United States-based company Cross Match, which offers biometrics-related products and services to India’s Aadhaar authority, has said that it has not captured, stored or processed any personal information of its customers, NDTV reported on Friday.
On August 24, WikiLeaks had published what it claimed were secret US Central Intelligence Agency documents that showed that the agency had the ability to hijack Cross Match’s software and use it to spy on the company’s clients. This would give the CIA access to the personal data of a billion Indians.
Cross Match said its software does not have spying abilities. The company’s vice president of global marketing, John Hinmon, said Cross Match does not store any personal data such as fingerprint images collected by any of its clients. He clarified that the company, instead, allows users to store and process the images in their own systems.
Security features of such systems can be unlocked only by trusted “administrative users”, Hinmon said, adding that this was the case with India’s Unique Identification programme.
“All software utilised with our scanners was developed, tested and certified under the direction of India’s UID,” Hinmon said. “We value our partnership with India to support the historic and progressive Aadhaar programme that widens social and economic inclusion and channels welfare payments more effectively.”
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