To breach Aadhaar data, fastest computer will take age of universe: UIDAI

NEW DELHI: The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) on Thursday told the Supreme Court that the biometric and demographic information of people is very much secure. UIDAI CEO also said that those who have enrolled for it, will not suffer loss of benefits for its lack. In a first-ever power point presentation in the open court, the constitution bench was told that the data in encrypted form was "very very secure". The presentation was done by center to defend its ambitious Aadhaar project. UIDAI assured safety of biometrics data (IMAGE: AFP/ FILE) While talking about the "exception handling mechanism" in the UIDAI system, UIDAI CEO Ajay Bhushan Pandey said that "no one will suffer the loss of benefits for the lack of Aadhaar". In the court, the bench had pointed that poor, illiterate or tribals may not be aware that over time their biometrics have undergone changes and must be updated. UIDAI CEO stressed that the entire system for storing the biometric data and demographic information is safe and free from any kind of intrusion as it is protected by a 2048-bit encryption, Pandey also said that it would "require the age of the universe to crack the data stored in encrypted form". He further added, “once biometrics comes to us, it will never go away.” Pointing at its facial scan mechanism, Pandey said that people like leprosy patients or others who don't have biometric details would get Aadhaar through feature or by their registered mobile number, which would operate on OTP (One Time Password) system. The bench also asked them about the death of a woman in Jharkhand after she was denied ration for want of Aadhaar  authentication. To this, CEO said he was aware of the case and it was not the case of failure of authentication. He said, it was a case of dishonesty on part of the shopkeeper of the fair price shop. Stressing that there was no intrusion in the privacy of Aadhaar users, he said "we are ignorant about the purpose and details of the transactions being undertaken by the people" whose Aadhaar is linked to various services. Noting that data matching software has been bought from the world's three best companies and stored on UIDAI's 6,000 servers, Pandey said that these are not linked to internet to eliminate possibility of any backdoor access to the data.