Data protection law to cover govt too: Prasad

New Delhi, July 20

Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today said once the data protection law comes into being after approval by the Parliament, it will apply to the Union government, private entities and also state governments.

Prasad was responding to questions in the Rajya Sabha on whether the state government data and records would also be protected under the data protection law. The Minister said the government was awaiting a related report by a committee of experts chaired by Justice BN Srikrishna. He said the government had appealed to the people not to give social platforms blanket consent to their data. 

“Aadhaar has been issued to 121.65 crore people and “we do daily authentication of 3.5 crore Aadhaar numbers,” he said. Stressing Aadhaar had become a platform for good governance, he said some people wanted a technological alternative so that they were not required to use Aadhaar for authentication. — TNS