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Showing posts with label Government Documents. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Government Documents. Show all posts

Monday, 2 April 2018

17:36

Digital Signatures are not a Scanned Handwritten Signatures

Digital Signatures are not a Scanned Handwritten Signatures

Digital Signatures
A digital signature is an electronic signature that can be used to authenticate the identity of the sender of a message or the signer of a document, and to ensure that the original content of the message or document that has been sent is unchanged. Digital signatures are easily transportable, cannot be imitated by someone else, and can be automatically time-stamped. A digital signature can be used with any kind of message, whether it is encrypted or plaintext. Thus Digital Signatures provide the following three features:-
Authentication- Digital signatures are used to authenticate the source of messages. The ownership of a digital signature key is bound to a specific user and thus a valid signature shows that the message was sent by that user.
Integrity - In many scenarios, the sender and receiver of a message need assurance that the message has not been altered during transmission. Digital Signatures provide this feature by using cryptographic message digest functions (discussed in detail in section 4.4).
Non Repudiation – Digital signatures ensure that the sender who has signed the information cannot at a later time deny having signed it.
4.2 Digital Signature Versus Handwritten Signatures
A handwritten signature scanned and digitally attached with a document does not qualify as a Digital Signature.
A Digital Signature is a combination of 0 & 1s created using crypto algorithms.
An ink signature can be easily replicated from one document to another by copying the image manually or  electronically. Digital Signatures cryptographically bind an electronic identity to an electronic document and the digital signature cannot be copied to another document. Further, paper contracts often have the ink signature block on the last page, allowing previous pages to be replaced after the contract has been signed. Digital signatures on the other hand compute the hash or digest of the complete document and a change of even one bit in the previous pages of the document will make the digital signature verification fail. As can be seen in the underlying figure, a Digital Signature is a string of bits appended to a document. The size of a digital signature depends on the Hash function like SHA 1 / SHA2 etc used to create the message digest and the signing key. It is usually a few bytes. 

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Sunday, 30 October 2016

14:27

Central Railway 165 Year Old History Records online- Pune Firm

Central Railway 165 Year Old History Records online- Pune Firm

Pune firm to help Central Railway put its 165-year-old history online

A city that cannot imagine surviving without its railways once left English officers anxious about introducing its first passenger train. This, and more historical nuggets to go online as 2,000 records from CR archives get digitised
Imagine getting the chance to go back in time when the first passenger train ran from Bori Bunder to Thane in 1853. This defining moment in India's history, as it turns out, was heralded by misconceptions and apprehensions. The English railway officers weren't sure if this new mode of transport would be received with enthusiasm by the 'natives', who had been used to roads and waterways.
There was "little or no hope that the line would be used to any large extent for passenger traffic". Fears of "a beggarly account of empty trains" preceded "…when we visited the terminus to witness the departure of the first public train, we knew not whether to anticipate crowded attendance or a deserted platform." More than a century later, the tenacious bond between the Mumbaikar and the local train is legendary.
In a digitisation programme launched last week by the Central Railway, these blasts from the past are in the form of books, documents and letters from the mid-1800s onwards. For instance, the above lines are from a retrospective hardbound booklet, published in 1900, titled The Great Indian Peninsula Railway, Under the Original Company's Administration.
"We want to create a databank and also document every book and journal so that it becomes available for people interested in reading about the Indian Railways," said AK Srivastava, Additional General Manager, Central Railway (CR). This new digitisation effort will see a substantial chunk of documents being available to the public on the CR website in a month's time.
Bringing pages together
Many of these documents were spread across the various departments of the Central Railway, and were compiled into hardbound records. While it has not been ascertained who carried out the compilation, it is undeniable that a massive, yet delicate job lies ahead for the Central Railway. There are over 2,000 books, journals and records, including letters. There are letters exchanged between officials that describe the challenges faced by the railways, its employees, statistics and accounts.
The first part of the digitisation programme is of the magazines of the GIP Railways, and their subsequent preservation. Phase 2 will include the rest of the documents. Srivastava said there was no separate budget allocated for this programme, and funds would come from the existing budget as the costs incurred don't seem to be too high. An official said that R25,000 has been spent on the project so far.
With the help of the Kairee System, a Pune-based IT solutions company, the fragile pages — which have borne the brunt of weather, bookworms and ink seepage — are being scanned and saved onto hard drives. Work is being carried out from the ground floor of CST. A Kairee staffer said, "I scan around 300 pages a day. We started almost a week ago and have already scanned 10 books." Srivastava said, "We are aware that preservation is an important step, which we are looking into."
A journal in the making
The CR plans to bring out a periodical, with the help of resources from the Maharashtra State Archives, which will help researchers and enthusiasts know more about significant moments from the history of the railways.
"In a couple of months, we will publish a journal dedicated to the making of Bhor Ghat and Thal Ghat, which were important passageways for the Indian Railways to connect Mumbai with Southern and Eastern India. These were monumental and strategic engineering decisions, described as jobs tougher than the making of the Suez Canal," said Srivastava.
300
No. of pages Kairee staffers scan daily
Rs 25k
Amount spent on digitising the project so far

Source:Mid-day


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Monday, 3 August 2015

07:42

Forced to have Biometric Aadhaar? File an affidavit in Supreme Court before by 3rd August to get relief

Forced to have Biometric Aadhaar? File an affidavit in Supreme Court before by 3rd August to get relief

Forced to have Biometric Aadhaar? File an affidavit in Supreme Court before by 3rd August to get relief

Court wants specific instances of violations of its order

Biometric profiling promotes genetically determined caste system

1st August, 2015: As per Supreme Court’s website the case against biometric aadhaar number is “Likely to be Listed on: 04/08/2015”. Earlier, on 30th July, 2015, the Court said that after hearing the whole matter if it found reasons they would give whatever order was necessary. The judges were concerned about denial of any service to any Indian resident because they did not have an aadhaar and asked for specific instances of violations of is orders. It wanted affidavit stating the same to enable it to pass orders in this regard.

Gopal Subramanian, Senior Advocate for the petitioner seeking scrapping of 12 digit biometric aadhaar number project concluded his arguments raising the issue of governments and their institutions violating Supreme Court’s orders. He underlined the issue of inter connectivity of various databases and seeding of aadhaar into all the databases. The counsel sought enforcement of court’s orders and sought immediate protection of all the children from biometric profiling. From Government’s side Additional Solicitor General of India, Pinky Anand apparently misinformed the Supreme Court that there is no interconnectivity between biometric aadhaar and other programs and databases of the government contrary to documentary evidence which were shown to the court. 

Apparently, applauding herself, she was heard telling the Senior Advocate that he did not get any desired interim relief not realizing that the court made it explicitly apparent that their reiteration of the previous orders even in the face of violations hasn’t been sufficient

Towards the end of the hearing on 30th July, Shyam Diwan, Senior Advocate representing Justice K S Puttaswamy (Retd) appeared and supported Subramanian’s contention against seeding of aadhaar with other databases such as electoral database. He asked the court time to argue the matter on Tuesday, 4th August, 2015.    

There is documentary evidence to suggest that a situation is emerging where if the pre-existing databases like electoral database, census and other databases which are under preparation are converged at the behest of unaccountable and undemocratic financial institutions and biometric surveillance technology companies. The court is yet to take cognizance of it although future heads of states, prime ministers, legislators, law enforcers, military and security personnel are being made transparent to transnational powers without factoring in its far reaching security implications for decades and centuries to come. 

The collection of biometric data, personal sensitive information which is deemed “asset” is illegal and mandatory requirement for aadhaar in manifest contempt Supreme Court’s repeated orders during 23rd September, 2013 till 16th March, 2015. When confronted with such gross wrongful acts, adopting the posture of “offense is the best defence”, in a stark case of misrepresentation of relevant precedents, Attorney-General Mukul Rohatgi orally submitted in the biometric aadhaar case in the Supreme Court that right to privacy is not a fundamental right. 

During the hearing Subramanian contended that right to privacy is an inalienable birth right and natural right during the pre-lunch hearing. In fact he argued, birth itself is a gift of privacy.

The fact remains aadhaar based on indiscriminate biometric profiling is an assault on right to privacy.  
Notably, Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) had set up a Biometrics Standards Committee which revealed that 'the biometrics will be captured for authentication by government departments and commercial organisations at the time of service delivery.' The commercial organisation mentioned herein is not defined. Notably, Biometrics Standards Committee had categorically stated that UID/aadhaar’s is meant only for “civilian application” but the order on aadhaar enabled biometric attendance system has been extended to defence employees as well. The fact remains UID was first adopted by USA’s Department of Defence, later by NATO. It has subsequently been pushed through World Bank’s eTransform Initiative in partnership with France, South Korea, Gemalto, IBM, L1, Microsoft, Intel and Pfizer. Some of them have signed agreements with UIDAI. This constitutes not only a threat to privacy but also to national security.  

Citizens Forum for Civil Liberties (CFCL) which has been opposing biometric enrollment, profiling, databasing and surveillance through aadhaar like schemes since 2010 appeals to fellow citizens to send information about specific instances wherein they were denied services in the absence of aadhaar or they were compelled to enroll for aadhaar. This is urgently required by to be filed in the court as an affidavit. If such facts can be shared, lawyers representing the petitioners can prepare it as an affidavit. CFCL had appeared before the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Finance that trashed the National Identification Authority of India Bill, 2010 that wished legalise UIDAI and aadhaar through an ex post facto law in order to escape adverse judicial action. Notably, the Bill did not define biometric data which as per Information Technology Act includes DNA data. Government’s Centre for DNA Fingerprinting & Diagnostics (CDFD) is seeking caste data as well paving the path of genetic determinism. Such projects have been abandoned in UK, Australia, China, France, USA, Philippines and other countries. CFCL attended the hearing in the Supreme Court on 29th and 30th July, 2015 and has been following the case since 2012 when the case against aadhaar was first filed.  

CFCL seeks attention of fellow citizens who want to say that they enrolled for 12 digit biometric aadhaar number because of a threat of discontinuance of a service, they too should share their formal statements in this regard. It could be quite useful. They could also make statements asking that their number be deleted from the aadhaar database called Central Identities Data Repository (CIDR) because they never wanted to be there in the first place. Such statements will illustrate how the aadhaar database was and is being constructed through coercion and not through consent or voluntarily. It will underline the absence of free informed consent. The cases of specific instances can be communicated to Email-1715krishna@gmail.com

(Aadhaar authentication is the process wherein aadhaar number, along with other attributes (demographic and/or biometrics and/or One Time PIN [OTP]) is submitted to UIDAI’s CIDR) for verification. Biometrics is a method by which a person's authentication information is generated by digitizing measurements of a physiological or behavioral characteristic. Biometric authentication verifies user's claimed identity by comparing an encoded value with a stored value of the concerned biometric characteristic.) Scientific studies have established that this technology is inherently fallible. The uniqueness and permanence of measurable biological material which is the very basis of aadhaar is a admittedly only a postulate.     

Given the fact that hearing is underway since 21st July, all eyes are on the three judge bench to set matters right by ensuring that its orders are complied with before addressing issues of constitutionality. In a situation no one has been held accountable for violating court’s previous orders on mandatororiness of aadhaar wherein almost every government entity has deliberately chosen not to comply with it, how can court be convinced that its verdict on the constitutionality of biometric data collection and aadhaar will be complied with?  


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