UIDAI discovers 384,000 false Aadhaar numbers

The Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI) has cancelled 384,000 Aadhaar numbers of the total 410,000 Aadhaar numbers issued under the biometric exception clause, hindustantimes reports.

According to the report, Aadhaar agencies are allowed to enroll people without proper fingerprints or iris biometrics under the exception clause. In this clause, agencies must use photographs as well as detailed demographic and biographical details of exempted enrollers. Initially, this clause was created to make Aadhaar numbers an inclusive measure in India, as other systems such as ration cards have previously excluded many in the country.

It has recently been discovered that many agencies have exploited this clause to generate money, as for each successful enrollment, the agency is paid a nominal amount of money.

This scam was recently discovered as a large number of Aadhaar letters in Andhra Pradesh remained undelivered and it was discovered they were falsified.

“Most of the 45,000 undelivered Aadhaar letters in Andhra were under the exception clause. It hinted that something was wrong,” a senior UIDAI official said.

After the discovery in Andhra Pradesh, similar instances were discovered at other agencies throughout the country. According to the hindustantimes report, the UIDAI has suggested there were a similarly high number of fake Aadhaar numbers in Jharkhan, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh.

To mitigate this problem, the UIDAI has asked agencies not to enroll using the biometric exception clause without approval from a senior government official.

As reported previously in BiometricUpdate.com, the spread of Aadhaar numbers is increasing, as is their use for citizens. Recently, it was announced that Aadhaar number holders could use their Aadhaar numbers to qualify for pre-paid credit services.

Article Topics

Aadhaar  |  biometrics  |  civil ID  |  identification  |  identity management  |  national ID