India issuing biometric IDs to all 1.2 billion citizens

While not busy being the destination of Westerners seeking spiritual growth and the birthplace of the beloved Bollywood song and dance flick, apparently India is home to some 1.2 billion people -- many of whom possess no proof of identification whatsoever. According to The Times (UK), less than seven per cent of the population are registered for income tax, and the voting lists are terribly inaccurate. Hoping to bring the nation's census data into the 21st century, India has created the Unique Identification Authority. Under the direction of Nandan Nilekani, one of the founders of Infosys, the plan is to outfit every one of the nation's citizens with a biometric ID card that contains personal data, fingerprint or iris scans, and possibly even criminal records and credit histories. Gathering the data is projected to cost at least $4.9 billion, a figure that's likely to soar once the ball gets rolling. While the Government expects that the first cards will be issued within 18 months, analysts say that project won't likely reach "critical mass" for at least four years.

[Via Switched]

[GTMac @ Jul 16th 2009 1:29PM]

Oh no! It's बड़ा भाई!

[sk8ordie @ Jul 16th 2009 1:41PM]

He said, Oh No It's "Big Brother"

[egress63 @ Jul 16th 2009 1:45PM]

My thoughts exactly! xD

[Saad (the other one) @ Jul 16th 2009 4:02PM]

Jai Ho.

[Quantumphysics @ Jul 16th 2009 7:46PM]

In Orwellian India, scanner thanks you. Come again !

[Wwhat @ Jul 16th 2009 9:05PM]

Now we know what was really discussed at that G8 meeting recently, they were telling india 'close the escape route that is india or we'll bomb you', using ever so nice terms of course.

[Bhanu Gouda @ Jul 16th 2009 1:29PM]

finally

[weems @ Jul 16th 2009 1:29PM]

tattooing names on their arms would be cheaper

[Kurian @ Jul 16th 2009 2:00PM]

In some places they already brand us like cattle.

[Martin @ Jul 16th 2009 6:00PM]

Wow ...

[Najakwa @ Jul 16th 2009 1:29PM]

that picture is funny, but maybe a bit mean. damn funny though.

[Adapada @ Jul 16th 2009 1:31PM]

"Gathering the data is projected to cost at least $4.9 billion"

Maybe the US could use some stimulus money to make jobs for this kind of project, and it would be only 1/4 the cost.

[AMiSH PiRATE @ Jul 16th 2009 1:57PM]

why would it be 1/4 the cost? haven't you learned anything about the american government's spending habits these past couple centuries?

[Adapada @ Jul 16th 2009 4:44PM]

Sorry, I forgot that we spend a million times more than we have to. I assumed that because the population of India is 4x bigger than the roughly 300,000,000 people here. If North America wishes to tighten up security, this may be a viable* solution.

*but costly

[murmermer @ Jul 16th 2009 6:24PM]

Ya, this has nothing to do with the sign of the beast...

[Spencer @ Jul 16th 2009 1:32PM]

seven per cent = seven hundred per dollar?

[roole @ Jul 16th 2009 2:06PM]

+1

[Will @ Jul 16th 2009 1:34PM]

The United States is heading in the same direction. It is scary how easily citizens are willing to give up their freedom and privacy.

[William @ Jul 16th 2009 1:39PM]

Why is it scary?
Why do we need privacy? I'm not talking 1984/BNW here, but who gives a crap about privacy?

Its not a conspiracy theory - its efficiency. Stop resisting progress.

[Maddy @ Jul 16th 2009 1:41PM]

The US already has it, it's called the Social Security Database linked with all your financial/health records. India has not had any such database yet.

[PGP-Protector @ Jul 16th 2009 1:55PM]

@William:

I care about privacy.

[Clyde Berry @ Jul 16th 2009 1:56PM]

I think IDs for everyone in the world is double-plus-good. Better to keep track of those pesky proles.

[Freedom Town @ Jul 16th 2009 2:15PM]

Privacy? Freedom?

What does having an ID card registering who you are and what you've done in society have anything to do with Freedom or Privacy?

You want to be off the grid? Try it, find a section of woods somewhere and don't get any utilities, or pay taxes of any kind. have fun with your freedom.

The rest of the country will try to be civilized and be accountable for the person you are in every day life, part of a society.

This isn't the dark ages anymore. This isn't some fishing village where you know the 30 people who live within 2 miles, and the rest of the world is hidden.

People are popping more and more kids out like its going out of style in the US, more and more people crossing the boarders. It is becoming a cess pool, and anything to help "keep track of wtf is going on" is fine

[Mycroft @ Jul 16th 2009 2:39PM]

@Freedom Town

You should really trade in your screen name.

[Dorf @ Jul 16th 2009 3:06PM]

It won't happen here... An ID card for everybody eliminates voter fraud that politians depend on to get elected. :-)

[IK @ Jul 16th 2009 3:07PM]

we all want progress, but not at the cost of our freedoms and powers


just imagine if you were an activist, fighting against the regime - all the things they could do to you just by flagging your 'account'.

you know in London, where they have all those CCTV cameras, they also have microphones everywhere. coupled together with their facial recognition software and their image database from licenses and passports, all they have to do is type in your name to get your location with live video and sound.

if you don't work against this, you will deserve to live in the cage you let them build around you.

[Canis_Minor @ Jul 16th 2009 3:08PM]

Well, if you're concerned about privacy, Will, you better:
1) Cut up those credit cards and store cards
2) Remove yourself from facebook and other social networking sites
3) Throw away your cellphone

All of the above give away far more information about you than an ID card.

[nrb @ Jul 16th 2009 3:09PM]

I care about privacy, but I don't see how this alters privacy.

Right now, we have an ID system. As time progresses, ID systems have to advance to keep them relatively accurate. A biometric system is simply an advancement. It's no more or less "private" than any other ID system.

What they do with the ID system may be another story.

[DarkLight @ Jul 16th 2009 5:03PM]

Yes, biometric is less private than the other stuff.

Any day you want to, you can deceide you just born again, you have another name, another address, another identity. If you do a good work running far away, they will never find you.

With biometric, however, you're busted for the rest of your life, no matter where you go. You can't change your biometric fingerprints.

And yes, it IS wrong that the government has all your information. It already happened in Mexico: The drug lords have access to databases stolen from the government, and it IS happening right now that if you dare do something against any of them, they will kill all your family and burn down your business.
Don't tell me such things don't happen, because it already happened and it's going on as I write this.
It only gets worse as other delinquents get access to that database, which is also happening (ie. kidnappers). Mexico right now is not all that far from a revolution.

It has happened in the USA too, even at the FBI level: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO

Anyone who supports actions like this is dooming their children, no matter how low ranked I get...

@Canis: Indeed, I don't have a cellphone. Neither do I use social networking or any of that crap.

[peepeepants @ Jul 16th 2009 5:31PM]

@William
"Why is it scary?
Why do we need privacy? I'm not talking 1984/BNW here, but who gives a crap about privacy?"

Okay, fine-- post pictures of your genitals and your parents' and siblings' genitals on engadget; well-lit and high-resolution. Also, upload for us video recordings of you having sex with your significant other.

[BigD145 @ Jul 16th 2009 1:35PM]

The addresses will all change when India runs out of water and that 1.2 billion have a mass exodus.

[sk8ordie @ Jul 16th 2009 1:42PM]

Think happy thoughts!

[BigD145 @ Jul 16th 2009 3:19PM]

It's too late for that.

[Theodore Wirth @ Jul 16th 2009 1:58PM]

Can you imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth if anybody even thought about doing this in the US? It was OK that Bush and cronies electronically spied on common citizens but heaven forbid we try to implement a national identification system!

[Wwhat @ Jul 16th 2009 9:10PM]

Is that some kind of joke? because the US did already.

[Nelagster @ Jul 16th 2009 1:42PM]

He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security.

-Benjamin Franklin

[Mark @ Jul 16th 2009 1:48PM]

I'm pretty sure there's a fairly big line between the government knowing you exist vs. taking away your freedom.

[paul34 @ Jul 16th 2009 2:01PM]

Negative, Mark. Read the article again. This goes far beyond simple identification.

[Mark @ Jul 16th 2009 2:12PM]

It still doesn't prevent anyone from doing anything, thus not taking away liberty. Privacy? Yes. Liberty? No.

[Karan @ Jul 16th 2009 2:38PM]

and benjamin franklin would have never guessed tht someone like BUSH would be the commander in chief of US.....so yeah.

[BigD145 @ Jul 16th 2009 3:19PM]

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."
-Franklin

[clocker6633 @ Jul 16th 2009 3:31PM]

One of our civil liberties IS our right to privacy....

[massive_98 @ Jul 16th 2009 1:45PM]

1.2 billion. When will they stop having so many kids? The world can barely support our current population. It doesn't help that most of those 1.2 billion are in extreme poverty. I feel some sympathy for them, but reproducing like rabbits only makes things worse.

If India were to spend a little bit of money teaching their people about family planning the number of ID's necessary and overall cost would go down. Just a thought.

[ichheissesuperfantastisch @ Jul 16th 2009 2:11PM]

maybe you could have written to the Bush administration five years ago and asked them not to tie family planning aid to poor countries to abstinence-only education. but of course, it was just easier to post your half-gathered thoughts on Engadget instead.

[HK @ Jul 16th 2009 2:20PM]

massive_98 - "The world can barely support our current population"

The world can definitely support the current population. The problem is the amount of resources that people consume. Did you know we in the US contribute for about 25% of global warming? If you are so concerned about the world, better change your consumer oriented lifestyle and be more responsible, not criticize others.

[Ranga Gunasekaran @ Jul 16th 2009 2:32PM]

HK hit it right on If you think that our world cannot support our population or even a bigger one, you should get a slight dosage of some decent education

[Ian @ Jul 16th 2009 2:48PM]

HK:

Lets actually prove global warming A) exists and B) is caused by people before we start assigning percentages of blame to different nations for it. I'm pretty sure it was just 52F here in Philadelphia 3 nights ago (June 13th), and that was a RECORD LOW.

[Canis_Minor @ Jul 16th 2009 3:05PM]

@massive_98

Well, before you ask your racially charged "they" to stop having kids because the world cannot support them, consider this. The US consumes ~30% of the world's resources, but has less than 5% of the population. As others have pointed out, the number of people is not the problem, it's the lifestyle.

[Matt @ Jul 16th 2009 3:09PM]

25%? It seems easily like 43% to me.

[massive_98 @ Jul 16th 2009 3:53PM]

For the record, I'm not American. One thing to remember to is that the USA has a much larger slice of resources than India. India is growing more and more dependent on other countries to fuel its growth.

My point is with unsustainable population growth and growing desires to industrialize there will disastrous consequences.

You can have one or the other. If India continues industrializing and educating its people, the traditional affect has been a decrease in population growth. But by the time this happens, there could be well over 2 billion Indian people all striving for the american dream.