In yet another Aadhaar-based data leak case, the Andhra Pradesh police have arrested a member of an inter-state gang with a hard-disk containing a database of one lakh Aadhaar numbers and fingerprints, mobile phones, a scanner, a fingerprints device and a monitor, according to a report by The News Minute. The gang is mainly involved in cloning Aadhaar-linked finger prints to withdraw money from people’s bank accounts, a financial crime mainly related to the Aadhaar-Enabled Payment System (AePS). The AP police’s investigation revealed that the gang could get their hands on the fingerprints of people through “intermediary payment gateway apps for AePS,” the TNM report said. AePS is an NPCI-developed system for financial inclusion which enables transactions through Aadhaar authentication using just the bank name, Aadhaar number and fingerprint of the individual captured during enrolment. The suspects then obtained the machines for cloning fingerprints and got access to the OTP required for siphoning off the money. They were able to loot at least 440 persons across various states without the knowledge of the individual account holders, the police informed. To understand how the fingerprints are cloned, check this report by MediaNama. The 27-year-old arrested suspect Seshnath Viswakarma was tracked down in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh and the police is on the lookout for his accomplices, according to KKN Anburajan, the Superintendent of Police at Kadapa district of Andhra Pradesh. Why does this matter? AePS is a significant component of the social welfare system linked to several government schemes where cash benefits…
