Posing a great threat to Aaadhar security, WikiLeaks on Thursday published a secret report revealing that the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) had the technology to access the unique identification data of Indian citizens that have enrolled for Aadhar.
Coincidentally, the report was published on the same day when the Supreme Court held that privacy is a fundamental right.
RELEASE: CIA ‘Express Lane’ system for stealing the biometric databases of its ‘partner’ agencies around the world. https://t.co/8FefOS2Ljl pic.twitter.com/LPwlAd0Tgr
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) August 24, 2017
The whistleblower site in its report claimed that CIA is secretly extracting Aadhaar data through ExpressLane, a tool designed by their technology provider, Cross Match Technologies, reports The Indian Express.
Cross Match Technologies, a company which which provides biometric solutions to the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI), may have been instrumental in compromising the sensitive data.
Have CIA spies already stolen #India‘s national ID card database? #aadhaar #biometric https://t.co/zqJmkaoiw8 #modi
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) August 25, 2017
Along with its Indian partner Smart Identity Devices Pvt Ltd, Cross Match has enrolled 1.2 million Indian citizens on the Aadhaar database.
”The company hit the headlines in 2011 when it was reported that the US military used a Cross Match product to identify Osama bin Laden during the assassination operation in Pakistan,” says the report on Wikileaks.
These claims have been dismissed by the Government
Government officials, however, have said that these reports do not have any basis in fact.
They claimed that leak is not possible as vendors receive data in an encrypted form which is then transferred to Aadhaar servers, says a report by The Times Of India.