TRAI chief discloses his Aadhaar number, challenges ‘hackers’ to show what harm can they do

Aadhar cards, representational image, via Twitter

RS Sharma, the chairman of the Telecom Regulatory authority of India has done something that has silenced Aadhar haters and made them come up with lame, laughable excuses that hold no ground. It began with an article in leftist propaganda website ‘The Print’ titled ‘What harm can you do to me if you have my Aadhar details, asks TRAI chairman RS Sharma’ published today.

In the article, RS Sharma was quoted saying the Aadhar data is completely safe and all the reports suggesting the data is vulnerable are false. He had asserted that Aadhar and IndiaStack, a digital interface that allows government and businesses to utilise digital infrastructure are remarkable innovations with no parallels in any country at present.

One Twitter user tagged the TRAI chief and demanded that since he has ‘paid salaries’ to the TRAI chief all these years, he should share his personal data with him.

He did not stop at that, tagging RS Sharma again in a follow-up tweet, the Twitter user then challenged the TRAI chairman to publish his Aadhar number if he has ‘so much trust in his 13 feet wall security system’.

Quite unexpectedly, RS Sharma responded to the tweet. He shared his Aadhar number and challenged the Twitter user to come up with at least one concrete example of how they can do any harm to him.

https://twitter.com/rssharma3/status/1023119411568201730?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Quite unsurprisingly, none of them came up with any concrete way to misuse the Aadhar number and extract any personal information. One Twitter user claimed that he had managed to find RS Sharma’s mobile number attached to his Aadhar card. But it was soon debunked by a popular handle @AndColorPocket that the TRAI chairman’s mobile number is already available in public domain.

https://twitter.com/AndColorPockeT/status/1023187127675150336?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
The ‘hacker’ then shared a tweet complaining to ‘lawyers and journalists’ on how could he proceed with the available information provided by the TRAI chief.

He also put out some easily available information and tried to pass it off as the information he gathered by using the TRAI chief’s Aadhaar details. The ‘hacker’ was called out by Netizens. The Twitter user @EtPrayLove in a Twitter thread explained how all the information was easily available.

https://twitter.com/EtPrayLove/status/1023248060137189376?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
The ‘hacker’ had claimed that no bank account number was linked to the phone number. That was also debunked since someone sent money to the Aadhaar pay account of the TRAI chief’s number and that wouldn’t be possible if a bank account wasn’t attached to the number.

https://twitter.com/EtPrayLove/status/1023249502050824192?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
The user also explained how PAN could be found out without using Aadhaar details and how the frequent flyer number was in all probability fraudulently obtained.

RS Sharma’s tweet sharing his Aadhar number has generated quite a buzz but till now none of the naysayers has been able to come up with a credible proof on how his data can be misused. It is notable here that recently, the government had declared that Aadhar based direct benefit transfers have saved the exchequer a total of Rs 90,000 crores so far.

OpIndia Staff: Staff reporter at OpIndia