The State of Aadhaar Report (SOAR; henceforth “Report”) by IDinsight (funded by Omidyar Network) was released on 17th May 2018. Herewith we examine the claims and recommendations in the Report to determine if it has indeed added new insights and nuances to the debate on Aadhaar. Claim 1: Most felt it was easy to enrol …

Public availability of cracked Enrollment software makes Aadhaar information equivalent to a Self Certified ID — The biggest question that the Asia Times news story raises about the compromised enrollment software is — Why UIDAI cannot fix it? This post answers this question and the implication of this compromise. India's ambitious digital ID project faces new security nightmare A slew of complaints and alerts to UIDAI reveal that operators can bypass biometric and geo-location safeguards to…www.atimes.com

The leak proves beyond doubt that Registered Devices cannot protect from fraud or identity theft — The basics Biometrics are private information — neither a secret, like passwords are, nor public, meant to be shared freely. This distinction is explained in depth by Kiran Jonnalagadda. Public, private and secret information Which type are biometrics?medium.com How is it possible for, say, Anand Venkatanarayanan to become Kiran Jonnalagadda in a presence-less system to perform an identity theft? …

The move to make everyone Cash Transfer compliant also hurt the Ujjwala scheme’s chance of success. — This is Part 2 of an earlier report, which showed that LPG subsidy savings because of Aadhaar is only Rs 107–203 crores before costs compared to the claim of Rs 29,769 crore by the Government Of India. LPG Savings due to Aadhaar is only 107–203 crore Aadhaar savings in LPG PAHAL is a fraction of 29,769 crore claimed by the Government of India, even before considering…medium.com

Every enrolment operator has always had full access to every resident’s demographic data — On 3 January, 2017, The Tribune published one of the best kept secrets in the Aadhaar enrolment ecosystem: that anyone can access the demographic details of all residents by paying just ₹500. Rs 500, 10 minutes, and you have access to billion Aadhaar details TRIBUNE INVESTIGATION - SECURITY BREACH Group tapping UIDAI data may have sold access to 1 lakh service providers…www.tribuneindia.com

Aadhaar savings in LPG PAHAL is a fraction of 29,769 crore claimed by the Government of India, even before considering capital and running costs — 1. Overview How much did Aadhaar-based deduplication really save on the LPG (Liquefied Petroleum Gas) “PAHAL” Scheme? Did it really save ₹29,769 crore until 2016–17, as claimed by the Government of India? Is it possible to separate out UID savings from the savings generated by the entire DBT program, using a methodology…

What is the true cost of Aadhaar? Answering this question is the first step to performing a cost-benefit analysis on the effectiveness of the project for welfare delivery. There are two broad categories of cost in the Aadhaar program: Enrolment costs and integration costs. Enrolment cost is the cost incurred…

Numbers might be hard to crunch, but even reputed financial journalists and publications find Aadhaar savings numbers hard to understand because of the notorious “lemons problem”. Lemons Problem The issue of information asymmetry between the buyer and seller of an investment or product. Lemons problem was…www.investopedia.com This guide is written to redress the information asymmetry so that readers can understand the savings numbers put out by the government objectively without…

UIDAI has always maintained that only minimal information is collected about the resident in multiple affidavits in the Supreme Court, and that resident data is never shared without consent.