Ever wondered as
to why bankers are immensely interested in biometric identification and
verification of citizens? Biometric identification implies that movements of present
and future generations of citizensare tracked like those of bacteria under a
microscope. This exercise of creating a centralized ‘online database’ of
biometric information of Indians is unfolding under the gaze of all the public
institutions in general and the Supreme Court in particular. The core issue
here is: will efforts to undermine the fundamental right of Indians to move and
transact freely around the country and to live without constantly having to
prove who they are, succeed or fail.
What is ironical is
that while it is inevitable that no centralized electronic database of
biometric information can be made leak proof in the post Wikileaks and Edward
Snowden world, the bankers, biometric technology companies and their
collaborators are marketing it as an answer to increasing demand for identity
proof and identity protection from citizens.
In 1998, National
Biometric Test Center, San Jose State University set up by the Biometric
Consortium, which is the U.S. government interest group on biometric
authentication was asked to testify to the USA’s House Committee on Banking and
Financial Services hearing on “Biometrics and the Future of Money”. This
testimony of May 20, 1998 was reprinted under the title, “Biometric
Identification and the Financial Services Industry. This centre emerged from a
meeting of Biometric Consortium held in 1995 at the FBI training facility. This
Test Centre has defined biometric authentication as “the automatic
identification or identity verification of an individual based on physiological
and behavioral characteristics”.
Whatever is happening
in India is an exercise in imitation of what was attempted in USA through the REAL ID Act of 2005 amidst bitter opposition.
As of 2018, half of all the 50 states have taken extensions. One state,
American Samoa has chosen not to comply with the REAL ID Act. It has been 13
years since the REAL ID Act was passed. The current round of extensions expires
October 10, 2018 but the extensions are renewable.
The US Senate never discussed or voted on the REAL ID Act specifically
and no Senate committee hearings were conducted on the Real ID Act prior to its
passage exposing its undemocratic character and the bill's proponents avoided a
substantive debate on a far-reaching piece of legislation by attaching it to a
"must-pass" bill. Barack Obama had categorically opposed it during
the 2008 presidential election campaign.
A significant number of US states are not participating in the program. Among
other concerns they have argued is that it infringes upon states’
rights. Bills have been introduced into
US Congress to amend or repeal it. The controversial, $4 billion Real ID
initiative is meant to provide secure licenses in the hands of 245 million
Americans. It is surprising as to why unlike in US, States in India are yet to
argue on how Aadhaar Act for Centralized Identities Data Repository (CIDR) of
Unique Identification (UID)/Aadhaar numbers infringes upon states’
rights.
In India, when one
looks at the definition of the “Biometrics” which “means the technologies that
measure and analyse human body characteristics, such as ‘fingerprints’, ‘eye
retinas and irises’, ‘voice patterns’, “facial patterns’, ‘hand measurements’
and ‘DNA’ for authentication purposes” as per Information Technology
(Reasonable security practices and procedures and sensitive personal data or
information) Rules, 2011 under section 87 read with section 43A of Information
Technology Act, 2000, it becomes clear that the plan of data collection does
not end with collection of finger prints and iris scan it goes quite beyond it.
As per Section 2 (g) of Aadhaar (Targeted Delivery of Financial and Other
Subsidies, Benefits and Services) Act, 2016, “‘biometric information’ means
photograph, fingerprint, iris scan, or such other biological attributes of an
individual as may be specified by regulations.”
The fact remains
biometric data like finger print, voice print, iris scan and DNA do not reveal
citizenship or residentship. While use of biometric technology, an advanced
technique for the identification of humans, based on their characteristics or
traits is unfolding there is agency within India to. These traits can be face,
fingerprint, iris, voice, signature, palm, vein, and DNA. DNA recognition and
vein recognition are the latest and most advanced types of biometric
authentication. Biometric technology is being deployed in the application areas
like government, travel and immigration, banking and finance, and defense.
Government applications cover voting, personal ID, license, building access,
etc.; whereas travel and immigration use biometric authentication for border
access control, immigration, detection of explosives at the airports, etc.
Banking and finance sector use biometric authentication for account access, ATM
security, etc.
The International
Biometric Industry Association has listed potential applications for including
voter registration, access to healthcare records, banking transactions,
national identification systems and parental control. Indeed “Biometrics are
turning the human body into the universal ID card of the future”. Unmindful of
dangerous ramifications of such applications, if citizens and political parties
concerned about civil liberties do not act quickly enough biometric ID’s are
all set to be made as common as email addresses without any legal and
legitimate mandate. Biometric information includes DNA profiling wherein
biological traits are taken from a person because by their very nature are
unique to the individual and positively identifies that person within an ever
larger population as the technology improves.
In its report titled
‘Regional Economic Outlook, Asia and Pacific Shifting Risks, New Foundations
for Growth’ as part of World Economic and Financial Surveys, the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) notes that “India is planning to enhance its existing cash
transfer program and identification system in connection with the ongoing
subsidy reform”.
Elaborating it further
it reports how “This program will also present large opportunities for savings.
A nationally uniform, biometric database would cut down on leakages from
outdated biographical information, ghost identification, double registration,
and other losses, which have been estimated in the range of 15–20 percent of
total spending.”
Underlining the
convergence underway, it says, “The integration of these two programs, aadhaar
and direct cash transfers, promises further savings but will involve many
challenges: the timeframe for bringing India’s population of 1.2 billion into
the aadhar program could extend beyond 2014, and integrating this database with
information on individuals eligible for subsidized fuel will take time.
Shifting the fertilizer subsidy from companies to individual farmers and
building up the capacity to deliver payments electronically could also be
challenging in such a large country. But the total savings could be
substantial: if the combination of direct cash transfer and aadhaar eliminates
the estimated 15 percent leakage cited above for the programs being integrated,
savings could total ½ percent of GDP in addition to the gains from the better
targeting of spending on the poor.”
Such claims are
figments of IMF’s imagination unless the total estimated budget of the
UID/Aadhaar project is disclosed. It is irrational for anyone to reach
inference about benefits from any project without factoring in the costs but
World Bank Group is doing it and endorsing similar acts by UIDAI.
Not surprisingly,
having applauded both biometric identification and cash transfer, Jim Yong Kim as
the World Bank Group President underlined the importance of the subject to the
World Bank Group in his opening remarks at the Bank's Development Economics
Lecture series on April 24, 2013 in Washington where Chairman, Unique
Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), Nandan Manohar Nilekani spoke about
the unique system for the biometric identification of Indian residents. It may
be recalled that Robert B. Zoellick, as the then World Bank Chief had met
Chairman of the UIDAI on December 4, 2009. What transpired at these meetings is
not in public domain.
In the aftermath of
these meetings what is least talked about is that the E-identity and
UID/aadhaar related projects are part of World Bank’s eTransform Initiative
formally launched on April 23, 2010 for converging private sector, citizen
sector and public sector and Interpol’s e-identity database project. This along
with the then Union Finance Minister, Pranab Mukherjee’s announcement in
January 2011 voluntarily seeking full-fledged Financial Sector Assessment
Programmee by IMF and the World Bank merits attention of the legislatures and
concerned citizens.
In April, 2010 L-1
Identity Solutions Inc. (which has now been purchased by biometric technology
company Safran group, a French corporation signed a Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) between L-1 and the World Bank was signed as part of the launch of the
initiative at a World Bank Spring Meeting event attended by many developing
country Ministers of Finance and Communications. It claimed that this
collaborative relationship with the World Bank is meant to improve the way
governments in developing countries deliver services to citizens as part of the
launch of the World Bank eTransform Initiative (ETI).
The World Bank's ETI
seeks to leverage Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to build a
knowledge sharing network that helps governments of developing nations to
leverage the best practices of practitioners like L-1 and others to improve the
delivery of social and economic services. The knowledge sharing network will
focus on areas such as electronic Identification (eID), e-Procurement, e-Health
and e-Education; areas vital to promoting the participation of citizens in
democratic processes, such as voting, and helping undocumented citizens get
access to health and welfare programs. The World Bank is currently funding 14
projects related to e-government and e-ID around the world. Are citizens
supposed to believe that the World Bank Group is working to ensure that India's
national interest and its citizens’ rights are protected?
"The speed and
precision with which developing countries administer services is dependent upon
many factors, not the least of which is the ability to verify the identities of
those receiving services," said Mohsen Khalil, as Director of the World
Bank's Global Information and Communication Technologies Department in a
statement.
Robert V. LaPenta, as Chairman,
President and CEO of L-1 Identity Solutions had said, "We believe that
identity management solutions and services can make a significant contribution
to society and undocumented citizens in developing countries, bringing them out
of anonymity and helping establish their place and participation in society and
affirming their rights to benefits they are entitled to receive as
citizens."
It has been underlined
that the “game-changing UID applications in payments, savings, and other tools
for driving efficiency and transparency” using “already created one of the
world's largest platforms (that is) transforming
not only authentication but also everything from government payments to
financial inclusion”. In effect, it is a case biometric profiling by the IFIs
who have vested interest in surveillance of financial transactions.
In his book Imagining
India, Nilekani refers to Bank’s economist, Hernando de Soto's book 'The
Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere
Else' to argue that national ID system would be a big step for land markets
to facilitate right to property and undoing of abolition of right to property
in 1978 in order to bring down poverty! In the post capitalist and post
socialist era, such assumptions of triumph have been found to be deeply
flawed. In fact even the title of the
books sounds weird in the post financial crisis era.
It does not appear to
be a coincidence that Lyon, France based Ronald K Noble, as Secretary General,
INTERPOL, and world’s largest police organisation too has called for global
electronic e-ID identity card system. When Nilekani was asked about the
relationship of UID/Aadhaar with the National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) in an
interview by Hard News magazine, his reply was ‘No Comments’. Isn’t global electronic e-ID identity card
system proposed by INTERPOL, e-Identity project of World Bank Group and
UID/aadhaar related databases linked? Is ‘No Comments’ a convincing answer?
Biometric documentation
of undocumented citizens in developing countries which is underway in some 14
developing countries under ETI is aimed at bringing them out of anonymity
without any legal mandate. Such documentation of sensitive data of citizens
facilitates bullying and invasiveness by the state and international financial
institutions.
Identifying citizens
biometrically is an exercise in empire building by ‘commercial czars’ and
turning citizens in to serfs. Modern day Jaichands, Mir Zafars, JeewanLals and
Mirza Ilahi Bakshis seem to be collaborating to help empire builders to earn
myopic rewards through attempts to compromise citizens’ sovereignty for good.
The journey of
biometric identification and numbering of Indians commenced a year after the
first war of India’s independence was brutally suppressed by the army of
British East India Company with the help of collaborators like Jeevan Lal,
Mirza Ilahi Baksh and Rajab Ali. The first systematic capture of hand images
for identification purposes initiated by William Herschel, a civil servant in
colonial India in 1858. It is noteworthy that in 1898, Edward Henry, Inspector
General of the Bengal Police established the first British fingerprint files in
London.
Referring to the
British victory over Indians in 1857, William Howard Russell of London Times
wrote: “Our siege of Delhi would have been impossible, if the Rajas of Patiala
and Jhind (Jind) had not been our friends”. The seize of the database of
personal sensitive biometric information of all the Indians would have been
impossible but for the help of ‘commercial czars’ and the complicity of civil
servants.
Occupy Wall Street
Movement has a pithy slogan ‘Empire is on the Wall Street’. The exercise of
biometric identification of citizens is a comprehensive intelligence initiative
with financial surveillance at its core. The personal sensitive information
like biometric data that is collected in myriad disguises and through numerous
tempting claims about its benefits is going to be purchased by banks and other
financial institutions to be correlated with other data, and used for purposes
that was neither agreed nor foreseen. This data is bound to be stolen or illegitimately
released, exposing citizens to risks of profiling, tracking and grievous
embarrassments as has happened in the case of Greece, Egypt, Pakistan and UK.
So far legislators and
citizens have failed to make bring World Bank Group and other international
financial institutions under legislative oversight. A situation is emerging
where if the pre-existing databases like electoral database, census and other
databases which are under preparation is converged, these unaccountable and
undemocratic financial institutions will never come under parliamentary
scrutiny. The identification and surveillance technology providers are appear
to be aiding an empire of a kind where every nano activity is under the
vigilance of the Big Brother.
Aadhaar Act is based on
the flawed assumption of Government of India that the benefits of biometric
systems are sufficient to warrant use of biometric technology for financial
transactions. This presumption is misplaced. States and citizens have succumbed
to such presumption because they have not been informed about potential risks
of biometric and electronic determinism. The blatant use of financial rewards
akin to bribes to promote citizen’s participation in biometric identification
programs sets a very harmful precedent as it violates the principle of free and
informed consent. Informed citizens and democratic legislatures can respond to
it only through non-cooperation, civil disobedience and voting against parties
which support the banker-biometric technology vendor nexus.
The author is a public policy and law
researcher, convener Citizens Forum for Civil Liberties (CFCL) and editor of www.toxicswatch.org. He had
appeared before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance that examined
and trashed the Aadhaar Bill, 2010. He has been working on the subject of UID/Aadhaar
and surveillance technologies since 2010. The author had also appeared before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Food, Consumer Affairs and Public
Distribution that examined the Consumer Protection Bill.
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