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Is There Anybody Out There

Even though the number of users online has steadily increased over the years, conversations have grown increasingly stilted and subdued. This is the Fermi's Paradox of the online world - even though there are so many of us are online we chose to keep our heads down, knowing that if we don't, we run the risk of becoming a target for trolls. This is a link-enhanced version of an article that first appeared in The Mint. You can read the original here. Sometimes, hoping for civil engagement on th...

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New Identity Solutions

Last week the UIDAI initiated a process by which private-sector access to the authentication infrastructure would be restored. I have every hope that this will create a new ecosystem of identity service providers that will enable a range of different services.

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Targeted Legislation

Narrowly targeting laws to specific countries or companies can have unintended consequences. They can push customers in different directions or serve as an unanticipated impetus for entrepreneurs to think of new and innovative approaches. In both instances, the outcomes are unexpected.

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Taking Stock

It has been over a year since we started to deploy DPI across the globe and it has not been easy. Despite global endorsements and multilateral commitments, actual deployment is hard. But looking back it is quite remarkable how much we have actually managed to achieve.

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The Report on AI Regulation

The Report on the Regulatory Framework for AI in India strikes the right mix of agile governance and light-touch supervision. However, its reliance on regulatory principles from the Global North could end up stifling innovation. We need to develop a framework that aligns more closely with our interests.

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The DPDP Rules: First Impressions

The much awaited Digital Personal Data Protection Rules are finally with us and, with that the final piece of the puzzle is in place. While there is a lot to unpack, overall, the Rules follow the Act in terms of simplicity - adding just enough to make it complete without complicating things unduly. That said, there are a few issues that still need to be sorted out. This is a link-enhanced version of an article that first appeared in the Mint. You can read the original here. The draft Digital ...

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A Look Back at 2024

My last column of the year has traditionally been a review of technology policy developments of the year gone by. Even though I had hoped to see the data protection law come into force, at the time of writing it still has not. And so, instead of privacy, the year was dominated by developments in DPI and AI.

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Secondary Use of Health Data

While it is generally advisable to anonymise health data, doing so at population scale would allow us benefit from secondary usese of data. The ABDM envisages this but by additionally deploying Secure Data Environments it should be possible to augment the level of data protection.

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A New AI Law

There are many who claim that the harms AI can cause can only be addressed by a new legislation specifically designed to address them. That said existing laws have, more often than not, been framed in terms that are broad enough to deal with these harms regardless of the technology that caused them.

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A DPI for Climate Change

Brazil has developed a rural environmental registry to encourage agriculturalists to follow sustainable land use policies and promote environmental preservation. If transformed into a DPI it can provide other countries a useful tool that, with some adaptation, they can use to meet their own environmental targets.