[aub3bhat]

This is ridiculous fearmongering at a scale unseen before, given the enormous amount of corruption in Indian public distribution schemes, Aadhar has potential to be revolutionary in not only reducing corruption but also in providing poor people in India with assistance that they currently lack. Its easy to be a rich and employed in SF and pontificate about how other countries should run their government.

Mozilla is equivalent of those who criticized "Green revolution" because if fed starving people without causing "social revolution" etc. Aadhar has potential to cause "Digital revolution" and decades from now Mozilla will be on the wrong side of history.

Finally any Indian in USA simply has no right to criticize Aadhar since the US Visa process requires biometrics from all visitors.

[schoen]

> Finally any Indian in USA simply has no right to criticize Aadhar since the US Visa process requires biometrics from all visitors.

I find the "no right to criticize" theory confusing.

I understand if your point is that one might be hypocritical in endorsing one government's biometric collection but not another. But I (a non-Indian) have criticized both US-VISIT and Aadhar. I don't want the U.S. government to have a database of visitors' (or citizens') biometric data, nor do I want the Indian government to have a database of citizens' (or visitors') biometric data. There need not be any hypocrisy or logical contradiction in that.

Edit: it looks from elsewhere in the thread like your point is that Indians in the U.S., in particular, must have acquiesced in giving their biometric data to the US-VISIT program (otherwise they would not have been admitted). I think there is some force to that argument, but it also seems to suggest that people who accept any government's preconditions for doing anything that they did not absolutely have to do are then giving up their right to criticize the government for imposing that requirement. For example, some people in the U.S. have criticized local government for requiring a government cosmetology license in order to practice eyebrow threading. I assume that some of those critics have nonetheless signed up for such licenses. Did they completely surrender their right to criticize that requirement when they did so?

[JumpCrisscross]

> fearmongering at a scale unseen before

Such hyperbole weakens your argument. It's borderline zealous. I don't think you are a zealot and I think you have a valid argument, although I disagree with you. But expressing good thoughts in hyperbole is not effective here.

(Another example is the "no right to criticise" argument. Nobody cares who has a legal right to do disagree. This isn't a court of law. All we care about are good arguments. If someone is hypocritical, point that out. But people can be hypocritical while still having a good point.)

[aub3bhat]

"fearmongering at a scale unseen before" is reasonable response when the argument uses words like "dystopian".

[JumpCrisscross]

You have never seen anyone call anything dystopian before?

[intended]

Aadhar is definitionally dystopian.

In case people are unaware

> No fundamental right to privacy to citizens: Centre tells SC

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/No-fundamental-righ...

thats from 2015.

Aadhar has regularly been pushed in violation of SC verdicts for ever.

Until 2016, and the enshrinment of the 2016 act, it wasn't even with parliamentary backing - AND it was still pushed.

At every level, aadhar has been abused and misused, publicly and on record.

It is dystopian

[it_learnses]

I don't understand why you're so pissed off rather than arguing logically.

>Finally any Indian in USA simply has no right to criticize Aadhar since the US Visa process requires biometrics from all visitors.

This simply doesn't hold any logic. If Aadhar is so good, then it should be able to stand up to any argument based on its merits regardless of where it's coming from. Can you actually present any points against the points being made by Mozilla?

Are you ok with your intimate personal details being sold to private companies? Maybe your son or daughter have a sickness and now all the private companies can know about it. Maybe years from now the collected data will be used to make decisions about whether to admit them into a school or hire them as professionals.

Please think calmly and logically rather than being sensational, egotistical, and personal. Nobody is trying to hurt your "Indian Pride".

[ganduG]

I don't mind giving my biometric data to the US government because I have more legal protection in the US if my data is leaked. India has absolutely no laws to deal with my data being leaked and misused. Also, my biometric data in the US is only used at entry and exit - its not used for every single action I do while in the country. Aadhar tracks literally every action you take - which is scary.

[e12e]

Are you an US citizen? If not, I don't think there are many limits on how your data might be used by the US government or by private actors in the US?

[ShirsenduK]

Yes they scan the biometrics and I allow it. But do they make it the password for different services? Coz thats where its headed. Authentication and Authorisation are not the same thing.

[anujdeshpande]

Have you read PG's How to Disagree essay? It's really good. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html

[_nedR]

Explain how Aadhar can reduce corruption? I still encounter government officials who take bribes in order to do the basic duty they were supposed to do. Neither Aadhar nor even demonetization has affected this in my experience.

I can understand how Aadhar reduces the corruption of common people (like in the case of tax evasion). And the government loves to reduce corruption of the common man. However it is very unwilling to lower its own corruption.

[flak48]

Getting a US Visa is voluntary. Getting an Aadhaar in India is being made compulsory

[adityab]

> Finally any Indian in USA simply has no right to criticize Aadhar since the US Visa process requires biometrics from all visitors.

This is BS because getting a visa is a conscious choice, Aadhar is forced upon India's residents. You're attacking people for having an opinion that's contrary to yours.

About your other points - no one is denying the benefits of having a strong unique ID system that lets people interface with government services; the problem is that Aadhar has no safeguards for privacy - which you would've focused on had you bothered to read the article.