
India’s identity scheme: The magic number - pitdesi
http://www.economist.com/node/21542763
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iandanforth
I really dislike the economist. To me the very first thing this program makes
me think of is how the government will abuse it. They briefly mention that
there is the possibility that some sort of privacy issue might pop up in the
future, but quickly dismiss the argument as outweighed by the ends these means
achieve. They even get a swipe in at 'market distorting subsidies' while their
at it.

While other magazines might have bias the Economist takes it to a whole new
level. I would call every piece of 'reporting' they do an editorial.

That said the article did prompt me to learn more. Top Google results which
paint a slightly different picture.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_Identification_Authority...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unique_Identification_Authority_of_India#Risks_and_criticism)

[http://www.zdnet.com/blog/india/indias-unique-id-project-
all...](http://www.zdnet.com/blog/india/indias-unique-id-project-all-but-
dead/802)

~~~
yaix
I disagree. It may be misused, but the amount of abuse of poor people due to
not having an identity is so much worse. Poverty itself is already very
dangerous. But poverty without having the ability to prove your own existance
is so much more dangerous. Having an own passport or ID card is a big step for
many people who had never any official papers about their being.

As the Wikipedia article details, the system may not work fully acurate, but
it is so much simpler to implement and more reliable than anything else I
could think of. Giving out ID cards only? They get lost or destroyed, fakes
get made, poors get talked into handing their ID card to that nice guy who
will go for them to this-or-that office (especially for elections, etc). A
biometric signal is so much more difficult to lose or falsify or get talking
into giving it up.

And the psycological effect of "officially being a unique person" is quite
large (take a look a Muhammad Yunus' book on how he invented the microcredit
system and estabished the Grameen bank in Bangladesh).

~~~
monsterix
Applying rocket-science on poor people who don't understand social-profiling
issues and intense racial issues sounds like a potent mix to me. System would
not work at all, is different from "system may not work fully accurate"
because well - you should read the fluff in their tender documents before you
lose more tax-payers money.

~~~
yaix
A biometric database is hardly rocket science anymore. The main problems to
overcome are likely not technical but administrative/political. I am pretty
sure it will not work at first and for some time, as said political problems
will need time to get (hopefully) worked out. As other posters said, only for
all gov't offices to start to actually accept the UID will probably take many
years. But its a good start.

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newbusox
I really want this to work, but I'm skeptical. I've lived in India, and I know
that corruption is rampant. These "middle men" will try hard to figure out
another way to game this system. Hopefully it's the start of something, but I
think the economist is being a bit too optimistic in claiming that this alone
will transform India.

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biggfoot
Forcing the middlemen to come up with new ways of cheating the system would be
a huge step-up from the status quo. Presently they don't even need to think!

~~~
nmridul
This will atleast make it costly for the middle men to cheat. It will be
difficult to replicate the retina / finger print scan. And that will surely
reduce the low level corruption that directly affects the poor. Surely, this
will not remove the high level corruptions (2g scandal etc).

~~~
setrofim_
Things will certainly get more difficult for these "middle men", but not by
all that much. There is no need for them to replicate the retina/fingerprint
scans or do anything hi-tech/expensive like that. The poor will still need to
exchange the money paid into their accounts for actual goods and supplies like
food and clean water. Simply giving the money directly to the poor will not
affect the scarcity of these resources.

What will happen is that the poor will simply withdraw the entire sum the day
it has been paid in to their accounts, and give it to these "middle men". All
that changes is the direction. Instead of the welfare money flowing down from
the government to the individual programs to the "middle men", it will be
flowing up from the poor through the individual traders to these same "middle
men".

~~~
nmridul
Yes, I agree. That issue is tough to solve.

But this will solve the issue about people that do not exist at all. The ones
that is artificially created by the middle men to scoop the money off and who
only exist on paper.

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biggfoot
There is tons to do even if the UID is successfully rolled out through out the
country. First and foremost would be to get all government services to
willingly accept the UID as the standard scheme ... I know that sounds ironic
but such is the life in India ...

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aangjie
Can't agree more... Getting all the govt. bodies to start using UID could well
take 5 years....

~~~
jaipilot747
Ah! How optimistic :)

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monsterix
The only reason why this project will fall-on-the-face is that here a
Government with least technical competence (notwithstanding the down-votes) is
dreaming to implement a solution (almost Utopian) to the most socio-
technically challenging problem known worldwide and that too for a country of
a billion bare-footed men. Besides, there is no-one to stop the nation from
bleeding to scams and corruption.

Edited: Punctuation.

~~~
jaipilot747
This. A million times this.

A look at the site of our national telephone company (www.bsnl.co.in) and our
railway ticketing service would tell you more than any comment I could write.

Like everywhere else, India has great programmers. Somehow the government
never seems to be able to afford them.

I can't imagine the chaos that UID will bring.

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johnc055
If this was proposed for a 'developed' country, there would rightly be uproar
from civil liberties groups, citizens etc. But because it's happening in an
'underdeveloped' country, it's somehow acceptable. I understand the challenges
faced by the Indian government in providing services to a such a huge
population but this approach is open to rampant abuse by the 'middlemen' and
by elements in the government itself. Any self-respecting 'security' agency
would get their tentacles into something like this asap. Doubtless, they're
already involved in the implementation on the quiet.

[edit: corrected typo]

~~~
jk
Is social security number in US being misused? Developed countries would
already have a unique ID in place.

Also, middlemen will not be able to take advantage of this. They will be cut
out completely when the person has to avail the benefits after identifying
himself/herself.

~~~
monsterix
SSN took at least 150 years to implement and there is substantial difference
between the American and Indian situation. Middlemen are already there isn't
it? - Technical services companies like TCS, Infosys etc. who are getting paid
in billions for something that Facebook/mobile type of platform could also
implement at a much lower cost.

I really don't really see your argument. Can you explain a little more?

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rickdangerous1
How will people with no eyes or no fingers (it happens) use government
services?

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silvestrov
If you have neither fingers nor eyes, I think you have bigger problems than
that.

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chii
Those without their eyes or fingers are probably the ones more requiring of
gov't services.

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ak2012
Hard to picture corrupt politicians allowing this to go through.

