A few months ago, the IT sector was struggling with a significant erosion in its pride and reputation following the Satyam episode involving on of its poster boys.
Today, the original poster boy is the reason why the country is abuzz with hope and optimism, based on the immense potential of the government?s UIN project and its choice of Nandan Nilekani to spearhead it.
If this succeeds, and I am sure it will, it will set a precedence for appropriate involvement of men of stature and integrity in nation-building.
This project will drive fundamental change on many core issues at the systemic level.
This will range from targeted delivery of public services, eliminating some of the main avenues of corruption, allow for identification services for bank accounts and help in fighting illegal immigration and terrorism. But much of all this is well documented.
It is the third aspect which is not yet in the public domain which I propose to discuss in some detail. This pertains to the approach which the UIAI can potentially take in achieving its basic objectives. All deliberations in the public domain suggest the smart-card led approach which uses the existing IT infrastructure and development of proprietary chipsets using ASIC-based applications.
A radically different approach would be to use the mobile telecom infrastructure to achieve the same goals, and perhaps much more, with significantly reduced costs. This is primarily based on the premise that the SIM card has superior characteristics than the traditional smart card and can be used to provide secure and trusted end-user authentication in an untrusted eco-system.
A relatively unknown feature is that a SIM card can support multiple secure domains in a single card. Secure domains which cannot be tampered with even by the telecom operators or the SIM manufacturers!
The government can, thus, have its own security domain embedded in SIM cards and for exclusive use of the government.
The benefits of this approach would have far-reaching implications and will prove to be a comprehensive game changer many times over on the social, technological and economic fronts.
Let me elaborate.
1. The primary requirement of having a unique government ID is, of course, easily accomplished. The SIM card issued to every qualified Indian by the government can carry biometric identification and photo capability without any difficulty.
2. The potential additional benefits are limited only by our imagination. For example, a. For less than the cost of the smart card, India can provide telecom coverage to 100 percent of its masses. Distribution reach of BSNL, Airtel and other telcos can be utilised to fulfill this promise b. The entire population can be potential users of mobile banking through the possession of a government-issued unique identifier for KYC purposes. This can become the basis of the India Payments network based on assured secure identification of the end user. c. One of the biggest problems with the US national ID system is that the Social Security number is public knowledge. Using the SIM based network enabled smart card will allow issuance of proxy numbers to negate this problem. In fact, the mobile number can be the preferred proxy for the Unique Government ID. d. The above can also be used to generate dynamic, one-time use proxy numbers as well akin to the conventional RSA tokens, except that it would be on the SIM. This allows for fraud elimination whilst maintaining user privacy. e. The unbanked sector at the bottom of the pyramid, in rural India and urban centres, can be included in the mobile payments revolution. f. Microfinance-led initiatives can be made accessible and enabled for the most needy in terms of repayments, interest payouts and money transfers. g. The government?s ability to directly communicate with all its citizens through the mobile.
Also, it is a happy coincidence that the launch of 3G services is slated soon which will require replacement of existing SIMs for a large section of the subscriber base. Thus the incremental costs of this project would be drastically reduced if viewed in this context. As regards telecom network rollouts in rural areas, this is part of the telecom plans in any case and this initiative can only hasten it. If not, these areas can be serviced through the traditional smart card till network rollouts are accomplished.
The author is a Sloan Fellow from the London Business School and CEO of Diptish Investments and Fund Advisors
Source: The Economic Times
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