[Reader-list] News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose National Identity Cards-118

[Kshmendra Kaul]

Dear Jeebesh
 
Sometimes I feel many of us thrive on 'disquiet'.
 
- either the MNIC will be "illegal" or contravene some essences of COI guaranteed to citizens ..... in which case any further work on it should should to be pre-empted through "legal" challenges  
 
- or the MNIC will not be "illegal" but there are reservations on the extent to which it will incorporate 'information' which is suspect in it's usefulness or will not further the benign uses of MNIC ... in that case the 'legal' challenge should focus on rerstricting the ambit of 'information' incorporated in the MNIC 
 
- another concern over the MNIC would be the collation of information generated by "user transactions"  and such collated information being susceptible to be abused .... in which case suyitable "walls" will have to be incorporated in such flow and collation of information and access to it or it's distribution.
 
"Disquiet" will serve no useful purpose. The concerns over MNIC should be pro-actively addressed through Legal Challenges including pre-emptive ones. 
 
"""""""MNICs should not become compulsory until there is an established judicial overview to ensure that the privacy rights of India’s citizens are not unlawfully violated. It is important that India confront and manage these risks and consider all alternatives before implementing the MNIC programme nationwide. """"""""" 
http://www.hrdc.net/sahrdc/hrfeatures/HRF169.htm
 
"Judicial Overview" will also not be enough if it only concludes agreement with the concerns over MNIC. It will have to extend itself into "intervention" of a kind that will "oversee" the design and architecture of the MNIC software and will not simply accept "self-certification". This could be done only by a non-governmental regulatory body comprised of IT professionals.
 
Kshmendra
 


--- On Sat, 5/30/09, Jeebesh <jeebesh at sarai.net> wrote:


From: Jeebesh <jeebesh at sarai.net>
Subject: Re: [Reader-list] News Items posted on the net on Multipurpose National Identity Cards-118
To: "Sarai Reader-list" <reader-list at sarai.net>
Date: Saturday, May 30, 2009, 3:06 PM



On 29-May-09, at 6:03 PM, Taha Mehmood wrote:

> That its security value will overshadow the MNIC’s more benign use
> leads to another worry — the possible misuse by an overbearing
> security apparatus. It is one thing for a national identity card to
> help prevent terror attacks, quite another for permanent check points
> to insist that crossers produce ID cards as a matter of routine. There
> is a fine line between a well-policed state and, well, a police state.

The last line of this editorial from Indian Express confirms the  
general disquiet that MNIC will produce as it becomes more and more a  
reality.

best
jeebesh

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