC) (Chinese: 居民身份证 Pinyin: Jūmín Shēnfènzhèng) becomes compulsory at 16.
Croatia: The Croatian identity card is compulsory at 16.
Cyprus: All Residents aged 12 and up are required to carry an official ID card (http://moi.gov.cy/content.php?subid=180)
Estonia: See id.ee (in Estonian), id.ee (in English)
Greece: In Greece, the biggest change in Identity Documents Law happened in 2000, when some fields of the Police Identity Card (as Greeks call it) were rejected. These fields included religion, addresses, biometric characteristics and fingerprint. Oppositely, some fields were added. These are Latin transliterations of name and surname, blood type and Rhesus of the owner. Under this law, all Greeks over 12 years old must go to a police office to ask for an Identity Card. In Greece, there are many everyday things you cannot do without an ID. In fact, according to an older law, the Police ID is the only legal identity document and no one has a right to ask for more identity documents. Since the 1980s all legal services in Greece must be done with this ID. Also, you can travel within the EU with a Greek National ID card. Carrying the ID is not compulsory, however during routine police checks, if you are found without an ID, the police officer may take you to the nearest police station for further investigation.
Hong Kong: See main article Hong Kong Identity Card. Identity cards have been used since 1949, and been compulsory since 1980. Children are required to obtain their first identity card at age 11, and must change to an adult identity card at age 18.
Hungary: See [5] (in Hungarian) It is compulsory to possess an ID or passport from the age of 14. A driving license can be also used for identification from the age of 17. Private entities however, are legally required to accept passport or driver's licence for proof, but often do not accept them, only the ID card, thus in effect almost all citizens have the ID card. Police has the legal power to stop people on streets at random and ask for ID paper only if they have any proof that the person was involved in a crime, or is a witness. If the person has no proof for identification he/she can be detained for maximum 24 hours. It is a common misconception in Hungary that the Police can ask for your ID at any time, but since 1990 this is not the case.
Indonesia: Kartu Tanda Penduduk for Indonesian citizens and the KITAP's or permanent residents card holder. This card is compulsory for people at age 17 or have been married or married.
Iran: The Iranian national identity card is compuslory for permanent residents, age 15 and over.
Israel: The Teudat Zehut is first issued at age 16 and is compulsory by 18.
Jordan: First issued at age 16 and is compulsory by 18.
Kenya: Issued at age 18 and is compulsory. Carrying the ID is not compulsory, however it's easier to get through police checks if you have one.
Lithuania: Asmens tapatybės kortelė, compulsory at 16.
Luxembourg: First issued at age 15 and only issued to Luxembourg citizens, who are required by law to carry it at all times.
Latvia: See [6] (In English) An identity card or passport is the mandatory personal identification document for a citizen of Latvia or a non-citizen who lives in Latvia and has reached 15 years of age. However, ID cards are still not being issued, the ID card project is a concept, even though the legislative base is present.
Madagascar: Kara-panondrom-pirenen'ny teratany malagasy (Carte nationale d'identité de citoyen malagasy). Possession is compulsory for Malagasy citizens from age 18 (by decree 78-277, 1978-10-03).
Malaysia: MyKad. Issued at age 12, it is updated at 18.
Malta: Karta ta' l-Identità Issued at 14, updated at 16, compulsory at 18.
Moldova: The Buletin de identitate is compulsory at 16.
Morocco: The national identity card is the ID of the citizens of Morocco (in Arabic : بطاقة التعريف الوطنية). This is an official document which allows any citizen to prove his identity and therefore it is valid, his Moroccan nationality. It is compulsory for all citizens aged over 18 years, but it can be obtained from the age of 16. A new version of the card is out, it has the form of a credit card. The Directorate General of National Security (DSMS) of Morocco announced Sunday, March 30, 2008 it will proceed on 1 April 2008 to issue new national identity card Electronic (NIEC). The current national maps will be gradually replaced in four years. The NIEC is biometric and provides citizens of the presentation of life certificate, residence certificate, extract of birth and citizenship certificates.

Specimen of a Montenegrin identity card

Montenegro: The Montenegrin identity card (Lična karta/Лична карта) is compulsory at the age of 16. It is issued only to Montenegrin citizens with permanent residence in Montenegro. While it is the most often used official identification document, three other hold the same status — Passport, Driver's licence and Refugee ID card. Old style IDs, that refer to a the no longer existing states of SFRY or FRY, will expire in 2011.
Mozambique: Bilhete de identidade
Netherlands: Identiteitsbewijs (Dutch Wikipedia): Since 1 January 2005 identification is compulsory at 14. Legal proof of identity are a Dutch or other European identity card or a passport. A Dutch driving license is valid while other driving licenses are not valid for identification. It is not compulsory to carry a proof of identity, but it is compulsory to show it to the authorities when they ask such under certain circumstances. Such circumstances include suspicious behaviour, committing any offense, or if a person is interviewed as a witness of a crime. Identity checks at events where the public order may be in danger are also allowed. Otherwise random identity checks by the police are not allowed in principle but can happen in certain areas such as a train station or doubtful areas i.e. redlight district, and a fine for not showing proof of identity may be successfully challenged in such cases. The fine for not being able to show proof of identity when legally required is € 50.-. Proof of identity is also required when opening a bank account and when entering an employment contract.
Panama: Cedula de Identidad. Required at 18. Panamaninan citizens must carry their Cedula at all times.^[8]
Pakistan: Computerized National Identity Card (CNIC). First made at the age of 18, not compulsory to carry all the time. The card is mandatory for opening bank accounts, for passport and almost all substantial monetary transactions from car, land to high value assets.
Peru: Documento Nacional de Identidad.

Specimen of a Polish national ID card (front and back)

Poland: Polish National Identity Card The card is compulsory at 18. Those who do not comply with the relevant law are denied passports.^{[citation needed]}
Portugal: as of 2006 the government has issued the Cartão de Cidadão (Citizen Card). The older Bilhete de identidade which has been compulsory at 10, is still in limited use.
Romania: The Carte de identitate is compulsory at 14.
Russia: Internal passport is compulsory at 14 (but there is no penalty for not having one until the age of 16) and reissued with a new photograph at 20, 45. Although there are no laws in Russia requiring to carry a proof of identity, in certain places, such as Moscow, it is sensible to carry a passport at all times as lack of an ID during ad-hoc police checks is sufficient grounds for detention. A passport is also required for travel by long-range trains and airlines. There are a couple of operations that require an internal passport, (e.g. all notarial operations, land to high value assets).
Saudi Arabia: The National ID Card "Bitaqat Al-Ahwal Al-Madaniya" (Arabic: بطاقة الأحوال المدنية‎) Issued at 15 for males, compulsory at 17. Non-compulsory for females but issued at 21.
Serbia: The Lična karta (Лична карта) is compulsory at the age of 16, but it can be obtained when a person turns 10. It is issued only to Serbian citizens with permanent residence in Serbia. While it is the most often used official identification document, three other hold the same status — Passport, Driver's licence and Refugee ID card. Old style IDs, that refer to a the no longer existing states of SFRY or FRY, will expire in 2011.
Singapore: It is compulsory for all citizens and permanent residents to apply for the National Registration Identity Card from age 15 onwards, and to re-register their cards for a replacement at age 30. It is not compulsory for bearers to hold the card at all times, nor are they compelled by law to show their cards to police officers conducting regular screening while on patrol, for instance. Failure to show any form of identification, however, may allow the police to detain suspicious individuals until relevant identification may be produced subsequently either in person or by proxy. The NRIC is also a required document for some government procedures, commercial transactions such as the opening of a bank account, or to gain entry to premises by surrendering or exchanging for an entry pass. Failure to produce the card may result in denied access to these premises or attainment of goods and services. In contrast to other countries, the NRIC also states the bearers' race. Immigration & Checkpoints Authority
Slovakia: Občiansky preukaz (Citizens card) is compulsory at the age of 15. It serves the purpose of general identification towards the authorities. It features a photograph, date of birth and the address. Every card has a unique number.
Slovenia: The Osebna izkaznica is compulsory for citizens of Slovenia who have a permanent residence in Slovenia, are at least 18 years old, and do not have a passport. It can be issued to citizens under 18 on request by their parent or legal guardian.
South Africa: An Identity Document (ID) is issued at age 16 to all citizens; and permanent residents. Although passports and driver's licences are also acceptable forms of identification, banks only accept IDs. Your ID has a barcode, a photo, and your unique ID number. Information (including age and gender but excluding race) is referenced under your ID number: accounts, criminal record, voting history, driver's licence etc. You need an ID in order to apply for a passport, bank account, driver's licence or tertiary studies, as well as to register to vote. In most cases employers will also request a photocopy of your ID in order to process your appointment. Your voting history as well as any firearm licences are documented in your ID booklet. As one's ID may be required for some of the functions listed above, some SA permanent residents, may elect to keep their ID document on their person.
South Korea: Korean citizens are issued a national ID card when reaching adulthood (typically when he/she reaches the age of 19 underEast Asian age reckoning). This card will have a unique "Citizen's Registration Number" (jumin deungnok beonho; Korean: 주민등록번호 - see main article Resident registration number (South Korea)). The first six numbers indicate the citizen's date of birth, while the last seven numbers includes information such as where the birth was registered. This number is used by Korean citizens for all forms of record-keeping, including online.

Spanish DNI specimen, front (top) back (bottom)

Spain: The Documento Nacional de Identidad (DNI) (Spanish Wikipedia) is compulsory at 14, can be issued before if necessary (to travel to other European countries, for example). By law, it has to be carried at all times, and it is routinely used for identification, and it is often photocopied by private and public bureaus. Credit-card purchases cannot be made without showing this ID. Since 2006, it is being replaced by theElectronic DNI.

Thailand : National ID card is compulsory for all citizens at the age of 15.
Turkey: The Nüfus Cüzdanı is compulsory right after birth without photograph, at the age of 15 a photograph must be sticked on. It has to be carried at all times and it is often photocopied by bureaus, banks, etc.
Ukraine: Internal Ukrainian passport is compulsory (to possess but not to carry) at age of 16.
Venezuela: In Venezuela it is called Cédula de Identidad, it is mandatory at the age of 10 and is renewed every 10 years
Vietnam: Known as giấy chứng minh nhân dân ("people's proof document"), it is compulsory for all Vietnamese citizens over 14.

[edit]Countries with non-compulsory identity cards

These are countries which have national identity cards, but they are not compulsory by law. Some kind of identity cards are usually needed anyway for e.g. bank transactions.

Austria
Canada: Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) issues the Canada Permanent Resident Card to permanent residents of Canada. ACitizenship Certificate can be given to any citizen that choose to apply, but is automatically issued to naturalized Canadian citizens.
Finland national identity cards exist, but commonly people use their driving licences or national social security cards as ID. When making purchases with a credit card, ID card will usually be asked for. In electronic transactions, online bank identifiers have been introduced also for personal identification purposes. Many government services can be accessed in this way.
France (see extended discussion below)
Iceland: The National Register of Persons ("Þjóðskrá") issues national identity cards ("Nafnskírteini") to all teenagers in the year they become 14 years old. People in Iceland are required to present identification if asked by police, but it doesn't have to be this particular card as driving licenses and various other ID cards are considered valid.
Italy: Carta d'Identità (Italian Wikipedia) May be issued to anyone (either Italian citizen or foreigner) who resides in Italy, and to Italian citizens living abroad. It is issued after the 15th birthday. It's not compulsory to have it or to carry it along, unless expressedly ordered by public security authorities.
Mexico: The Federal Electorate Institute("Insituto Federal Electoral") issues a Voting card (Credencial para votar) for Mexican citizens when they become 18 years old. The card is compulsory in order to participate in Federal level elections, and is the defacto ID for most legal tramits.
Sweden (see extended information below)
Switzerland
In the European Union, a national identity card complying to certain standards can be used by European citizens as a travel document in place of a passport^[9]. An exception is that a Swedish national identity card is not usable when leaving Sweden to a non-Schengen country.
In Trinidad and Tobago the Elections and Boundaries Commission (EBC) is responsible for the issuing of National Identification Cards. A National Identification (ID) Card is issued to a citizen or eligible resident when they register to vote. The National ID Card is an electoral document that is used to identify you in the voting process. It is also accepted as a primary form of identification within Trinidad and Tobago and can be obtained prior to your being eligible to vote. Eligible are a citizen of Trinidad and Tobago who is 15 years of age or older, and a Commonwealth citizen 15 years of age or older, who has resided legally in Trinidad and Tobago for a period of at least one year immediately preceding the application. The National ID Card is valid for a period of 10 years.^[10] It is not, however, mandatory when voting. Voting can be done with other forms if ID, including passport or driver's permit.
In the United States, the Passport card is issed to its citizens upon request. Although its main purpose is for land and sea travel within the country, under the REAL ID Act, the passport card will also be accepted for domestic air travel.^[11] U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has indicated that the U.S. Passport Card may be used in the Employment Eligibility Verification Form I-9 (form) process^[12]. The passport card is considered a "List A" document that may be presented by newly hired employees during the employment eligibility verification process to show work authorized status. "List A" documents are those used by employees to prove both identity and work authorization when completing the Form I-9. The passport card can be used as a valid proof of citizenship and proof of identity both inside and outside the United States^[13]. Most people, however, use state issued driver's licenses, or state issued (generally by the state's DMV) nondriver's ID cards, as identity cards.

[edit]France

Main article: French national identity card

The country has had a national ID card since 1940, when it helped the Vichy authorities identify 76,000 for deportation as part of the Holocaust.

In the past, identity cards were compulsory, had to be updated each year in case of change of residence and were valid for 10 years, and their renewal required paying a fee. In addition to the face photograph, the card included the family name, first names, date and place of birth, and the national identity number invented by the national INSEE registry, and which is also used as the national service registration number, as the Social Security account number for health and retirement benefits.

Later, the laws were changed^{[citation needed]} so that any official and certified document (even if expired and possibly unusable abroad) with a photograph and a name on it, issued by a public administration or enterprise (such as a railroad transportation card, a student card, a driving licence or a passport) can be used to prove one's identity^{[citation needed]}. Also, law enforcement (police, gendarmerie) can now accept photocopies of these documents^{[citation needed]} when performing identity checks, provided that the original document is presented within two weeks^{[citation needed]}. For financial transactions, any of these documents must be equally accepted as proof of identity^{[citation needed]}.

The current identity cards are now issued free of charge, and non-compulsory. Legislation has been published for a proposed compulsory biometric card system, which has been widely criticised, among others by the "National commission for computing and liberties" (Commission nationale de l'informatique et des libertés, CNIL), the national authority and regulator on computing systems and databases. Identity cards issued since 2004 include basic biometric information (a digitized fingerprint record, a printed digital photograph and a scanned signature) and various anti-fraud systems embedded within the plastic-covered card.

The next generation of the French green card, named "Carte Vitale", for the Social Security benefit (which already includes a chip and a magnetic stripe currently containing very little information) will include a digital photograph and other personal medical information in addition to identity elements. It may then become a substitute for the National Identity Card.

[edit]Sweden

Main article: Identity documents in Sweden

Sweden has since October 1, 2005 issued national identity cards, but they are not compulsory and only obtainable by Swedish citizens^[14], mostly intended to use for intra-Schengen area travel.

Having an identity card in Sweden is not mandatory, but it is needed in several situations, e.g. for bank services or when picking up a package at a post office. Opening a bank account, getting a drivers license or other situations requiring one to have a Swedish personal identity number necessitates a valid Swedish identity document. Commonly people use their driver's licenses or certified identification cards issued by the banks.

From 2008-2009 banks and the postal service have stopped issuing them. Instead the state through the tax authorities has take the responsibility of issuing identity cards for foreign citizens from the second half 2009. These are mostly issued to immigrants, since Swedish citizens prefer getting a passport instead. The tax authority card and the Swedish passport are nowadays the only ways to get a card, if one does not have any Swedish identity documents.

The reason for the introduction of the tax authority card was that the process of getting a bank card was tightened around 2005-2007 so that most immigrants could not get a card. The rule was that if you want a Swedish identity card when you have none, you must have a close family member who has a valid Swedish identity card who then vouches for your identity.^[15]^[16].

[edit]Countries with no identity cards

Australia: In 1985, there was a failed proposal to create an Australia Card. In 2006 the Australian Government announced the introduction a non-compulsory Access Card that would act as a gateway to services administered by The Department of Human Services. This project, however, was terminated in November 2007. Class A identification documents in most Australian states include Driver's License (issued by the state government), 18+ Card (issued by the state government), Australian Passport (issued by the Federal government), foreign passport, or Residency/Citizenship documents (issued by the Federal government).
Denmark: No national identity card, but other identity cards exist which are needed e.g. in the bank if not using a passport.
India (India is currently piloting an ID card system, see Multipurpose National Identity Card (India) Though a Passport, Ration Card, PAN Card or a driving license is mandatory for issuing essentials like electricity, water, cell-phone SIM cards, etc. Often, those without access to identification are also left devoid of such basics.^[17])
Ireland: There is no requirement for Irish or UK citizens to identify themselves in Ireland.^{[dubious – discuss]} Citizens who are born in Ireland or the UK are allowed to travel within the Common Travel Area without producing a passport, but should be able to provide photographic identification on demand. All others are required to show a passport, or National Identity card in the case of EEA nationals. There is a voluntary Aoischárta Náisiúnta / National Age Card available to residents over 18, showing name, date of birth, sex, photograph, and unique card number. It is aimed at young people to prove they are legally allowed to buy alcohol, it is a "proof of age card" not an "identity card"^[18]
Japan: There are no national identity cards for Japanese citizens, but all resident foreigners must get a Certificate of Alien Registration (外国人登録証明書 Gaikokujin Tōroku Shōmeisho^?). Non-Japanese citizens must be able to show that they have the right to stay in Japan (using a Certificate of Alien Registration if the person entered the country more than 90 days ago; or either a Certificate of Alien Registration or a passport with a valid landing permission if the person entered the country up to 90 days ago). Driving licenses, National Health Insurance Cards (国民健康保険証 Kokumin Kenkō Hoken Shō^?), Certificates of Alien Registration and passports containing a registration for a Certificate for Alien Registration are used as ID for most purposes. Note that the insurance card doesn't contain any photo of the person in question.
New Zealand: There are no national identity cards, however the New Zealand driver license is the de facto national identity card used as a legal document to certify a person's identity or age when purchasing alcohol, authorizing bank transactions and at other situations when identification is required. They do not show citizenship status and therefore a passport, or birth certificate in conjunction with a driver license must be presented when required to show citizenship.
Norway: No national identity card, but other identity cards exist which are needed e.g. in the bank if not using a passport. Norway will in 2011 or 2012 introduce a voluntary national identity card, to be usable for travel to EU countries.^[19]
Philippines: In an effort to hasten application for government services, the government is now issuing the Unified Multi-Purpose ID (UMID) as the single identity card for the four main government agencies namely, the Social Security System (SSS), Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), Philippine Health Insurance Corporation (PhilHealth) and the Pag-IBIG Fund.
United Kingdom: The introduction of voluntary cards began in 2009 (under the Identity Cards Act 2006), but were cancelled by the Identity Documents Act 2010.^[20]

[edit]Notes

As noted above, certain countries do not have national ID cards, but have other official documents that play the same role in practice (e.g. driver's license for the United States). While a country may not make it de jure compulsory to own or carry an identity document, it may be de facto strongly recommended to do so in order to facilitate certain procedures.

[edit]References

^ ^a ^b [347]=x-347-61881 Identity cards: Frequently Asked Questions - Privacy International
^ eID. Brussels: Belgium.
^ Diplomatie.be. Brussels: Belgium.
^ Decreto 89.250. Brasília, DF: Presidência da República Federativa do Brasil.
^ Bulgaria to Start Issuing Biometric IDs in March 2010
^ nuernberg.de. Nuernberg: Germany.
^ Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, Sri Lanka: The National Identity Card (NIC); its issuance, cost, validity period, security features and description of front and back of card, 8 April 2008, LKA102742.E, available at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4829b5571a.html
^ [1]
^ EU Directive 2004/38/EC
^ [2]
^ Driver's License or Passports Preferred ID at Checkpoints, retrieved May 30, 2008.
^ USCIS - USCIS Informs The Public That New Passport Card Is Acceptable For Employment Eligibility Verification
^ Passport Card
^ "Fakta om nationellt id-kort". Swedish Police Service. Archived from the original on 2007-06-30. Retrieved 2007-08-18.
^ "Immigrants blocked from getting Swedish ID". The Local. 2007-02-15. Retrieved 2007-08-18.
^ "Immigrant ID: Readers' reactions". The Local. 2007-03-01. Retrieved 2007-08-18.
^ [3], accessdate=12-30-2010.
^ "The Garda Age Card". Retrieved 2009-10-06.
^ [4]
^ Porter, Andrew; Kirkup, James (2010-05-24). "ID card scheme will be scrapped with no refund to holders". The Daily Telegraph (London).

[show]v · d · eNational Identity cards

Categories: Personal documents | Personal identification documents | Society-related lists | Lists by country | National identity cards

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What's the 'Aadhaar' of the UID Scheme?

Gopal Krishna

The national identity card scheme represents the worst of government. It is intrusive and bullying. It is ineffective and expensive. It is an assault on individual liberty that does not promise a great good…" – Theresa May (British Home Secretary) announcing the complete dismantling of the UID project in the UK in June 2010.
The UPA's National Identification Authority of India Bill has been approved by the Union Cabinet, and subsequently the UPA has already launched its much-touted and ambitious Unique Identification (UID) project, called Aadhaar, in some parts of the country. It is to be noted that this massive project, which has tremendous repercussions for democracy in India, is being introduced without even a formal clearance by the Indian parliament, let alone a broad-based, country-wide discussion on its implications. It is also ironical that the UPA is promoting the UID project in India at a time when several countries in the world (including the USA, the UK, Australia, China, Canada and Germany) have scrapped similar projects. As the powers-that-be try to convince us of the 'advantages' of the UID project, let us consider the claims.
'Better Delivery of Social Sector Schemes'?
According to the UPA Government, the UID will enable 'inclusive growth' and help the poor to better access social services by providing each citizen with a verifiable identity. The UID, we're told, will 'facilitate delivery of basic services', and 'plug leakages' in public expenditure.
This claim is highly exaggerated: after all, exclusion from social sector schemes are rarely caused by the inability to prove identity – they are, in the main, caused by the deliberate exclusion of the poor from these services and by deliberate corruption by those entrusted to run these schemes. When BPL families are unable to make use of their valid ration cards, when workers are not paid the legally mandated minimum wages, or when women workers in NREGA schemes are denied work or paid less than their due, the reason is not their lack of ability to prove their identity.
In fact, the introduction of UID is likely to go hand in hand with dismantling of the entire PDS mechanism (whereby the Government is responsible for delivery of guaranteed entitlements of food and fuel) in favour of 'smart cards' and 'cash transfers', under which the poor are likely to face even greater deprivation and exclusion.
Foolproof Identification?
The UID scheme is being peddled as a system of foolproof biometric identification (i.e identification through fingerprints and iris scans as well as photographs.)
But this technology is neither highly accurate nor suitable for large scale use on a population of India's size. Research commissioned by the CIA and US Security establishment in September 2010 had concluded that the current state of biometrics is "inherently fallible" and liable to develop major problems if used on a large scale. The poorest Indians, most of them engaged in hard manual labour have what is in technical terms called "low quality" fingerprints rather than well-defined ones. This same section of people are also highly prone to malnutrition-induced cataract, and corneal injury too is very common, making iris scans quite unreliable as a form of identification. In case their 'fingerprint' or 'iris scan' fails to match at a later date, how will they prove their identity? Is this unreliable form of identification not, therefore, likely to create uncertainty and exclusion for the very section in whose name it is being introduced?

What are CIA-backed US Corporations doing on the UID Project?

Is the UID project a government project? If so, why has it entered into contracts with a range of private players and corporations, including those with close links with US intelligence agencies?
Take the instance of two US companies which have been hired for "Implementation of Biometric Solution for UIDAI." One of them is L1 Identity Solutions (whose main market, and recruitment ground, is the Central Intelligence Agency). Their website reads: "American and foreign military services, defense and intelligence agencies rely on L-1 solutions and services to help determine ally from enemy". Another US company is Accenture (which is working with US Homeland Security in their Smart Borders Project). This company is "committed to helping the (US) Department of Homeland Security" and its "solutions include developing prevention tactics, streamlining intelligence gathering and maximizing new technologies."
Why are companies closely linked to the CIA and US intelligence being given access to sensitive databases about Indian citizens? Is it for their expertise? The National Corruption Index, a website dedicated to exposing corruption in the US, has profiles on both Accenture and L-1, linking them to corruption. It states that Accenture was given a contract for a hi-tech screening system around US borders using fingerprint readers, optical scans and facial recognition software, but from the inception, the project was "plagued with breakdowns, mistakes and security breaches" and "has repeatedly failed to work."
The same website tells us that the L-1 CEO is "one of the main privatized gatekeepers of America's borders." The company has a former CIA director on its board, and specialises in identification technology. But in October 2007 a fraud unit found that its scanners "routinely declared counterfeit IDs to be valid." Can these US companies with their track record of failed projects, be trusted to keep India safe? Obviously not. But they are being entrusted with sensitive personal data about every Indian citizen! What guarantee is there that this information will not be leaked to the global market or expose Indian citizens to intrusive surveillance not only by the Indian State but even by organisations like the CIA?

'Voluntary Participation'?
The UPA Government has stressed that the UID would be a voluntary scheme. Nandan Nilekani, the former Infosys CEO heading the Aadhaar Project however spilled the beans when he said, "Yes, it is voluntary. But the service providers might make it mandatory. In the long run, I wouldn't call it compulsory. I would rather say that it will become ubiquitous." In other words, people will effectively have no choice but to register under the scheme because social welfare schemes and agencies like banks, insurance providers will insist on UID numbers. The upcoming legislation on the UID does not even bother to speak the language of democracy – according to the provisions of the proposed bill, one can be penalized for not updating the information provided to the UID project.
Steep Costs
The current costs are estimated at whopping Rs.45,000 crores, and this is probably a gross underestimate. Operationalising the UID scheme on the ground for NREGA and the public distribution system would require placing fingerprint readers at every panchayat office and every ration shop. The total costs of placing fingerprint readers in each PDS outlet and in each of India's 600,000 villages have not been taken into account in official cost calculations.
Consequences for Privacy
The NIAI Bill and UID project cannot be seen in isolation from a host of other Bills and projects relating, among other things, to privacy, DNA Profiling, Public Information Infrastructure and Innovations (PIII) for a National Knowledge Network and the National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID). Joining the dots of all these various proposals, the picture that emerges is an ominous one of surveillance and tracking of Indian citizens to serve corporate and imperialist interests, economic as well as political.

Chidambaram's Man Suggests "Corporate Territorial Armies"

Mahindra Special Services Group CEO Captain Raghu Raman who heads NATGRID, a pet project of Chidambaram's Home Ministry to integrate intelligence databases, has prepared a report in which he makes the audacious suggestion that "it's time for the corporates to step in" to the arena of security. In favour of this idea, he cites the precedence for private security contractors in the Israel, the US and other countries. He proposes that corporates be allowed to raise their own "private territorial armies." He concludes that "If the commercial czars don't begin protecting their empires now, they may find the lines of control cutting across those very empires."
Let us remind ourselves that this is no corporate crank speaking. A man who advocates private armies for corporates has been entrusted by the Home Ministry to head a crucial national intelligence project, while companies who are "privatised gatekeepers" in the US have been given contracts for implementation of the UID project. What does it add up to?

On UID, the Draft Paper on Privacy Bill states, "Data privacy and the need to protect personal information is almost never a concern when data is stored in a decentralized manner. However, all this is likely to change with the implementation of the UID Project. One of the inevitable consequences of the UID Project will be that the UID Number will unify multiple databases. As more and more agencies of the government sign on to the UID Project, the UID Number will become the common thread that links all those databases together. Over time, private enterprise could also adopt the UID Number as an identifier for the purposes of the delivery of their services or even for enrolment as a customer...Once this happens, the separation of data that currently exists between multiple databases will vanish." This poses a threat to the identity of citizens and the idea of residents of the state as private persons will be forever abandoned. The potential for the UID data to be leaked to market forces as well as for intrusions by the state into citizens' privacy becomes enormous. Seen in conjunction with the involvement in the UID project of US corporations close to the CIA (see box) and with potentially intrusive Home Ministry initiatives like NATGRID which aim to integrate 21 databases to feed information to 11 security and intelligence agencies including RAW and IB, serious concerns about the expansion of the web of surveillance arise.

The revolving door phenomenon – where corporate honchos dictate, guide and execute public policy – is very much visible in the UID project too and this explains their unadulterated enthusiasm for this project. Clearly, the UID project will open the doors to an unprecedented access of our personal and financial information to the corporate world; paving the way for misuse and manipulation of such information. The UID scheme is a blatant attempt to convert a resident into a number, the Indian population into a global market and then citizens into subjects.

Home > Org > Liberation > Year_2011 > April_11 > What's the 'Aadhaar' of the UID Scheme?

http://cpiml.org/liberation/year_2011/april_11/opinion.html

say no to fingerprint and iris based unique identity uid aadhaar and npr - part 1

signatures: 89
signature goal: 90

Target: Hon'ble Supreme Court, President, PM, NHRC, SHRCs, NAC, Census Commissioner & Registrar General of India, MIT, CERT, MHA, MPs, Guvs, CMs, Chief Secys, MLAs, MLCs, ECI
Sponsored by: Syed Tanveeruddin for the or likely to be aggrieved / affected law-abiding usual Indian residents (citizens and non-citizens), Human / Civil Rights Activists, Privacy India and Privacy International

Say no to fingerprint and iris based Unique Identity / UID / Aadhaar and National Population Register / NPR - Part 01
Petition / PDF creator: Syed Tanveeruddin
Created: Saturday, December 18, 2010 Last Update: Wednesday, May 03, 2011 @ 17:40 hrs IST

This petition's been addressed to the Hon'ble Supreme Court, President, Prime Minister (PM), National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), State Human Rights Commissions (SHRCs), National Advisory Council (NAC), Census Commissioner & Registrar General of India, Union Ministry of Information Technology (MIT), Indian Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) & Members of Parliament (MPs), Governors / Guvs, Chief Ministers (CMs), Chief Secretaries, Members of Legislative Assemblies, Members of Legislative Councils (MLCs) and Election Commission of India (ECI).

This petition's been created by Syed Tanveeruddin resident of Siddharthanagar, Mysore, Karnataka for the or likely to be aggrieved / affected law-abidin... more

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# 89

04:33, Jun 29, Nag K, India
the govt should ensure the purpose of UID cards and should bring a hope for secracy of data...

# 88

21:33, Jun 09, kamlakar reddy, India

# 87

03:46, Jun 08, Name not displayed, India

# 86

00:44, May 18, Pushpa Vijula, India
I OPPOSE the Open Air Prisoner Movement of Tagging and UID/Biometrics.

# 85

21:56, May 17, Nayeem Aslam, IL

# 84

00:01, May 15, Name not displayed, India

# 83

14:53, Apr 25, UJJAL DUTTA, India
I agree with the contents of the petition and hence I am signing it.

# 82

11:15, Apr 16, Ioannis Andriopoulos, Greece

# 81

16:02, Mar 30, Name not displayed, India

# 80

14:56, Mar 23, sujit raj, CA

# 79

04:25, Feb 28, Name not displayed, Philippines

# 78

16:53, Feb 16, cris Colombi, Argentina

# 77

22:12, Feb 15, Sebastian D'Souza, India

# 76

08:12, Feb 15, Rahul D, India

# 75

01:17, Jan 20, Ningus Niz, Thailand

# 74

12:49, Jan 14, Kellie Smith, NH

# 73

22:31, Jan 08, Alice Hall, OR

# 72

23:38, Dec 22, Name not displayed, India

# 71

15:48, Dec 22, Alan Burke, Australia

# 70

11:44, Dec 22, Prem Verma, India

# 69

23:32, Dec 21, Kozue Fukuzawa, Japan

# 68

22:50, Dec 21, Claire Barker, United Kingdom

# 67

22:23, Dec 21, Pratap Antony, India
The UID scheme violates the right to privacy. I do not remember being consulted about this.

# 66

22:03, Dec 21, Jelica Roland, Croatia

# 65

16:42, Dec 21, Name not displayed, India

# 64

16:20, Dec 21, Inayet Rahman, NJ

# 63

13:38, Dec 21, Lisa Sills, MO

# 62

10:24, Dec 20, Giulia Sciarretta, France

# 61

06:58, Dec 20, Olivia Schlosser, CT

# 60

03:54, Dec 20, sumathy n, India

# 59

01:05, Dec 20, Farah Hage Ali, Lebanon

# 58

22:27, Dec 19, Sridhar Raman, India

# 57

21:58, Dec 19, bhargavi rao, India

# 56

20:29, Dec 19, Venugopalan Raghunathan, India
I petition that UID project may be scrapped in its present form.

# 55

12:53, Dec 19, annie statton, United Kingdom

# 54

11:19, Dec 19, Karina Paller, Slovenia

# 53

11:16, Dec 19, Kelly Stephens, NM

# 52

06:50, Dec 19, Esther Zamora, CA

# 51

06:16, Dec 19, Carole Sarcinello, TN

# 50

06:02, Dec 19, Bill C, Germany

# 49

05:43, Dec 19, norma laborie, France

# 48

05:41, Dec 19, Mila Samsonova, Russian Federation

# 47

05:30, Dec 19, Steve Dale, Australia

# 46

05:22, Dec 19, Andy Walker, United Kingdom

# 45

05:04, Dec 19, Patrick Whyte, United Kingdom

# 44

05:01, Dec 19, Catherine Gaspard, Belgium

# 43

00:55, Dec 19, Maj Gen S.G. Vombatkere (Retd), India
NIAI has not gone about the UID project with transparency. Also, in the absence of Indian-government-sourced e-security measures (excluding those purchased from commercial sources), the data base of NIAI can easily be copmpromised. This is a source of deep insecurity for India. Lastly, the UID project cannot achieve what it claims it can achieve. However, the UID Chairman must openly discuss the problems put forward especially as there has been no discussion in Lok Sabha.

# 42

00:05, Dec 19, Daffy McGee, CA

# 41

23:23, Dec 18, Amiya Dev, India

# 40

23:11, Dec 18, Philippa Powers, Canada

# 39

21:59, Dec 18, Mickey Tan, China

# 38

20:23, Dec 18, Name not displayed, France

# 37

18:29, Dec 18, Name not displayed, IL

# 36

17:40, Dec 18, Charles Webb, FL

# 35

17:05, Dec 18, Susan Suni Ibarra, CA

# 34

16:31, Dec 18, Joanna Hosaniak, Poland

# 33

16:17, Dec 18, Mary Ann Merville, PA

# 32

15:38, Dec 18, Kate Kenner, MA

# 31

15:37, Dec 18, Name not displayed, Australia

# 30

14:50, Dec 18, randall furman, OH

# 29

14:31, Dec 18, Mary Donnelly, Australia

# 28

14:20, Dec 18, Madeline KM, Canada
This is crazy, I hope you make the right choice and decide not to start this horrible project.

# 27

13:51, Dec 18, Szilvia Molnar, Hungary

# 26

13:17, Dec 18, David Dunkleberger, PA

# 25

13:14, Dec 18, Chantal Dothey, OH

# 24

12:41, Dec 18, Melissa OBrien, CA

# 23

12:19, Dec 18, Rebecca Stover, AL

# 22

11:55, Dec 18, Tom Rose, IN

# 21

11:45, Dec 18, Dalia Hettfield, CA

# 20

10:55, Dec 18, Name not displayed, NJ

# 19

10:25, Dec 18, ANIL KUMAR, India

# 18

10:20, Dec 18, michael earley, United Kingdom

# 17

10:01, Dec 18, Maria Oniga, Romania

# 16

10:00, Dec 18, Tammy Caleno, Ireland

# 15

09:35, Dec 18, Alamzeb Akhund, Pakistan

# 14

09:17, Dec 18, Beverley Phillips, France

# 13

08:59, Dec 18, Name not displayed, Sweden

# 12

08:53, Dec 18, Name not displayed, Germany

# 11

08:40, Dec 18, Polina Zhukova, Russian Federation

# 10

08:35, Dec 18, Name not displayed, Yemen

# 9

08:32, Dec 18, Cherry Marrone, OR

# 8

08:10, Dec 18, DIANE ROBINSON, NY
LEFT NO ONE BEHIND!STOP CHILDREN ABUSES!

# 7

08:07, Dec 18, Koch Saskia, Germany

# 6

07:40, Dec 18, Francisca Harris, GA

# 5

07:21, Dec 18, Deb Kobres, FL

# 4

07:17, Dec 18, William Harper, GA

# 3

06:49, Dec 18, Sakura li, Germany

# 2

06:26, Dec 18, Steve Finger, NC

# 1

05:53, Dec 18, Syed Tanveeruddin, India
The digital sovereignty of India and the privacy and dignity of its citizens are at stake. The political parties who would've access to the database when in gov could misuse it. The UK abandoned the project in June 2010 because it considered it 'intrusive bullying' by the state, and that the gov intended to be the 'servant' of the people, and not their master. Several countries (including the USA, the UK, Australia, China, Canada and Germany) have tried such projects and have given these up as impractical, unjustified and dangerous. It'll/It'd lead to profiling and function creep (the way in which information is collected for one limited purpose but gradually gets used for other purposes). The reasons cited by the UK government for rejection of the UID scheme - higher costs, impracticality and ungovernable breaches of privacy and civil liberties – are all valid in the Indian case as well.

See more petitions:

Human Rights

Privacy

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Privacy (disambiguation).

The examples and perspective in this article deal primarily with Western culture and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article and discuss the issue on the talk page. (June 2011)

Privacy (from Latin: privatus "separated from the rest, deprived of something, esp. office, participation in the government", from privo "to deprive") is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves and thereby reveal themselves selectively. The boundaries and content of what is considered private differ among cultures and individuals, but share basic common themes. Privacy is sometimes related to anonymity, the wish to remain unnoticed or unidentified in the public realm. When something is private to aperson, it usually means there is something within them that is considered inherently special or personally sensitive. The degree to which private information is exposed therefore depends on how the public will receive this information, which differs between places and over time. Privacy is broader than security and includes the concepts of appropriate use and protection of information.

The right against unsanctioned invasion of privacy by the government, corporations or individuals is part of many countries' privacy laws, and in some cases, constitutions. Almost all countries have laws which in some way limit privacy; an example of this would be law concerningtaxation, which normally require the sharing of information about personal income or earnings. In some countries individual privacy may conflict with freedom of speech laws and some laws may require public disclosure of information which would be considered private in other countries and cultures. Privacy may be voluntarily sacrificed, normally in exchange for perceived benefits and very often with specific dangers and losses, although this is a very strategic view of human relationships. Academics who are economists, evolutionary theorists, and research psychologists describe revealing privacy as a 'voluntary sacrifice', where sweepstakes or competitions are involved. In the business world, a person may give personal details (often for advertising purposes) in order to enter a gamble of winning a prize. Information which is voluntarily shared and is later stolen or misused can lead to identity theft.

The concept of privacy is most often associated with Western culture, English and North American in particular. According to some researchers, the concept of privacy sets Anglo-American culture apart even from other Western European cultures such as French or Italian.^[1] Privacy, as the term is generally understood in the West, is not a universal concept and remained virtually unknown in some cultures until recent times. Most cultures, however, recognize certain forms of hidden or personal information that is not shared with wider society.
The word "privacy" is sometimes regarded as untranslatable^[2] by linguists. Many languages lack a specific word for "privacy". Such languages either use a complex description to translate the term (such as Russian combine meaning of уединение - solitude, секретность- secrecy, and частная жизнь - private life) or borrow English "privacy" (as Indonesian Privasi or Italian la privacy).^[2]

[edit]Types of privacy

The term "privacy" means many things in different contexts. Different people, cultures, and nations have a wide variety of expectations about how much privacy a person is entitled to or what constitutes an invasion of privacy.

[edit]Physical

Physical privacy could be defined as preventing "intrusions into one's physical space or solitude"^[3] This would include such concerns as:

preventing intimate acts or one's body from being seen by others for the purpose of modesty; apart from being dressed this can be achieved by walls, fences, privacy screens, cathedral glass, partitions between urinals, by being far away from others, on a bed by a bed sheet or a blanket, when changing clothes by a towel, etc.; to what extent these measures also prevent acts being heard varies
video, of aptly named graphic, or intimate, acts, behaviors or body parts
preventing unwelcome searching of one's personal possessions
preventing unauthorized access to one's home or vehicle
medical privacy, the right to make fundamental medical decisions without governmental coercion or third party review, most widely applied to questions of contraception

An example of the legal basis for the right to physical privacy would be the US Fourth Amendment, which guarantees "the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures",.^[4] Most countries have laws regarding trespassing and property rights also determine the right of physical privacy.

Physical privacy may be a matter of cultural sensitivity, personal dignity, or shyness. There may also be concerns about safety, if for example one has concerns about being the victim of crime or stalking.^[5] Civil inattention is a process whereby individuals are able to maintain their privacy within a crowd.

[edit]Informational

Main article: Information privacy

Data privacy refers to the evolving relationship between technology and the legal right to, or public expectation of privacy in the collection and sharing of data about one's self. Privacy concerns exist wherever uniquely identifiable data relating to a person or persons are collected and stored, in digital form or otherwise. In some cases these concerns refer to how data is collected, stored, and associated. In other cases the issue is who is given access to information. Other issues include whether an individual has any ownership rights to data about them, and/or the right to view, verify, and challenge that information.

Various types of personal information often come under privacy concerns. For various reasons, individuals may not wish for personal information such as their religion, sexual orientation, political affiliations, or personal activities to be revealed. This may be to avoiddiscrimination, personal embarrassment, or damage to one's professional reputation.

Financial privacy, in which information about a person's financial transactions is guarded, is important for the avoidance of fraud or identity theft. Information about a person's purchases can also reveal a great deal about that person's history, such as places they have visited, whom they have had contact with, products they use, their activities and habits, or medications they have used.

Internet privacy is the ability to control what information one reveals about oneself over the Internet, and to control who can access that information. These concerns include whether email can be stored or read by third parties without consent, or whether third parties can track the web sites someone has visited. Another concern is whether web sites which are visited collect, store, and possibly share personally identifiable information about users. Tools used to protect privacy on the internet include encryption tools and anonymizing services like I2Pand Tor.

Medical privacy allows a person to keep their medical records from being revealed to others. This may be because they have concern that it might affect their insurance coverage or employment. Or it may be because they would not wish for others to know about medical or psychological conditions or treatment which would be embarrassing. Revealing medical data could also reveal other details about one's personal life (such as about one's sexual activity for example).

Sexual privacy prevents a person from being forced to carry a pregnancy to term and enables individuals to acquire and use contraceptivesand safe sex supplies and information without community or legal review

Political privacy has been a concern since voting systems emerged in ancient times. The secret ballot is the simplest and most widespread measure to ensure that political views are not known to anyone other than the original voter — it is nearly universal in modern democracy, and considered a basic right of citizenship. In fact even where other rights of privacy do not exist, this type of privacy very often does.

[edit]Organizational

Governments agencies, corporations, and other organizations may desire to keep their activities or secrets from being revealed to other organizations or individuals. Such organizations may implement various security practices in order to prevent this. Organizations may seek legal protection for their secrets. For example, a government administration may be able to invoke executive privilege^[6] or declares certain information to be classified, or a corporation might attempt to protect trade secrets.^[4]

[edit]Spiritual and intellectual

The earliest development of privacy rights began under British common law, which protected "only the physical interference of life and property." Its development from then on became "one of the most significant chapters in the history of privacy law."^[7] Privacy rights gradually expanded to include a "recognition of man's spiritual nature, of his feelings and his intellect."^[7] Eventually, the scope of those rights broadened even further to include a basic "right to be let alone," and the former definition of "property" would then comprise "every form of possession -- intangible, as well as tangible." By the late 19th century, interest in a "right to privacy" grew as a response to the growth of print media, especially newspapers.^[7]

[edit]History of privacy

Further information: Privacy laws of the United States - Early years

[edit]Privacy and technology

Advertisement for dial telephone service available to delegates to the 1912 Republican convention in Chicago. A major selling point of dial telephone service was that it was "secret", in that no operator was required to connect the call.

As technology has advanced, the way in which privacy is protected and violated has changed with it. In the case of some technologies, such as the printing press or the Internet, the increased ability to share information can lead to new ways in which privacy can be breached. It is generally agreed ^[8]that the first publication advocating privacy in the United States was the article by Samuel Warren andLouis Brandeis, The Right to Privacy, 4 Harvard L.R. 193 (1890), that was written largely in response to the increase in newspapers and photographs made possible by printing technologies.^[9]

New technologies can also create new ways to gather private information. For example, in the U.S. it was thought that heat sensors intended to be used to find marijuana growing operations would be acceptable. However in 2001 in Kyllo v. United States (533 U.S. 27) it was decided that thermal imaging devices that can reveal previously unknown information without a warrant does indeed constitute a violation of privacy.^[10]

Generally the increased ability to gather and send information has had negative implications for retaining privacy. As large scale information systems become more common, there is so much information stored in many databases worldwide that an individual has no way of knowing of or controlling all of the information about themselves that others may have access to. Such information could potentially be sold to others for profit and/or be used for purposes not known to the individual of which the information is about. The concept of information privacy has become more significant as more systems controlling more information appear. Also the consequences of a violation of privacy can be more severe. Privacy law in many countries has had to adapt to changes in technology to address these issues and maintain people's rights to privacy as they see fit. But the existing global privacy rights framework has also been criticized as incoherent and inefficient. Proposals such as theAPEC Privacy Framework have emerged which set out to provide the first comprehensive legal framework on the issue of global data privacy.

[edit]Privacy and the Internet

The Internet has brought new concerns about privacy in an age where computers can permanently store records of everything: "where every online photo, status update, Twitter post and blog entry by and about us can be stored forever," writes law professor and author Jeffrey Rosen.^[11]

This currently has an effect on employment. Microsoft reports that 75 percent of U.S. recruiters and human-resource professionals now do online research about candidates, often using information provided by search engines, social-networking sites, photo/video-sharing sites, personal web sites and blogs, and Twitter. They also report that 70 percent of U.S. recruiters have rejected candidates based on internet information.^[11] This has created a need by many to control various online privacy settings in addition to controlling their online reputations, both of which have led to legal suits against various sites and employers.^[11]

The ability to do online inquiries about individuals has expanded dramatically over the last decade. Facebook for example, as of July 2010, was the largest social-networking site, with nearly 500 million members, or 22 percent of all Internet users, who upload over 25 billion pieces of content each month. Twitter has more than 100 million registered users. The Library of Congress recently announced that it will be acquiring — and permanently storing — the entire archive of public Twitter posts since 2006, reports Rosen.^[11]

According to some experts, many commonly used communication devices may be mapping every move of their users. Senator Al Frankenhas noted the seriousness of iPhones and iPads having the ability to record and store users locations in unencrypted files,^[12] although Apple denied doing so.^[13]

Andrew Grove, co-founder and former CEO of Intel Corporation, offered his thoughts on internet privacy in an interview in 2000:^[14]

Privacy is one of the biggest problems in this new electronic age. At the heart of the Internet culture is a force that wants to find out everything about you. And once it has found out everything about you and two hundred million others, that's a very valuable asset, and people will be tempted to trade and do commerce with that asset. This wasn't the information that people were thinking of when they called this the information age.

[edit]The right to privacy

Privacy uses the theory of natural rights, and generally responds to new information and communication technologies. In North America,Samuel D. Warren and Louis D. Brandeis wrote that privacy is the "right to be let alone" (Warren & Brandeis, 1890) focuses on protecting individuals. This citation was a response to recent technological developments, such as photography, and sensationalist journalism, also known as yellow journalism. Warren and Brandeis declared that information which was previously hidden and private could now be "shouted from the rooftops."^[15]

Privacy rights are inherently intertwined with information technology. In his widely cited dissenting opinion in Olmstead v. United States(1928), Brandeis relied on thoughts he developed in his Harvard Law Review article in 1890. But in his dissent, he now changed the focus whereby he urged making personal privacy matters more relevant to constitutional law, going so far as saying "the government [was] identified . . . as a potential privacy invader." He writes, "Discovery and invention have made it possible for the Government, by means far more effective than stretching upon the rack, to obtain disclosure in court of what is whispered in the closet." At that time, telephones were often community assets, with shared party lines and the potentially nosey human operators. By the time of Katz, in 1967, telephones had become personal devices with lines not shared across homes and switching was electro-mechanical. In the 1970s, new computing and recording technologies began to raise concerns about privacy, resulting in the Fair Information Practice Principles.

[edit]Definitions

In recent years there have been only few attempts to clearly and precisely define a "right to privacy." Some experts assert that in fact the right to privacy "should not be defined as a separate legal right" at all. By their reasoning, existing laws relating to privacy in general should be sufficient.^[16] Other experts, such as Dean Prosser, have attempted, but failed, to find a "common ground" between the leading kinds of privacy cases in the court system, at least to formulate a definition.^[16] One law school treatise from Israel, however, on the subject of "privacy in the digital environment," suggests that the "right to privacy should be seen as an independent right that deserves legal protection in itself." It has therefore proposed a working definition for a "right to privacy":

The right to privacy is our right to keep a domain around us, which includes all those things that are part of us, such as our body, home, thoughts, feelings, secrets and identity. The right to privacy gives us the ability to choose which parts in this domain can be accessed by others, and to control the extent, manner and timing of the use of those parts we choose to disclose.^[16]

[edit]An individual right

Alan Westin believes that new technologies alter the balance between privacy and disclosure, and that privacy rights may limit government surveillance to protect democratic processes. Westin defines privacy as "the claim of individuals, groups, or institutions to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others". Westin describes four states of privacy: solitude, intimacy, anonymity, reserve. These states must balance participation against norms:

Each individual is continually engaged in a personal adjustment process in which he balances the desire for privacy with the desire for disclosure and communication of himself to others, in light of the environmental conditions and social norms set by the society in which he lives. - Alan Westin, Privacy and Freedom, 1968^[17]

Under liberal democratic systems, privacy creates a space separate from political life, and allows personal autonomy, while ensuring democratic freedoms of association and expression.

David Flaherty believes networked computer databases pose threats to privacy. He develops 'data protection' as an aspect of privacy, which involves "the collection, use, and dissemination of personal information". This concept forms the foundation for fair information practices used by governments globally. Flaherty forwards an idea of privacy as information control, "[i]ndividuals want to be left alone and to exercise some control over how information about them is used".^[18]

Richard Posner and Lawrence Lessig focus on the economic aspects of personal information control. Posner criticizes privacy for concealing information, which reduces market efficiency. For Posner, employment is selling oneself in the labour market, which he believes is like selling a product. Any 'defect' in the 'product' that is not reported is fraud.^[19] For Lessig, privacy breaches online can be regulated through code and law. Lessig claims "the protection of privacy would be stronger if people conceived of the right as a property right", and that "individuals should be able to control information about themselves".^[20] Economic approaches to privacy make communal conceptions of privacy difficult to maintain.

[edit]A collective value and a human right

There have been attempts to reframe privacy as a fundamental human right, whose social value is an essential component in the functioning of democratic societies.^{[citation needed]} Amitai Etzioni suggests a communitarian approach to privacy. This requires a shared moral culture for establishing social order.^[21] Etzioni believes that "[p]rivacy is merely one good among many others",^[22] and that technological effects depend on community accountability and oversight (ibid). He claims that privacy laws only increase government surveillance.^[23]

Priscilla Regan believes that individual concepts of privacy have failed philosophically and in policy. She supports a social value of privacy with three dimensions: shared perceptions, public values, and collective components. Shared ideas about privacy allows freedom of conscience and diversity in thought. Public values guarantee democratic participation, including freedoms of speech and association, and limits government power. Collective elements describe privacy as collective good that cannot be divided. Regan's goal is to strengthen privacy claims in policy making: "if we did recognize the collective or public-good value of privacy, as well as the common and public value of privacy, those advocating privacy protections would have a stronger basis upon which to argue for its protection".^[24]

Leslie Regan Shade argues that the human right to privacy is necessary for meaningful democratic participation, and ensures human dignity and autonomy. Privacy depends on norms for how information is distributed, and if this is appropriate. Violations of privacy depend on context. The human right to privacy has precedent in the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."^[25] Shade believes that privacy must be approached from a people-centered perspective, and not through the marketplace.^[26]

[edit]Privacy protection

[edit]Free market versus consumer protection approaches

Approaches to privacy can, broadly, be divided into two categories: free market, and consumer protection.^[27] In a free market approach, commercial entities are largely allowed to do what they wish, with the expectation that consumers will choose to do business with corporations that respect their privacy to a desired degree. If some companies are not sufficiently respectful of privacy, they will lose market share. Such an approach may be limited by lack of competition in a market, by enterprises not offering privacy options favorable to the user, or by lack of information about actual privacy practices. Claims of privacy protection made by companies may be difficult for consumers to verify, except when they have already been violated.

In a consumer protection approach, in contrast, it is acknowledged that individuals may not have the time or knowledge to make informed choices, or may not have reasonable alternatives available. In support of this view, Jensen and Potts showed that most privacy policies are above the reading level of the average person .^[28] Therefore, this approach advocates greater government definition and enforcement of privacy standards.

[edit]Privacy law

Main article: Privacy law

Privacy law is the area of law concerning the protecting and preserving of privacy rights of individuals. While there is no universally accepted privacy law among all countries, some organizations promote certain concepts be enforced by individual countries. For example, theUniversal Declaration of Human Rights, article 12, states:

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honor and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Europe

For Europe, Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights guarantees the right to respect for private and family life, one's home and correspondence. The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has developed a large body of jurisprudence defining this fundamental right to privacy.^{[citation needed]} The European Union requires all member states to legislate to ensure that citizens have a right to privacy, through directives such as the 1995 Directive 95/46/EC on the protection of personal data. It is regulated in the United Kingdom by the Data Protection Act 1998 and in France data protection is also monitored by the CNIL, a governmental body which must authorize legislation concerning privacy before them being enacted.

Although there are comprehensive regulations for data protection, Some studies show that despite the laws, there is a lack of enforcement in that no institution feels responsible to control the parties involved and enforce their laws.^[29]

United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, it is not possible to bring an action for invasion of privacy. An action may be brought under another tort (usually breach of confidence) and privacy must then be considered under EC law. In the UK, it is sometimes a defense that disclosure of private information was in the public interest.^[30] There is, however, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), an independent public body set up to promote access to official information and protect personal information. They do this by promoting good practice, ruling on eligible complaints, giving information to individuals and organisations, and taking action when the law is broken. The relevant U.K. laws include: Data Protection Act 1998; Freedom of Information Act 2000; Environmental Information Regulations 2004; Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations 2003. The ICO has also provided a "Personal Information Toolkit" online which explains in more detail the various ways of protecting privacy online.^[31]

United States

Concerning privacy laws of the United States, privacy is not guaranteed per se by the Constitution of the United States. The Supreme Court of the United States has found that other guarantees have "penumbras" that implicitly grant a right to privacy against government intrusion, for example in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965). In the United States, the right of freedom of speech granted in the First Amendment has limited the effects of lawsuits for breach of privacy. Privacy is regulated in the U.S. by the Privacy Act of 1974, and various state laws. Certain privacy rights have been established in the United States via legislation such as the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA),^[32]the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act (GLB), and the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).

Canada

Canadian privacy law is governed federally by multiple acts, including the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and the Privacy Act (Canada). Mostly this legislation concerns privacy infringement by government organizations. Data privacy was first addressed with thePersonal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act, and provincial-level legislation also exists to account for more specific cases personal privacy protection against commercial organizations.

Australia

In Australia there is the Privacy Act 1988. Privacy sector provisions of the Act apply to private sector organisations with a link to Australia, including: 1. individuals who collect, use or disclose personal information in the course of a business. For example, a sole trader's business activities will be regulated (unless it's a small business), but information gathered outside business activities won't be; 2. bodies corporate; and 3. partnerships, unincorporated associations and trusts - any act or practice of a partner, committee member or trustee is attributed to the organisation. Organisations outside Australia must comply with the provisions in some circumstances. Sending information out of Australia is also regulated.^[33]

[edit]Privacy on the Internet

There are many means to protect one's privacy on the internet. For example e-mails can be encrypted^[34] and anonymizing proxies or anonymizing networks like I2P and Tor can be used to prevent the internet service providers from knowing which sites one visits and with whom one communicates. Covert collection of personally identifiable information has been identified as a primary concern by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.^[35] Although some privacy advocates recommend the deletion of original and third-party HTTP cookies, Anthony Miyazaki, marketing professor at Florida International University and privacy scholar, warns that the "elimination of third-party cookie use by Web sites can be circumvented by cooperative strategies with third parties in which information is transferred after the Web site's use of original domain cookies."^[36] As of December 2010, the Federal Trade Commission is reviewing policy regarding this issue as it relates tobehavioral advertising.^[35]

[edit]Privacy and Location Based Services

As location tracking capabilities of mobile devices are increasing, problems related to user privacy arise, since user's position and preferences constitute personal information and improper use of them violates user's privacy. Several methods to protect user's privacy when using location based services have been proposed, including the use of anonymizing servers, blurring of information e.a. Methods to quantify privacy have also been proposed, to be able to calculate the equilibrium between the benefit of providing accurate location information and the drawbacks of risking personal privacy.^[37] Users of such services may also choose to display more generic location information (i.e. "In the City" or "Philadelphia" or "Work") to some of their more casual acquaintances while only displaying specific location information, such as their exact address, to closer contacts like spouse, relatives, and good friends.

[edit]See also

Computer Security portal

[edit]References

^ Gramota.ru
^ ^a ^b Translation Today
^ Managing Privacy: Information Technology and Corporate America By H. Jeff
^ ^a ^b "Fixing the Fourth Amendment with trade secret law: A response to Kyllo v. United States". Georgetown Law Journal. 2002.
^ Security Recommendations For Stalking Victims
^ FindLaw's Writ - Amar: Executive Privilege
^ ^a ^b ^c Solove, Daniel J., Rotenberg, Marc, Schwartz, Paul M.Privacy, Information, and Technology, Aspen Publ. (2006) pp. 9-11
^ Information Privacy, Official Reference for the Certified Information privacy Professional (CIPP), Swire, P.P [1]. and Bermann, S. (2007)
^ Privacy Law in the United States
^ Privacy (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Rosen, Jeffrey. "The Web Means the End of Forgetting"New York Times, July 19, 2010
^ Popkin, Helen A.S., "Gov't officials want answers to secret iPhone tracking" MSNBC, "Technology", April 21, 2011
^ "Apple denies tracking iPhone users, but promises changes",Computerworld, April 27, 2011
^ "What I've Learned: Andy Grove", Esquire magazine, May 1, 2000
^ Warren and Brandeis, "The Right To Privacy", 4 Harvard Law Review 193 (1890)
^ ^a ^b ^c Yael Onn, et. al., Privacy in the Digital Environment , Haifa Center of Law & Technology, (2005) pp. 1-12
^ Westin, A. (1968). Privacy and freedom (Fifth ed.). New York, U.S.A.: Atheneum.
^ Flaherty, D. (1989). Protecting privacy in surveillance societies: The federal republic of Germany, Sweden, France, Canada, and the United States. Chapel Hill, U.S.: The University of North Carolina Press.
^ Posner, R. A. (1981). The economics of privacy. The American Economic Review, 71(2), 405-409.
^ Lessig, L. (2006). Code: Version 2.0. New York, U.S.: Basic Books.
^ Etzioni, A. (2006). Communitarianism. In B. S. Turner (Ed.), The Cambridge Dictionary of Sociology (pp. 81-83). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
^ Etzioni, A. (2007). Are new technologies the enemy of privacy? Knowledge, Technology & Policy, 20, 115-119.
^ Etzioni, A. (2000). A communitarian perspective on privacy. Connecticut Law Review, 32(3), 897-905.
^ Regan, P. M. (1995). Legislating privacy: Technology, social values, and public policy. Chapel Hill, U.S.: The University of North Carolina Press.
^ United Nations. (1948). Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Retrieved October 7, 2006 fromhttp://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html
^ Shade, L. R. (2008). Reconsidering the right to privacy in Canada. Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, 28(1), 80-91.
^ Quinn, Michael J. (2009). Ethics for the Information Age. ISBN 0-321-53685-1.
^ Jensen, Carlos (2004). Privacy policies as decision-making tools: an evaluation of online privacy notices.
^ Burghardt, Buchmann, Böhm, Kühling, SivridisA Study on the Lack of Enforcement of Data Protection Acts Proceedings of the 3rd int. conference on e-democracy, 2009.
^ Does Beckham judgment change rules?, from BBC News(retrieved 27 April 2005).
^ "Personal Information Toolkit" prepared by the Information Commissioner's Office, U.K.
^ Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, 15 U.S.C. § 6501 et seq.
^ http://www.privacy.gov.au/law/act
^ Eudora 3.05 was released with PGP built in, and then quickly followed by 3.06 without PGP.Eudora Light 3.0.5
^ ^a ^b Federal Trade Commission (2010), "Protecting Consumer Privacy in an Era of Rapid Change: A Proposed Framework for Businesses and Policymakers," Preliminary FTC Staff Report (December), available at [2].
^ Miyazaki, Anthony D. (2008), "Online Privacy and the Disclosure of Cookie Use: Effects on Consumer Trust and Anticipated Patronage," Journal of Public Policy & Marketing, 23 (Spring), 19–33.
^ Athanasios S. Voulodimos and Charalampos Z. Patrikakis, "Quantifying Privacy in Terms of Entropy for Context Aware Services", special issue of the Identity in the Information Society journal, "Identity Management in Grid and SOA", Springer, vol. 2, no 2, December 2009

[edit]Further reading

Yael Onn, et al. Privacy in the Digital Environment , Haifa Center of Law & Technology, (2005)
Judith Wagner DeCew, 1997, In Pursuit of Privacy: Law, Ethics, and the Rise of Technology, Ithaca: Cornell University Press
Ruth Gavison, "Privacy and the Limits of the Law," in Michael J. Gorr and Sterling Harwood, eds., Crime and Punishment: Philosophic Explorations (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 2000, formerly Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 1996), paperback, 552 pages, pp. 46–68.
Ulrike Hugl, "Approaching the value of Privacy: Review of theoretical privacy concepts and aspects of privacy management", Proceedings of the Sixteenth Americas Conference on Information Systems (AMCIS) 2010, paper no. 248.
Steve Lohr, "How Privacy Can Vanish Online, a Bit at a Time", The New York Times, Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Daniel J. Solove, "'I've Got Nothing to Hide' and Other Misunderstandings of Privacy", San Diego Law Review, Vol. 44, 745-772.
Judith Jarvis Thomson, "The Right to Privacy," in Michael J. Gorr and Sterling Harwood, eds., Crime and Punishment: Philosophic Explorations (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Publishing Co., 2000, formerly Jones and Bartlett Publishers, 1995), 552 pages, pp. 34–46.
Rita Watson and Menahem Blondheim (eds.), The Toronto School of Communication Theory: Interpretations, Extensions and Applications (Toronto and Jerusalem: University of Toronto Press and Magnes Press, 2007)
A. Westin, 1967, Privacy and Freedom, New York: Atheneum
Robert Ellis Smith, 2004, "Ben Franklin's Web Site, Privacy and Curiosity from Plymouth Rock to the Internet," Providence: Privacy Journal
Bruce Schneier, Privacy in the Age of Persistence

[edit]External links

Find more about Privacy on Wikipedia's sister projects:
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	News stories from Wikinews
	Quotations from Wikiquote
	Source texts from Wikisource
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Evergreen collection of regulatory / academic / business interviews and independent objective analysis
Privacy International
Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
Privacy Rights Clearinghouse
Privacy and public cameras
privacy.org, a service of the Electronic Privacy Information Center
Privacy at the Open Directory Project
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry
Privacy Commission
UNESCO Chair in Data Privacy
Privacy Office at the Department of Homeland Security
Interview about internet privacy 12 min. video, Fox News, Jan. 26, 2011

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Surveillance

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Surveillance (disambiguation).

A 'nest' of surveillance cameras at the Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Massachusetts

Surveillance ( /sərˈveɪ.əns/ or /sərˈveɪləns/)^[1] is the monitoring of the behavior, activities, or other changing information, usually of people and often in a surreptitious manner. It most usually refers to observation of individuals or groups by government organizations, butdisease surveillance, for example, is monitoring the progress of a disease in a community.

The word surveillance is the French word for "watching over".

The word surveillance may be applied to observation from a distance by means of electronic equipment (such as CCTV cameras), or interception of electronically transmitted information (such as Internet traffic or phone calls). It may also refer to simple, relatively no- or low-technology methods such as human intelligence agents and postal interception.

Surveillance is very useful to governments and law enforcement to maintain social control, recognize and monitor threats, and prevent/investigate criminal activity. With the advent of programs such as the Total Information Awareness program and ADVISE, technologies such as high speed surveillance computers and biometrics software, and laws such as theCommunications Assistance For Law Enforcement Act, governments now possess an unprecedented ability to monitor the activities of their subjects.^[2]

However, many civil rights and privacy groups such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation andACLU have expressed concern that by allowing continual increases in government surveillance of citizens that we will end up in a mass surveillance society, with extremely limited, or non-existent political and/or personal freedoms. Fears such as this have led to numerous lawsuits such as Hepting v. AT&T.^[2]^[3]

[hide]

[edit]Types of surveillance

[edit]Computer surveillance

Official seal of the Information Awareness Office -- a U.S. agency which developed technologies for mass surveillance

The vast majority of computer surveillance involves the monitoring of data and traffic on the Internet.^[4]In the United States for example, under the Communications Assistance For Law Enforcement Act, all phone calls and broadband Internet traffic (emails, web traffic, instant messaging, etc.) are required to be available for unimpeded real-time monitoring by Federal law enforcement agencies.^[5]^[6]^[7]

There is far too much data on the Internet for human investigators to manually search through all of it. So automated Internet surveillance computers sift through the vast amount of intercepted Internet traffic and identify and report to human investigators traffic considered interesting by using certain "trigger" words or phrases, visiting certain types of web sites, or communicating via email or chat with suspicious individuals or groups.^[8] Billions of dollars per year are spent, by agencies such as theInformation Awareness Office, NSA, and the FBI, to develop, purchase, implement, and operate systems such as Carnivore, NarusInsight, and ECHELON to intercept and analyze all of this data, and extract only the information which is useful to law enforcement and intelligence agencies.^[9]

Computers are also a surveillance target because of the personal data stored on them. If someone is able to install software (either physically or remotely), such as the FBI's "Magic Lantern" and CIPAV, on a computer system, they can easily gain unauthorized access to this data.^[10]

Another form of computer surveillance, known as TEMPEST, involves reading electromagnetic emanations from computing devices in order to extract data from them at distances of hundreds of meters.^[11]^[12]^[13]

The NSA also runs a database known as "Pinwale", which stores and indexes large numbers of emails of both American citizens and foreigners.^[14]^[15]

[edit]Telephones

Main article: Lawful interception

The official and unofficial tapping of telephone lines is widespread. In the United States for instance, the Communications Assistance For Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) requires that all telephone and VoIP communications be available for real-time wiretapping by Federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies.^[5]^[6]^[7] Two major telecommunications companies in the U.S. -- AT&T and Verizon—have contracts with the FBI, requiring them to keep their phone call records easily searchable and accessible for Federal agencies, in return for $1.8 million dollars per year.^[16] Between 2003 and 2005, the FBI sent out more than 140,000 "National Security Letters" ordering phone companies to hand over information about their customers' calling and Internet histories. About half of these letters requested information on U.S. citizens.^[17]

Human agents are not required to monitor most calls. Speech-to-text software creates machine-readable text from intercepted audio, which is then processed by automated call-analysis programs, such as those developed by agencies such as the Information Awareness Office, or companies such as Verint, and Narus, which search for certain words or phrases, to decide whether to dedicate a human agent to the call.^[18]

Law enforcement and intelligence services in the U.K. and the United States possess technology to remotely activate the microphones in cell phones, by accessing the phone's diagnostic/maintenance features, in order to listen to conversations that take place nearby the person who holds the phone.^[19]^[20]^[21]^[22]^[23]^[24]

Mobile phones are also commonly used to collect location data. The geographical location of a mobile phone (and thus the person carrying it) can be determined easily (whether it is being used or not), using a technique known multilateration to calculate the differences in time for a signal to travel from the cell phone to each of several cell towers near the owner of the phone.^[25]^[26] A controversy has emerged in the United States over the legality of such techniques, and particularly whether a court warrant is required.^[27] Records for one carrier alone (Sprint), showed that in a given year federal law enforcement agencies requested customer location data 8 million times.^[28]

[edit]Surveillance cameras

Main article: Closed-circuit television

Citizens under surveillance in Cairns, Queensland

Surveillance cameras such as these are installed by the millions in many countries, and are nowadays monitored by automated computer programs instead of humans.

Surveillance cameras are video cameras used for the purpose of observing an area. They are often connected to a recording device, IP network, and/or watched by a security guard/law enforcement officer. Cameras and recording equipment used to be relatively expensive and required human personnel to monitor camera footage. Now with cheaper production techniques, it is simple and inexpensive enough to be used in home security systems, and for everyday surveillance. Analysis of footage is made easier by automated software that organizes digital video footage into a searchable database, and by automated video analysis software (such as VIRAT and HumanID) . The amount of footage is also drastically reduced by motion sensors which only record when motion is detected.

The use of surveillance cameras by governments and businesses has dramatically increased over the last 10 years. In the U.K., for example, there are about 4.2 million surveillance cameras—1 camera for every 14 people.^[29]

In the United States, the Department of Homeland Security gives billions of dollars per year inHomeland Security grants for local, state, and federal agencies to install modern video surveillance equipment. For example, the city of Chicago, IL recently used a $5.1 million Homeland Security grant to install an additional 250 surveillance cameras, and connect them to a centralized monitoring center, along with its preexisting network of over 2000 cameras in a program known asOperation Virtual Shield. Chicago Mayor Richard Daley has announced that Chicago will have a surveillance camera on every street corner by the year 2016.^[30]^[31]

As part of China's Golden Shield Project, several U.S. corporations such as IBM, General Electric, and Honeywell have been working closely with the Chinese government to install millions of surveillance cameras throughout China, along with advanced video analytics and facial recognition software, which will identify and track individuals everywhere they go. They will be connected to a centralized database and monitoring station, which will, upon completion of the project, contain a picture of the face of every person in China: over 1.3 billion people.^[32] Lin Jiang Huai, the head of China's "Information Security Technology" office (which is in charge of the project), credits the surveillance systems in the United States and the U.K. as the inspiration for what he is doing with the Golden Shield project.^[32]

Payload surveillance camera manufactured by Controp and distributed to the U.S. Government by ADI Technologies.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is funding a research project calledCombat Zones That See that will link up cameras across a city to a centralized monitoring station, identify and track individuals and vehicles as they move through the city, and report "suspicious" activity (such as waving arms, looking side-to-side, standing in a group, etc.).^[33]

At Super Bowl XXXV in January 2001, police in Tampa Bay, Florida, used Identix's facial recognition software, FaceIt, to scan the crowd for potential criminals and terrorists in attendance at the event.^[34] (it found 19 people with pending arrest warrants)^[35]

Governments often initially claim that cameras are meant to be used for traffic control, but many of them end up using them for general surveillance. For example, Washington, D.C. had 5000 "traffic" cameras installed under this premise, and then after they were all in place, networked them all together and then granted access to the Metropolitan Police Department, so that they could perform "day-to-day monitoring".^[36]

The development of centralized networks of CCTV cameras watching public areas—linked to computer databases of people's pictures and identity (biometric data), able to track peoples' movements throughout the city, and identify who they have been with—has been argued by some to present a risk to civil liberties.^[37]

[edit]Social network analysis

One common form of surveillance is to create maps of social networks based on data from social networking sites such as Facebook,MySpace, Twitter as well as from traffic analysis information from phone call records such as those in the NSA call database,^[38] and others. These social network "maps" are then data mined to extract useful information such as personal interests, friendships & affiliations, wants, beliefs, thoughts, and activities.^[39]^[40]^[41]^[42]

Many U.S. government agencies such as the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the National Security Agency (NSA), and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) are currently investing heavily in research involving social network analysis.^[43]^[44] The intelligence community believes that the biggest threat to U.S. power comes from decentralized, leaderless, geographically dispersed groups of terrorists, subversives, extremists, and dissidents . These types of threats are most easily countered by finding important nodes in the network, and removing them. To do this requires a detailed map of the network.^[41]^[42]^[45]^[46]

Jason Ethier of Northeastern University, in his study of modern social network analysis, said the following of the Scalable Social Network Analysis Program developed by the Information Awareness Office:

The purpose of the SSNA algorithms program is to extend techniques of social network analysis to assist with distinguishing potential terrorist cells from legitimate groups of people ... In order to be successful SSNA will require information on the social interactions of the majority of people around the globe. Since the Defense Department cannot easily distinguish between peaceful citizens and terrorists, it will be necessary for them to gather data on innocent civilians as well as on potential terrorists.

—Jason Ethier^[41]

AT&T developed a programming language called "Hancock" which is able to sift through enormous databases of phone call and Internet traffic records, such as the NSA call database and extract "communities of interest" -- groups of people who call each other regularly, or groups that regularly visit certain sites on the Internet. AT&T originally built the system to develop "marketing leads",^[47] but the FBI has regularly requested such information from phone companies such as AT&T without a warrant,^[47] and after using the data stores all information received in its own databases, regardless of whether or not the information was ever useful in an investigation.^[48]

Some people believe that the use of social networking sites is a form of "participatory surveillance", where users of these sites are essentially performing surveillance on themselves, putting detailed personal information on public websites where it can be viewed by corporations and governments.^[39] About 20% of employers have reported using social networking sites to collect personal data on prospective or current employees.^[49]

[edit]Biometric surveillance

Fingerprints being scanned as part of theUS-VISIT program

Main article: Biometrics

Biometric surveillance refers to technologies that measure and analyze human physical and/or behavioral characteristics for authentication, identification, or screening purposes.^[50] Examples of physical characteristics include fingerprints, DNA, and facial patterns. Examples of mostly behavioral characteristics include gait (a person's manner of walking) or voice.

Facial recognition is the use of the unique configuration of a person's facial features to accurately identify them, usually from surveillance video. Both the Department of Homeland Security andDARPA are heavily funding research into facial recognition systems.^[51] The Information Processing Technology Office, ran a program known as Human Identification at a Distance which developed technologies that are capable of identifying a person at up to 500 ft by their facial features.

Another form of behavioral biometrics, based on affective computing, involves computers recognizing a person's emotional state based on an analysis of their facial expressions, how fast they are talking, the tone and pitch of their voice, their posture, and other behavioral traits. This might be used for instance to see if a person is acting "suspicious" (looking around furtively, "tense" or "angry" facial expressions, waving arms, etc.).^[52]

A more recent development is DNA fingerprinting, which looks at some of the major markers in the body's DNA to produce a match. The FBI is currently spending $1 billion to build a new biometric database,^[53] which will store DNA, facial recognition data, iris/retina (eye) data, fingerprints, palm prints, and other biometric data of people living in the United States. The computers running the database will be contained in an underground facility is about the size of a football field.^[54]^[55]

The Los Angeles Police Department is currently installing automated facial recognition and license plate recognition devices in its squad cars, and providing handheld face scanners, which officers will use to identify people while on patrol.^[56]^[57]^[58]

Facial thermographs are currently in development, which allow machines to identify certain emotions in people such as fear or stress, by measuring the temperature generated by blood flow to different parts of their face.^[59] Law enforcement officers believe that this has potential for them to identify when a suspect is nervous, which might indicate that they are hiding something, lying, or worried about something.^[59]

[edit]Aerial surveillance

Micro Air Vehicle with attached surveillance camera

Aerial surveillance is the gathering of surveillance, usually visual imagery or video, from an airborne vehicle—such as a unmanned aerial vehicle, helicopter, or spy plane. Military surveillance aircraftuse a range of sensors (e.g. radar) to monitor the battlefield.

Digital imaging technology, miniaturized computers, and numerous other technological advances over the past decade have contributed to rapid advances in aerial surveillance hardware such asmicro-aerial vehicles, forward-looking infrared, and high-resolution imagery capable of identifying objects at extremely long distances. For instance, the MQ-9 Reaper,^[60] a U.S. drone plane currently used for domestic operations by the Department of Homeland Security, carries cameras that are capable of identifying an object the size of a milk carton from altitudes of 60,000 feet, and has forward-looking infrared devices that can detect the heat from a human body at distances of up to 60 kilometers.^[61]

HART program concept drawing from official IPTO (DARPA) official website

The United States Department of Homeland Security is in the process of testing UAVs to patrol the skies over the United States for the purposes of critical infrastructure protection, border patrol, "transit monitoring", and general surveillance of the U.S. population.^[62] Miami-Dade police department ran tests with a vertical take-off and landing UAV from Honeywell, which is planned to be used in SWAT operations.^[63] Houston's police department has been testing fixed-wing UAVs for use in "traffic control".^[63]

The U.K., as well, is currently working on plans to build up a fleet of surveillance UAVs ranging from micro-aerial vehicles to full-size drones, to be used by police forces throughout the U.K.^[64]

In addition to their surveillance capabilities, MAVs are capable of carrying tasers for "crowd control", or weapons for killing enemy combatants.^[65]

Programs such as the Heterogenous Aerial Reconnaissance Team program developed by DARPAhave automated much of the aerial surveillance process. They have developed systems consisting of large teams drone planes that pilot themselves, automatically decide who is "suspicious" and how to go about monitoring them, coordinate their activities with other drones nearby, and notify human operators if something suspicious is occurring. This greatly increases the amount of area that can be continuously monitored, while reducing the number of human operators required. Thus a swarm of automated, self-directing drones can automatically patrol a city and track suspicious individuals, reporting their activities back to a centralized monitoring station.^[66]^[67]^[68]

[edit]Data mining and profiling

Data mining is the application of statistical techniques and programmatic algorithms to discover previously unnoticed relationships within the data.. Data profiling in this context is the process of assembling information about a particular individual or group in order to generate a profile — that is, a picture of their patterns and behavior. Data profiling can be an extremely powerful tool for psychological and social network analysis. A skilled analyst can discover facts about a person that they might not even be consciously aware of themselves.^[69]

Economic (such as credit card purchases) and social (such as telephone calls and emails) transactions in modern society create large amounts of stored data and records. In the past this data would be documented in paper records and would leave a "paper trail", or simply not be documented at all. Correlation of paper-based records was a laborious process—it required human intelligence operators to manually dig through documents, which was time-consuming and incomplete, at best.

But today many of these records are electronic, resulting in an "electronic trail". Every use of a bank machine, payment by credit card, use of a phone card, call from home, checked out library book, rented video, or otherwise complete recorded transaction generates an electronic record. Public records—such as birth, court, tax and other records—are increasily being digitized and made available online. In addition, due to laws like CALEA, web traffic and online purchases are also available for profiling. Electronic record-keeping makes data easily collectable, storable, and accessible—so that high-volume, efficient aggregation and analysis is possible at significantly lower costs.

Information relating to many of these individual transactions is often easily available because it is not generally not guarded in isolation, since the information, such as the title of a movie a person has rented, might not seem sensitive. However, when many such transactions areaggregated they can be used to assemble a detailed profile revealing the actions, habits, beliefs, locations frequented, social connections, and preferences of the individual. This profile is then used, by programs such as ADVISE ^[70] and TALON, to determine whether the person is a military, criminal, or political threat.

In addition to its own aggregation and profiling tools, the government is able to access information from third parties — for example, banks, credit companies or employers, etc. — by requesting access informally, by compelling access through the use of subpoenas or other procedures,^[71] or by purchasing data from commercial data aggregators or data brokers. The United States has currently spent $370 million on its 43 planned fusion centers, which are national network of surveillance centers that are located in over 30 states. The centers will collect and analyze vast amounts of data on U.S. citizens. It will get this data by consolidating personal information from sources such as state driver's licensing agencies, hospital records, criminal records, school records, credit bureaus, banks, etc. -- and placing this information in a centralized database that can be accessed from all of the centers, as well as other federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies.^[72]

Under United States v. Miller (1976), data held by third parties is generally not subject to Fourth Amendment warrant requirements.

[edit]Corporate surveillance

Corporate surveillance is the monitoring of a person or group's behavior by a corporation. The data collected is most often used for marketing purposes or sold to other corporations, but is also regularly shared with government agencies. It can be used as a form of business intelligence, which enables the corporation to better tailor their products and/or services to be desirable by their customers. Or the data can be sold to other corporations, so that they can use it for the aforementioned purpose. Or it can be used for direct marketing purposes, such as the targeted advertisements on Google and Yahoo, where ads are targeted to the user of the search engine by analyzing their search history and emails^[73] (if they use free webmail services), which is kept in a database.^[74]

For instance, Google, the world's most popular search engine, stores identifying information for each web search. An IP address and the search phrase used are stored in a database for up to 18 months.^[75] Google also scans the content of emails of users of its Gmail webmail service, in order to create targeted advertising based on what people are talking about in their personal email correspondences.^[76] Google is, by far, the largest Internet advertising agency—millions of sites place Google's advertising banners and links on their websites, in order to earn money from visitors who click on the ads. Each page containing Google ads adds, reads, and modifies "cookies" on each visitor's computer.^[77] These cookies track the user across all of these sites, and gather information about their web surfing habits, keeping track of which sites they visit, and what they do when they are on these sites. This information, along with the information from their email accounts, and search engine histories, is stored by Google to use for building a profile of the user to deliver better-targeted advertising.^[76]

The United States government often gains access to these databases, either by producing a warrant for it, or by simply asking. TheDepartment of Homeland Security has openly stated that it uses data collected from consumer credit and direct marketing agencies—such as Google—for augmenting the profiles of individuals that it is monitoring.^[74] The FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and other intelligence agencies have formed an "information-sharing" partnership with over 34,000 corporations as part of their Infragard program.

The U.S. Federal government has gathered information from grocery store "discount card" programs, which track customers' shopping patterns and store them in databases, in order to look for "terrorists" by analyzing shoppers' buying patterns.^[78]

[edit]Human operatives

Organizations that have enemies who wish to gather information about the groups members or activities face the issue of infiltration.^[79]^[80]

In addition to operatives infiltrating an organization, the surveilling party may put pressure on certain members of the target organization to act as informants (i.e. disclose the information they hold on the organization and its members).^[81]^[82]

Fielding operatives is very expensive, and for governments with wide-reaching electronic surveillance tools at their disposal the information recovered from operatives can often be obtained from less problematic forms of surveillance such as those mentioned above. Nevertheless, human infiltrators are still common today. For instance, in 2007 documents surfaced showing that the FBI was planning to field a total of 15,000 undercover agents and informants in response to a anti-terrorism directive sent out by George W. Bush in 2004 that ordered intelligence and law enforcement agencies to increase their HUMINT capabilities.^[83]

[edit]Satellite imagery

On May 25, 2007 the U.S. Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell authorized the National Applications Office (NAO) of theDepartment of Homeland Security to allow local, state, and domestic Federal agencies to access imagery from military intelligence satellitesand aircraft sensors which can now be used to observe the activities of U.S. citizens. The satellites and aircraft sensors will be able to penetrate cloud cover, detect chemical traces, and identify objects in buildings and "underground bunkers", and will provide real-time video at much higher resolutions than the still-images produced by programs such as Google Earth.^[84]^[85]^[86]^[87]^[88]^[89]

[edit]Identification and credentials

A card containing an identification number

One of the simplest forms of identification is the carrying of credentials. Some nations have an identity card system to aid identification, whilst many, such as Britain, are considering it but face public opposition. Other documents, such as passports, driver's licenses, library cards, bankers or credit cards are also used to verify identity.

If the form of the identity card is "machine-readable," usually using an encoded magnetic stripe or identification number (such as a Social Security number) that corroborates the subject's identifying data. In this case it may create a document trail when it is checked and scanned, which can be used in profiling, as mentioned above.

[edit]RFID and geolocation devices

Hand with planned insertion point for Verichip device

[edit]RFID tagging

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tagging is the use of very small electronic devices (called 'RFID tags') which are applied to or incorporated into a product, animal, or person for the purpose of identification and tracking using radio waves. The tags can be read from several meters away. They are extremely cheap, costing a few cents a piece, so they can be inserted into many types of everyday products without significantly increasing the price, and can be used to track and identify these objects for a variety of purposes.

Many companies are already "tagging" their workers, who are monitored while on the job. Workers in U.K. went on general strike in protest of having themselves tagged. They felt that it wasdehumanizing to have all of their movements tracked with RFID chips.^[90] Some critics have expressed fears that people will soon be tracked and scanned everywhere they go.^[91]

RFID chip pulled from new credit card

Verichip is an RFID device produced by a company called Applied Digital Solutions (ADS). Verichip is slightly larger than a grain of rice, and is injected under the skin. The injection reportedly feels similar to receiving a shot. The chip is encased in glass, and stores a "VeriChip Subscriber Number" which the scanner uses to access their personal information, via the Internet, from Verichip Inc.'s database, the "Global VeriChip Subscriber Registry". Thousands of people have already had them inserted.^[91] In Mexico, for example, 160 workers at the Attorney General's office were required to have the chip injected for identity verification and access control purposes.^[92]^[93]

It may be that soon every object that is purchased, and perhaps ID cards, will have RFID devices in them, which would broadcast information about people as they walk past scanners (what type of phone they have, what type of shoes they have on, which books they are carrying, what credit cards or membership cards they have, etc.). This information could be used for identification, tracking, or targeted marketing.^[94]

[edit]Global Positioning System

Diagram of GPS satellites currently orbiting Earth

[edit]Mobile phones

Mobile phones are also commonly used to collect geolocation data. The geographical location of a mobile phone (and thus the person carrying it) can be determined easily (whether it is being used or not), using a technique known multilateration to calculate the differences in time for a signal to travel from the cell phone to each of several cell towers near the owner of the phone.^[25]^[26]

[edit]Surveillance devices

Surveillance devices, or "bugs", are hidden electronic devices which are used to capture, record, and/or transmit data to a receiving party such as a law enforcement agency.

The U.S. has run numerous domestic intelligence, such as COINTELPRO, which have bugged the homes, offices, and vehicles of thousands of U.S. citizens, usually political activists, subversives, and criminals.^[97]

[edit]Postal services

As more people use faxes and e-mail the significance of surveilling the postal system is decreasing, in favor of Internet and telephone surveillance. But interception of post is still an available option for law enforcement and intelligence agencies, in certain circumstances.

The CIA and FBI have performed twelve separate mail-opening campaigns targeted towards U.S. citizens. In one of these programs, more than 215,000 communications were intercepted, opened, and photographed.^[98]^[99]

[edit]Controversy surrounding surveillance

Graffiti expressing concern about proliferation of video surveillance

[edit]Support

Some supporters of surveillance systems believe that these tools protect society from terroristsand criminals. Other supporters simply believe that there is nothing that can be done about it, and that people must become accustomed to having no privacy. As Sun Microsystems CEO Scott McNealy said: "You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it."^[100]^[101]

Another common argument^[102] is: "If you aren't doing something wrong then you don't have anything to fear." Some critics state that this claim should be modified to read: "As long as we do what we're told, we have nothing to fear.".^[103] For instance, a person who is part of a political group which opposes the policies of the national government, might not want the government to know their names and what they have been reading, so that the government cannot easily subverttheir organization, arrest them, or kill them.^[104] Other critics state that while a person might not have anything to hide right now, the government might later implement policies that they do wish to oppose, and that opposition might then be impossible due to mass surveillance enabling the government to identify and remove political threats.^[103]^[105] Other critics point to the fact that most people do have things to hide.^[102]^[104] For example, if a person is looking for a new job, they might not want their current employer to know this.^[106]

[edit]Opposition

[edit]Totalitarianism

A traffic camera atop a high pole oversees a road in the Canadian city of Toronto.

Programs such as the Total Information Awareness program, and laws such as theCommunications Assistance For Law Enforcement Act have led many groups to fear that society is moving towards a state of mass surveillance with severely limited personal, social, political freedoms, where dissenting individuals or groups will be strategically removed in COINTELPRO-like purges.^[2]^[3]^[29]

Kate Martin, of the Center For National Security Studies said of the use of military spy satellites being used to monitor the activities of U.S. citizens: "They are laying the bricks one at a time for a police state."^[88]

[edit]Psychological/Social Effects

Some critics, such as Michel Foucault, believe that in addition to its obvious function of identifying and capturing individuals who are committing undesirable acts, surveillance also functions to create in everyone a feeling of always being watched, so that they become self-policing. This allows the State to control the populace without having to resort to physical force, which is expensive and otherwise problematic.^[107]

[edit]Privacy

Numerous civil rights groups and privacy groups oppose surveillance as a violation of people's right to privacy. Such groups include: Electronic Privacy Information Center, Electronic Frontier Foundation, ACLU

There have been several lawsuits such as Hepting v. AT&T and EPIC v. Department of Justice by groups or individuals, opposing certain surveillance activities.

Legislative proceedings such as those that took place during the Church Committee, which investigated domestic intelligence programs such as COINTELPRO, have also weighed the pros and cons of surveillance.

[edit]Countersurveillance, inverse surveillance, sousveillance

Countersurveillance is the practice of avoiding surveillance or making surveillance difficult. With recent developments — the Internet, increasing prevalence of electronic security systems, armedUAVs flying at 60,000 feet, and large corporate/government computer databases — counter surveillance has dramatically grown in scope and complexity.

Inverse surveillance is the practice of reversalism on surveillance (e.g., citizens photographing police). Well-known examples are George Holliday's recording of the Rodney King beating and the organization Copwatch, which attempts to surveil police officers to prevent police brutality.

Sousveillance (a term coined by Steve Mann, a professor at the University of Toronto) is inverse surveillance that includes the recording of an activity by a participant in the activity.^[108]

[edit]In popular culture

[edit]In literature

George Orwell's novel, 1984, portrays a fictional totalitarian surveillance society which has a very simple (by today's standards) mass surveillance system consisting of human operatives, informants, and two-way "telescreens" in people's homes. Because of the impact of this book, "Orwellian" is a common term used to describe mass surveillance technologies.
The book, The Handmaid's Tale as well as a film based on it, portray a totalitarian Christian theocracy where all citizens are kept under constant surveillance.

[edit]In music

The Dead Kennedys' song, "I Am The Owl", is about government surveillance and social engineering of political groups.

[edit]Onscreen

The movie, Gattaca, portrays a society that uses biometric surveillance to distinguish between people who are genetically engineered "superior" humans and genetically natural "inferior" humans.
In the movie Minority Report, the police and government intelligence agencies use micro aerial vehicles in SWAT operations and for surveillance purposes.
HBO's crime-drama series, The Sopranos, regularly portrays the FBI's surveillance of the DiMeo Crime Family. Audio devices they use include "bugs" placed in strategic locations (e.g., in "I Dream of Jeannie Cusamano" and "Mr. Ruggerio's Neighborhood") and hidden microphones worn by operatives (e.g., in "Rat Pack") and informants (e.g., in "Funhouse", "Proshai, Livushka", and "Members Only"). Visual devices include hidden still cameras (e.g., in "Pax Soprana") and video cameras (e.g., in "Long Term Parking").
The movie, THX-1138, portrays a society where people are drugged with sedatives and antidepressants, and have surveillance cameras watching them everywhere they go.

[edit]See also

[edit]References

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[edit]Further reading

Garfinkel, Simson, Database Nation; The Death of Privacy in the 21st Century. O'Reilly & Associates, Inc. ISBN 0-596-00105-3
Gilliom, John Overseers of the Poor: Surveillance, Resistance, and the Limits of Privacy, University Of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0226293615
Jenkins, Peter Advanced Surveillance Training Manual, Intel Publishing, UK ISBN 0-9535378-1-1
Jensen, Derrick and Draffan, George (2004) Welcome to the Machine: Science, Surveillance, and the Culture of Control Chelsea Green Publishing Company. ISBN 978-1931498524
Lyon, David (2001). Surveillance Society: Monitoring in Everyday Life. Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 978-0335205462
Lyon, David (2007) Surveillance Studies: An Overview. Cambridge: Polity Press. ISBN 978-0745635910
Parenti, Christian The Soft Cage: Surveillance in America From Slavery to the War on Terror, Basic Books, ISBN 978-0465054855

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COINTELPRO -- FBI counterintelligence programs designed to neutralize political dissidents.

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Sunday, July 3, 2011

The target of generating 600 mn unique ID cards by 2014 would be achieved, Nandan Nilekani , chairman of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), has already claimed. In Karnataka, you may get Paid getting UID to kill your Individual sov

NATO - UID of Items

Topic

Submission Deadline

Word Length

Topic Summary

Who We Are

Eight reasons why you should oppose Unique Identification: Stop UID Campaign

Nilekani admits that UID will be used for tracking people

Huge rush for Aadhaar card speaks of its success

One crore register in Maharashtra under UID project

Union Budget 2011: Direct cash subsidy on fuel, fertilizers by Mar '12

Bouquets & brickbats: Nandan Nilekani decodes the UID

Nandan Nilekani questioned over pitfalls in UID

"Basic procedures not followed before UID project was launched"

Subsidy

Contents

[edit]Overview

[edit]Types of subsidies

[edit]Indirect subsidies

[edit]Labor subsidies

[edit]Infrastructure subsidies

[edit]Trade protection (import restrictions)

[edit]Export subsidies (trade promotion)

[edit]Procurement subsidies

[edit]Consumption subsidies

[edit]Subsidies due to the effect of debt guarantees

[edit]Controversy

[edit]Historical meaning

[edit]See also

[edit]Notes

[edit]External links

Unique Identification Authority of India

Contents

[edit]Launch

[edit]Coverage, goals and logistics

[edit]Name and logo

[edit]Projected costs and business opportunities

[edit]Benefits

[edit]Risks

[edit]Criticism

[edit]References

[edit]External links

Nandan Nilekani

Contents

[edit]Early life

[edit]Career

[edit]Personal life

[edit]Honours and awards

[edit]Bibliography

[edit]References

[edit]External links

List of national identity card policies by country

Contents

[edit]Identity card policies by country

[edit]Countries with compulsory identity cards

[edit]Countries with non-compulsory identity cards

[edit]France

[edit]Sweden

[edit]Countries with no identity cards

[edit]Notes

[edit]References

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