Is Aadhaar Use a Bane? Moody’s Allegation & India Government’s Reply

New Delhi: Global credit agency Moody’s alleged that the use of Aadhaar poses privacy and security risks, and the use of its biometric technology in humid climates is unreliable.

Reacting to it the Centre on Monday termed the assertions of Moody’s baseless and lacking evidence.

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) strongly refuted Moody’s allegations that the Aadhaar system frequently causes service denials, particularly for manual labourers in hot and humid climates.

The statement added that global bodies like the IMF and the World Bank have praised Aadhaar, and many countries have reached out to the UIDAI to understand how to implement similar digital ID systems.

In its report, Moody’s warned that centralised systems with a single point of control over users’ identification credentials and access to online resources pose security and privacy risks to users.

“The report in question does not cite either primary or secondary data or research in support of the opinions presented in it”, the government’s statement read.

The government said Moody’s report failed to mention that biometric submissions can also be contactless, such as through face authentication and iris authentication.

“The factual position in this regard has been repeatedly disclosed in response to Parliament questions, where Parliament has been categorically informed that till date no breach has been reported from the Aadhaar database,” the statement said.