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South African-European Union Dialogue Facility Series

Creating Digital

Identity for All

Lessons learned from India

India’s ambitious Aadhaar programme is an example
of how technological and social innovation has been
mobilised in creating a national digital identity system
that supports public service delivery, write Dr Luci
Abrahams and Mark Burke

The proliferation of digital technologies throughout
society and in government has influenced approach- § the incredibly strong mission orientation to
es to the management of identity by governments. achieve success on a digital innovation me-
The use of digital technologies in identity manage- ga-project,
ment has contributed to the emergence of digital
identity. Unlike its physical counterpart, a digital iden- § the significant digital capability unleashed
tity is the set of digital data representing a person. It for the project,
is made up of information that is stored and transmit- § the digital leadership exercised and the ca-
ted in digital form. pacity established for success; and

The digital identification system was established in § the need for enabling policy and regulation
India through the Aadhaar programme. Aadhaar is a upfront.
verifiable 12-digit identification number issued by the
Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI) to the resi- As a digital project in operation for more than ten
dents of India free of cost. To date, 1.2 billion unique years from inception, there is much to study, learn
numbers, with a coverage of about 95% of the coun- and understand in terms of strengths and weak-
try’s population and 16% of the world’s population, nesses. The disadvantages, risks and concerns
have been recorded on the system. As an enormous expressed in the discussion on this case study will
undertaking in the world, this scale of enrolment was require understanding and attention, noting that
achieved over ten years and motivated by efforts to innovation often brings inherent risks and requires
support inclusion and improved public service deliv- risk mitigation measures. Where these features are
ery, including reducing fraud and corruption. in place, the chances of success are increased. Re-
lated insights include an appropriate level of dig-
Insights for South Africa ital leadership and a platform design enabling val-
The Aadhaar number enables the bearer to engage in ue-added services and products.
multiple transactions rather than have multiple cards
or forms of identification for each transaction. There Digital innovation and technologies
are several overarching insights for South Africa that One of the critical design features of Aadhaar is the
could be gleaned from the Aadhaar digital identifica- de-linking of the person’s identity from the person’s
tion programme, and these are: nationality, so that all residents can be enrolled. This
means that an applicant does not have to prove Indi-

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