NIC raises concern over privacy of UIDAI database

The National Informatics Centre has raised concerns over privacy and security of proposed database of Unique Identification Authority of India(UIDAI), headed by Infosys founder Nandan Nilekani.

The newly established UIDAI would be hosting information of all residents of the country on a private data centre, which NIC believes raises concern about privacy and security, official sources said.

In a letter dated November 6, accessed by PTI, NIC writes, “It has been proposed to hire the data centre services for PoC (proof-of-concept) and prototype on rental basis. It is presumed that the data related to UID will be hosted in a government Data Centre. If not, the issues related to privacy and security with respect to UID data may require to be taken into consideration.”

UIDAI replied that hosting the data on a private network “does not necessarily lead to violation of privacy and security”.

“There will be appropriate SLAs (Service Legal Agreements — both legal and technological) to ensure that the data is protected. It is to be mentioned that a number of sensitive database (Income Tax and PFRDA, to name two of them,) which ensure security and privacy, though they are not necessarily housed in the ‘government’ Data Centre,” the Authority replied.

It said UIDAI approach envisaged 24 Technical posts (Director Technical, Principal Systems Analyst and Senior Systems Analyst). “This will ensure adequate technical capacity to ensure both security and privacy concerns,” it said.