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Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has proposed a solution to deal with the problem of data leak by providing dummy Aadhaar numbers which will be given to the card-holders and UIDAI, reports Economic Times.

Breach of personal data is one issue surrounding Aadhaar and to rectify this problem UIDAI is evaluating the framework of providing pseudo numbers to the card-holders. These numbers then can be used for every other purpose for which an Aadhaar is essential.

Instead of the real Aadhaar number, the dummy number can be provided to government agencies, private utilities, banks and moving funds from one bank account to another under the Aadhaar-enabled payment system.

However, this unique idea is still in talks at senior levels in UIDAI and has not been finalised yet.

But, will this framework solve the issue?

This remains doubtful as the sole purpose of giving Aadhaar numbers to people is unique identification and with dummy numbers the purpose will be lost. Aadhaar numbers are provided to authenticate and verify the details of an individual. However, with the dummy numbers there will new numbers generated for every purpose and this will make it difficult to trace a person or his activity.

In another case of breach of personal details, more than 200 central and state government websites publicly displayed details such as names and addresses of some Aadhaar beneficiaries. Websites of central government, state government departments including educational institutes were displaying the list of beneficiaries along with their name, address, other details and Aadhaar numbers for information of general public.

The UIDAI took note and got the Aadhaar data removed from the said websites.

In light of these events, UIDAI authority said it is taking measures to ensure that the system is safe from data leaks.

“It said security audits are conducted on a regular basis to further strengthen security and privacy of data. Besides this, all possible steps are taken to make the data safer and protected,” the authority said in an RTI reply.

The central government is in the process of making Aadhaar mandatory for people to avail benefits of various social service schemes.

The UIDAI has a well-designed, multi-layer approach robust security system in place and the same is also constantly upgraded to maintain highest level of data security and integrity.

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