In the tweets posted on Tuesday evening, the UIDAI wrote, “In our regular media campaigns, we have been consistently making people aware not to display or publish or share their Aadhaar number in public domain. Indiscriminate and unwanted publication of any personally sensitive information whether Aadhaar or any other, may render the concerned person vulnerable and, therefore, should be avoided.”

The only problem? UIDAI had said the exact opposite thing just a few months ago, after an expose in March 2018 revealed that the Aadhaar number of several individuals had been made publicly accessible on the internet for no clear reason.

All one had to do to find Aadhaar numbers of random individuals was google the search phrase “mera aadhaar meri pehchan filetype:pdf”. At the time, the UIDAI had published yet another nine-tweet response, in which they said, “By simply knowing someone’s Aadhaar, no one can impersonate & harm him because Aadhaar alone is not sufficient, it requires biometrics to authenticate one’s Identity.”