India’s ruling that citizens have right to privacy could impact biometric ID plan
- Author:zz
- Source:zz
- Release on:2017-08-28
India’s Supreme Court has finally ruled citizens have a fundamental right to privacy, which could potentially derail the government’s plan for making registration of its Aadhaar biometric identification program a requirement for all government services, according to a report by Bloomberg.
The Supreme Court made the ruling after a month of hearing multiple petitions challenging the legality of the Aadhaar project to determine whether citizens are entitled to privacy as a fundamental right.
The nine-judge bench unanimously ruled that privacy was considered a fundamental right under the country’s constitution.
Aadhaar was initially developed to facilitate the accurate issuance of social security benefits to the poor, as well as prevent duplicate or false payments, by linking a citizen’s ID with their biometric data.
The Supreme Court made the ruling after a month of hearing multiple petitions challenging the legality of the Aadhaar project to determine whether citizens are entitled to privacy as a fundamental right.
The nine-judge bench unanimously ruled that privacy was considered a fundamental right under the country’s constitution.
Aadhaar was initially developed to facilitate the accurate issuance of social security benefits to the poor, as well as prevent duplicate or false payments, by linking a citizen’s ID with their biometric data.