Share using – #PayCashNoTrack
The ripples that were created by the demonetization announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi don’t seem to die down. Why will they? After all, for a long time, there had been no decision taken in this country by any PM which would affect the lives of so many people in one stroke. Everyone is trying to make sense of how this has affected their personal lives. Some seem to be concerned about the impact demonetization has had in the short term in terms of availability of cash while others are happy that finally their honesty paid off. Some are still pondering over the issue. This now becomes perfect breeding ground for our media, which sets the agenda for us. Our opinion seems to be formed by which party we support, channel or host we watch/like, our personal understanding of the subject and what people around us seem to believe.
So, when I finally sat to think about, how this demonetization has affected me and whether I should be happy or sad with what has happened, I realized that in all the noise around the subject, one particular thing which was making me most uncomfortable was not addressed by anyone.
The government seems to be suggesting that it wants our country to move towards 100% digitized transactions. What is most concerning about this argument to me is the fact that once we start making all transactions digitally, the state can easily keep us under constant surveillance. Not only the authorized agencies but people handling the transaction data in banks and payment gateways can also easily track us. Question thus arises that in a country which boasts of freedom, should we be having freedom of not being tracked, if we wish so. Let me bring out certain scenarios where things might go horribly wrong.
Personal Privacy Concerns
If cash was available I could withdraw some cash and go anywhere I want in the country, pay anyone I wanted to, without giving out my location or transaction details (details about what I bought and from where or whom), but what digital payment instantaneously takes away from me is the fact that the banks/payment gateways will know these details as soon as I make a digital payment.
Take an example of a person suffering from some severe ailment and wants to hide it from his family/employers for personal reasons. As of now when he pays cash and buys the medicines or pays the doctor he can be sure that no one else knows about these details. But once they start making digital transactions the details can be seen by the banks/gateways and might get shared with the employers or the family members.
Government neither has any provision to stop people from being tracked nor are the banks legally bound to not share the transaction information with other people/govt agencies/companies etc.
Impact on Traditional India Families
In case of women and children who traditionally used to save money for use during emergencies, digitization makes it impossible to continue this practice any longer. Wife’s transaction details will be known to the husband, children’s transactions will be known to their parents and all transactions will be known to bank employees.
It is already known that with the centralized banking systems, any bank employee can check the transaction details of an individual whose account number or name is known, suppose you know one bank employee personally you can check the whereabouts of any bank account holder of his bank through him.
Potential Cyber Threat
Digitization is being so aggressively ushered in, that every one is having to quickly shift to digital payment systems without addressing the concerns of security related issues in digital world. If the accounts of prominent leaders like Rahul Gandhi, prominent news networks like NDTV can be hacked so easily, what happens if the digital transaction information lands in the hands of malicious users (hackers). In such a scenario, the privacy of the citizens takes a big hit. The hackers can then go on to cyber bullying individuals, collecting ransoms or selling such sensitive personal information to corporations/news agencies/individuals.
Good People Need Privacy Too!
It is sometimes argued that people who don’t do bad things don’t need privacy. But everyone needs some privacy. Anyone who has ever picked up a large bar bill and then driven to a movie and paid to park with a credit/debit card or digital payment gateway could look like he drives after drinking, even if he was the designated driver for a birthday party and himself never drank. Anyone can do something that is subject to misinterpretation.
I think these are some pertinent questions which need to be answered or pondered upon. I request the readers who after reading this piece think that at least in longer run this could be a problem to please share this article and increase awareness among all. To get a sense of how many people actually relate to this thought process and are concerned with such tracking, I request you to use #PayCashNoTrack when sharing this article on facebook, twitter or any other social media site. If you want to voice your concerns over the subject and plan to write about the same, I request you to keep the hashtag the same, i.e #PayCashNoTrack.
Merlin's Homepage 