The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has been given a prestigious data security award known as the DSCI AISS Award for having the best data security practises in the government sector.
UIDAI was given the award by the Data Security Council of India (DSCI), an industry body on data protection in India that does not operate for profit and was established by NASSCOM. UIDAI was recognised for its significant role in securing national critical ‘Aadhaar’ infrastructure, which provides digital identity-based welfare services to residents.
The jury commended the forward-looking security strategy, the good security practises for safeguarding residents’ demographic and biometric data, as well as the proactive approach in addressing new age cyber security risks and threats through effective and efficient security governance and the deployment of state of the art security infrastructure by the UIDAI.
This award is yet another feather in the cap of UIDAI, which is proud to be the first government organisation to be Privacy Certified on a leading industry standard (ISO27701) and one of the leading government institutions in the incubation and implementation of indigenous technology. Specifically, this award recognises UIDAI’s work as a pioneer in the field of biometric identification and authentication.
The award was given out at the DSCI’s recently concluded “Annual Information Security Summit (AISS)” in New Delhi, which took place over the course of three days. Out of the more than 270 nominations that were submitted for the five different award categories, the DCSI jury panel decided to give the award for “Best Security Practices in Government Sector” to UIDAI.
The Chief Executive Officer of the UIDAI, Dr. Saurabh Garg, gave a lengthy presentation during the opening session of the summit. He discussed the agency’s proactive approach, which has fueled the rapid adoption of digital public goods to power the nation’s digital economy. He emphasised the fact that several nations are contacting UIDAI for advice on digital identity programmes and the important role that India can play in assisting them in navigating the Digital Public Goods. In addition, he emphasised that UIDAI is receiving requests for advice on digital identity programmes from several nations.
The CEO of UIDAI, Dr. Garg, also extended an invitation to indigenous start-ups and tech companies to conduct research and work together on the development of innovative indigenous information security technology projects.