A SIM card distributor in Telangana was arrested for activating 6,000 SIM cards through the eKYC system using Aadhaar numbers, reported The Times of India. P Santosh Kumar was a distributor of Vodafone prepaid SIM cards. On June 20, the regional office of UIDAI in Hyderabad lodged a complaint the local police station alleging that P Santosh Kumar was involved in illegal Aadhaar linking (eKYC). The UIDAI alleged that Kumar had fraudulently downloaded Aadhaar credentials of people from Telangana government’s registration and stamps department and misused them to activate SIM cards. Apart from UIDAI's central database, Aadhaar numbers and fingerprint scans are available at local sub-registrar's office. Anybody who can access registered property documents to create their own Aadhaar database and then use an individual's Aadhaar. A report on The Wire has explained how a SIM card dealer was able to get into a system that one would think requires technical knowledge. Property registration documents submitted in the sub-registrar's office need to have the following information: names and addresses of the buyers, sellers and witnesses, their fingerprints, and in some states Aadhaar. Some states leak this data through vulnerable online dashboards, for example, Andhra Pradesh. All these documents can be obtained legally through the registration department in Telangana for up to Rs 210-235. One property document has the Aadhaar details of 4-5 people — the seller, the buyer, and two or more witnesses. Thus the Aadhaar database of one person can be built for Rs. 50-60. The Wire report further…
