TRAI chief humbled after publishing his Aadhaar number in security challenge

Telecom Regulatory Authority of India chairman RS Sharma’s alleged personal details were leaked on Twitter on Saturday, after Sharma tweeted his 12-digit Aadhaar number and threw a challenge, asking if it had made him vulnerable to any security risk.

Sharma, a known defender of Aadhaar, has been maintaining that the unique ID does not violate privacy and the government reserved a right to create such a database of residents since it gives subsidies on state-run welfare schemes. Amid a debate on privacy concerns, which has also reached the Supreme Court, activists and people in general fear that the 12-digit biometric number was harmful to citizen's privacy.

"My Aadhaar number is 76XX XXXX XX40. Now I give this challenge to you: Show me one concrete example where you can do any harm to me," tweeted Sharma, whose tenure ends on August 9.

A twitter user had earlier asked Sharma to "walk your talk" after the TRAI chief tweeted his interview with an online portal in which he strongly defended Aadhaar and rejected apprehensions that one billion Aadhaar accounts were vulnerable. He said there had not been a single instance of data being breached and had there been one, the entire Aadhaar database would have been vulnerable.

Within hours of Sharma tweeting his Aadhaar number, a French security expert who goes by the nickname ‘Elliot Anderson’, in a series of tweets caused ripples on the social media site, leaking Sharma’s "personal address, DoB, your alternate phone number" and explaining to the TRAI chairman, how risky it was to make the Aadhaar number public.

"People managed to get your personal address, DoB and your alternate phone number. I stop here, I hope you will understand why make your Aadhaar number public is not a good idea," Alderson wrote.

Anderson further informed Sharma: "The phone number linked to this #Aadhaar number is 995#####77. According to an official @nicmeity circular, this phone number is the number of your secretary," Anderson wrote and posted a link to the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology circular.

The security researched also posted a picture of Sharma with a portion of it blackened. "I supposed this is your wife or daughter next to you."

Anderson, who is known to have revealed security loopholes in the Aadhaar data system, also posted screenshots of Sharma's leaked details with key areas blackened and hidden.

One of the screenshots even carried his PAN details. But that was also hidden.

With IANS inputs