India plots 1.2bn user biometric ID cards project
India is pushing ahead with plans to issue each of its 1.2 billion citizens with biometric-based ID cards, linked through an online database of Himalayan proportions. The monster project, assigned to India's newly-established Unique Identification Authority, is designed to resolve confusion over 20 existing proof of identity ( …
that's all it takes for this sytem to be wasted against existing corruption. Doesn't matter how high-teq the system, just pay-as-you-go, that's what has worked for thousands of years in that part of the world and will continue. No disrespect, but it's just how many things get done. Everybody knows it happens and many benefit from it. Of course if your pennyless to start of with, your screwed and the gap between rich and poor gets greater. We suffer from the same human greed, the same results, BUT we're just not so up-front about it !
/rant_over (gosub): close_rant_[END]
You can always contact the helpdesk in Scunthorpe.
..why didn't we Brits think of it first?
Oh, what's that? We did? Oh, I see, the British government has outsourced construction and testing to India and paid for it with a "donation" to help "India out of its economic and environmental crisis". Mmm...
Nothing to fear, nothing to hide... I prefer nothing to hide, nothing to fear.
I wonder how many people will jump to India to get a clean ID and a better tax status.
That it will solve the problems of the Indian legion of the dead, those people who under the existing permit raj have been reported dead by unscrupulous relatives looking to 'inherit' their property:
http://movies.indiainfo.com/2007/10/01/0710011313_abhishek.html
?
Indian bureaucracy already demostrates quite well the consequence, if everyone has to have an officially approved identity, of having your identity officially deleted.
The argument from government there is much more explicit, but essentially the same as that offered in the UK: "You know all the unnecessary and unreasonable demands for 'identification' we are now making? Here's something that will help you comply with them, and incidentally make it easier for us to collate the information."
Once India gets their ID cards up and running, Uk.Gov can offshore ours to them.
Surprising, I know, but probably true. At least for a reasonable definition of "work".
They have a really strong and independent Electoral Commission which manages to run an election with vanishingly small amounts of fraud (compared to the size of the electorate), using home designed and built hardware.
Remember, they aren't making the same mistakes as the Home Office. They aren't trying to track people, "merely" trying to ID them. I strongly suspect that, had the HO simply put together a card to use instead / as well as a passport to ICAO standards (and no more), there would have far fewer complaints and much less cost.
The Indians have a track record now for (eventually) solving huge scale problems of this sort, using indigenous resources. I, for one, would not bet against them achieving a pretty reasonable system. Probably before the HO manage it here.
>> The Indians have a track record now for (eventually) solving huge scale problems of this sort,
>> using indigenous resources. I, for one, would not bet against them achieving a pretty
>> reasonable system. Probably before the HO manage it here.
I didn't think Jacquie Smith was responsible for ID cards anymore
India's neighbor has done it too: http://www.govtech.com/gt/374860. They have nothing to fear :)
We outsource the whole Home Office to Bangalore and let the Indians have them. We'll even throw in every Home Secretary for the last 20 years to sweeten the deal.
Possibly the fact that the Indian goverment doesnt have this sort of cash?
As India is still a 3rd world country.
Wouldn't this money be better spent on housing and food for the starving rather than another Plum for one of the ruling families of India?
"Nandan Nilekani, the outsourcing expert who co-founded Infosys, is leading the project and wants the database behind the scheme to be available online."
"This ambition adds extra security to already pressing scalability and privacy concerns."
Available online & privacy? What could possibly go wrong?
Hmmm, I know the guy's name is Singh (types it into browser...)
...lights in the data centre start to go dim, sound of hard-drives thrashing...
Like that! That is so true.
The number of people without any valid identification in India is truly astonishing.
No birth certificate. No schooling, thus no records. No recollection of date of birth, or even of place of birth.
Plus, the issue of having identical names - how do you tell one Babulal from another?
@Scott Broukell:
Sadly, inflation has caught up with this part of the world as well. A handful of rupees no longer provides any relief.
@Mike Richards:
From what I read on this site about your former Home Secretary, we might end up sending her to our neighbouring country. Much better for everybody.
I, for one, welcome our bureaucratic, ID card bearing overlords.
There must be literally 100's of thousands, if not millions of people in India who have so little, they don't even wear basic clothes!
Where will they put their ID cards?
Stop, don't bother, I've worked it out.
I am from India and they couldn't even get the existing Voter ID cards for even a single member of my family correct on the first try !! - wrong names / family names or incorrectly spelled .. incorrect data (Eg. wrong name of husband / wife / date of birth etc) - meaningless adress data (incorrect / incomplete information) ... whew ....
And to top that - you can only get these voter ID cards (which like this bio-ID card was designed to do the same thing - do away with multiple ID proofs and also to be used as a voter identification card during elections ..) during / just before any elections ..
Almost every person i spoke to has got some details incorrect on his / her current voter id card and getting the authorities to change this - is often an uphill task - as is common with almost all "official busines / processes" in India...
Let's just see if this works .. and how useful it is or is it a waste of money - a bit like the Voter ID card scheme .. (The scheme partially worked - but not of much use due to its numerous inaccuracies and other deficiencies .. why would you want an ID card that stated your name or your family name or your father's / mothers / husbands's name incorrectly for e.g. ?)
That said .. India is definitely a Country where seemingly impossible things can happen .. so on a positive .. optimistic note .. let's see how that goes !! keep fingers crossed !!
I've seen many corporate projects many orders of magnitude less complex (1.2 thousand users not 1.2bn) take longer than 18 months to get anywhere near production.
We're obviously doing it wrong... no wonder so much of our IT is outsourced to India.
