Slashdot Mirror
Biometric IDs For Every Indian Citizen
wiedzmin writes "This month, officials from the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), armed with fingerprinting machines, iris scanners and cameras hooked to laptops, will fan out across the towns and villages of southern Andhra Pradesh state in the first phase of the project whose aim is to give every Indian a lifelong Unique ID (UID) number for 'anytime, anywhere' biometric authentication. While enrolling with the UIDAI may be voluntary, other agencies and service providers might require a UID number in order to transact business. Usha Ramanathan, a prominent legal expert who is attached to the Center for the Study of Developing Societies in the national capital, said that, 'taken to its logical limit, the UID project will make it impossible, in a couple of years, for an ordinary citizen to undertake a simple task such as traveling within the country without a UID number.' Next step, tying that UID number and biometric information to to their RIM BlackBerry PIN number."
The original intent of this ID is create something akin to the social security number in the US.
I'll tell you two important reasons for this
1. Make resource allocation more efficient.
For example, there is a concept of basic items like rice, wheat etc... being sold subsidized to poor people.
That mechanism is very inefficient and red tape laden presently.The ID is supposed to streamline it .
2. Currently there is no concept credit history in India other than a credit card.
There is no way a dealer would sell you a TV on credit unless you bring somebody known the dealer along with you.
Imagine US without SSN. That is what it is now in India. very inefficient.
India has a much less uniform naming system, with a lot more duplicate birthdays + names, and much less variance in traits. How many Amrish Patels exist with the same name, color hair, color eyes, and same birthday in India?
My name is not too common, but still I have a duplicate in my home US state - same name and same birthday for two people. That's fine most of the time, but the other guy is a felon, and the state does not require SSN when you are arrested. Therefore, they cannot distinguish me from the felon. My insurance was cancelled retroactively for 1 month while I was out of town. (thanks to Choicepoint for incorrectly associated his name and criminal record with my insurance - you should opt out). My voter registration was cancelled since they do not use a common primary key for voters.
Therefore I prefer a real unique identifier that the state government would respect and correctly associate with me. Since the state uses drivers licenses as their primary key, and the feds use SSN as their primary key, I can have different identities in different states, and the cops may accuse me of being the escaped felon one day when I am innocent.
I don't like the idea of biometrics, but I also don't trust an inaccurate primary key as my identification. A name + birthday != unique.
The enforcement of privacy should be in the way they allow usage of the identity. Credit and Taxes perhaps are tier 2 concerns compared with entering and leaving the country.
Just a thought...
Not in Canada, there's strict laws about who can ask for a SIN (our SSN). Basically, only your employer and the tax man, as it's only used for tax purposes. I couldn't even tell you what mine is, because I don't carry the card for it, and nobody ever asks for it.
Game! - Where the stick is mightier than the sword!
You seem to have a lot of faith in government (or in your government).
The reason Slashdotters (and others) are skeptical of government power is that power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
FYI, India is at 74 on the corruption index.
By the way, an ad that pops up when searching for india corruption index is: http://indiaunheard.videovolunteers.org/?s=corruption&x=0&y=0&gclid=CLm1qair-aMCFQtN5wod2T5cGw, which details a lot of corruption. The more tools you give government, the more harm they can do.
It's naive to think that government officials won't use the awesome amount of cross-linked information for their own purposes.
Also, you must likely not be a member of any kind of minority or repressed group (there are such in every country).
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
Not to mention, names can change through a person's life, say by marriage, or by religious conversion. Or maybe simply because someone doesn't like their current name. Or because they're the-artist-formerly-and-now-currently-known-as-Prince.
In India, it becomes even more difficult - I see newspaper reports every day with people named as "A" alias "B"; not necessarily for illicit purposes, but just because they may be called differently by different people. Besides, I (for example) don't really have a "family name" - I have a given name and a couple of other identifiers. Even for those who do have "family" names, it's more of a "community" name. For example, the name "Singh" would indicate a North Indian, either a Sikh, or one of the many Hindu clans that use the name. It's not just likely that someone bearing the same first + last name would be pretty similar in physical characteristics, it would be almost a given.
Quite frankly, I'm glad we're finally getting this.
At least this is happening in India, not in a country that actually matters globally. I feel sorry for the poor bastards that have to deal with it, but if they're not willing to fight for their freedom, then this is what they'll get. At least in the U.S. we've had our experience with SSNs and the more intelligent members of our population (the ones that aren't out to dominate others - that caveat has to be added, since there's plenty of intelligent people who have no respect for freedom, responsibility, or accountability) should, mostly, be able to understand why a program like this is a very, very bad idea for those of us who value our freedom. SSNs are bad enough as-is - a government program that has become a tool of the private business sector as well, tracking every significant purchase or decision a man makes in his life. I'll undoubtedly be haunted the rest of my life by the problems I had when I was married, despite the fact that I made the best decisions that I could at the time (some of which were forced by the economy, some by personal circumstances, some by business matters gone awry)..
Actually, what bothers me the most about identification systems like this is the invasion of one's privacy. You will never have a chance to start over after losing everything, any person at all may be tracked by government agencies much easier, et al. It makes evil deeds on the behalf of so-called "authorities" (be they governing bodies, businesses, credit tracking agencies, or what-have-you) much easier to accomplish, while offering nothing in return to the citizens subjected to such measures.
PC moderators can suck my White pierced, tattooed dick. If you think pride == hate, s/dick/Aryan meat mallet/g.