data protection & government schemes

What is missing?

Sunday, 26 May /2013 1

My first computer – IBM Mainframe 1401

Main memory was 8 K – 10 Million alphanumeric characters!

Sunday, 26 May /2013 2

An exabyte (EB) is a large unit of computer data storage, two to the sixtieth power bytes. The prefix exa means one billion billion, or one quintillion, which is a decimal term.

Two to the sixtieth power is actually 1,152,921,504,606,846,976 bytes in decimal, or somewhat over a quintillion (or ten to the eighteenth power) bytes.

An exabyte is approximately one quintillion bytes. In decimal terms, an exabyte is a billion gigabytes.

An exabyte of storage could contain 50,000 years' worth of DVD-quality video.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 3

An Osborne Executive portable computer, from 1982 with a Zilog Z80 4MHz CPU, and a 2007 Apple iPhone with a 2MHz ARM11 CPU. The Executive weighs 100 times as much, is nearly 500 times as large by volume, costs approximately 10 times as much (inflation adjusted), and has 1/100th the clock frequency of the phone.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 4

A 30-qubit quantum computer would equal the processing power of a conventional computer that could run at 10 teraflops (trillions of floating-point operations per second). Today's typical desktop computers run at speeds measured in gigaflops (billions of floating-point operations per second).

Sunday, 26 May /2013 5

Current Technological Tsunami is brushing aside every sane voice of caution before it into a headlong rush to find tech fixes for ALL ILLS.

Enormous increases in storage capacity and speed of computing have led technocrats to imagine that these could be used for correcting any and all ills, like corruption in welfare schemes

Sunday, 26 May /2013 6

Technology developments come with problems if they are not correctly understood and properly applied

Like, to the man with a hammer all problems look like nails, so too to the unwary technologist all problems are to be hammered with technology

Some technological solutions go round looking for problems to solve!

Sunday, 26 May /2013 7

1. The ubiquitous “Dog tag” – a status symbol.

2. Extraordinary popular delusions regarding identity & madness of crowds

◦ Many believe that government needs to identify people for “security” reasons.

◦ Such false notions are very difficult to get rid off, especially when people do not understand “security”

◦ Since identities could be stolen / impersonated / implanted, faith in identification as a security tool is misplaced

3. Games Indians play – currently it is the identity game. Here, we follow US of A

Sunday, 26 May /2013 8

Before addressing the issue of Data Protection, we could look at the basis for collecting the data in the first place. Why collect data at all?

Data collection is based on the false assumption that “Lack of identity is the reason why the poor are unable to access government welfare schemes”.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 9

The discussions here have centered on data theft, loss etc. and the need for data protection.

The law fraternity would naturally look for legal solutions. Hence, the advocacy for a law.

I agree that government should act only under the ambit of law. Data protection and privacy need laws.

UIDAI functions outside of law

Before that let’s check the use of UID

Sunday, 26 May /2013 10

1. Welfare subsidies are siphoned off. UID would prevent this.

2. Welfare beneficiaries can be targeted using UID

Let’s discuss UID’s use in1. PDS2. LPG

Hence, is UIDAI & Government acting under false assumptions or is there deceit involved?

Sunday, 26 May /2013 11

1. If UID were meant to target poor for welfare benefits, why enroll others?

2. If meant to give an ID to those without ID, why ask & accept any of 14 other IDs?

Sunday, 26 May /2013 12

1. People being forced to part with data by threats & inducements

2. The deceit of “Voluntariness”

3. Silence on use and sharing of data

4. Data being shared by facilitating setting up of NIUs

5. Responses or the lack of these to RTI queries

Sunday, 26 May /2013 13

Two principles regarding data collection:

1. If the objective can be achieved without collecting and storing data, then governments should NOT collect data

2. If governments can’t protect it, they should NOT collect it – Data

Sunday, 26 May /2013 14

1. What is personal data?

2. Why protect it?

3. How is government collecting such data?

4. Why is government doing so?

Sunday, 26 May /2013 15

There are many dangers. Here are five.

1. First, the process of data collection

2. Second, Casual attitude, carelessness

3. Third, its use and abuse

4. Fourth, is control over data

5. Fifth – The inability to appreciate that ALL data is “Sensitive”.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 16

1. The Enrolling Agency system – dubious firms & Incompetent outfits

2. FIRs filed for fraud

3. People think that data is given to Government

Sunday, 26 May /2013 17

Several Lakhs of people’s data has been lost.

UIDAI claims “Data is not ‘lost’, it could not be ‘Decrypted’.

Compare with UK: Only 15,000 people’s data captured. £ 1.25 Millions spent on destroying the data. Independent audit to confirm all data destroyed.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 18

1. No Law

2. No transparency

3. No Accountability (UIDAI not accountable to Parliament). Government acting against Parliament

4. Several criminals in legislatures and ministry

Sunday, 26 May /2013 19

1. UID makes people transparent to government, while government remains opaque to people

2. Privacy right and its limits

Sunday, 26 May /2013 20

Should data be protected or should people whose data has been taken by government be protected?

Sunday, 26 May /2013 21

1. Computer systems always fail – and national database will do so big time

2. Computer systems are like life forms. They entropy, degrade over time. They pick up errors and build data error upon error

3. The problem is not so much the ID, but the database. You are what the database says you are. There is no remedy.

4. No Law can protect you against this.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 22

You are NOT YOU in FLESH & BLOOD, but YOU ARE what the DATABASE SAYS YOU ARE

Sunday, 26 May /2013 23

ID cards or UID numbers are the ultimate ID theft.

Your ID is not in your control, but in the power of some faceless administrator database, which is supposed to AUTHENTICATE you

Why does UIDAI & Government want to force or trick us into enrolling for UID?

John Lennon’s answer in next slide.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 24

“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs.”

Prof Ian Angell:

“More likely, ministers have been dazzled by the myth of the perfectibility of computers.”

Not only ministers, but most techies are mesmerized

Sunday, 26 May /2013 25

UK – Home Secretary, Theresa May:

“(ID Cards) represent the worst of government. It is intrusive bullying, an assault on personal liberties. We propose to do government business as servants of the people, not their masters”.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 26

Follow example of UK –

Scrap the UID project and destroy all data.

Sunday, 26 May /2013 27

Honesty and sincerity of purpose

Sunday, 26 May /2013 28