When it comes to maintaining the security of your personal life and financials, the Aadhaar card plays a significant role these days. Given how integrated the Aadhaar card is, from your monthly utilities to your pension fund, maintaining a certain level of vigilance has become that much more important in this day and age. Having said that, you need to be very careful when disclosing your Aadhaar ID proof to anyone. In the event that you do need to or want to share the details of your Aadhaar, you need not resort to sharing the actual 12-digit Aadhaar card number. Rather, you can use the ‘Masked Aadhaar ID’ or Virtual ID (VID) which the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has provided. This is essentially a 16-digit ID number that can be shared without revealing anything important about your personal information.
What is a Masked Aadhaar or VID?
As the name suggests it serves the purpose of obscuring your Aadhaar number while still being a legal way of verification. The Mask Aadhaar option allows the users to hide their Aadhaar number in their downloads of e-Aadhaar copies. It essentially replaces the first 8 digits of your actual Aadhaar number with characters with crosses such as ‘xxxx-xxxx’ and only makes visible the last 4 digits.
Why Is It a Good Option?
For one, it is a widely accepted form of identification, so there is no instance where someone can claim it to be an invalid form of identification. It has to be accepted. Secondly, it is far safer than using your actual Aadhaar number as it reduced the chances of your Aadhaar number being distributed. Even in the case that this number is circulated it carries very little risk as it does not reveal anything significant, so the risk mitigation factor makes this a very useful tool or aspect of Aadhaar.
How to Download the Masked Aadhaar
Step 1: Open the link – https://eaadhaar.uidai.gov.in/
Step 2: Enter your full 12-digit Aadhaar card number.
Step 3: Tick the option that reads – ‘I want a masked Aadhaar’.
Step 4: Next you need to input the Captcha verification code that will be provided to verify yourself.
Step 5: Click on the option ‘Send OTP’.
Step 6: Now, all that is left is for you to download the e-Aadhaar copy.
Earlier in August as well, the UIDAI put out a tweet warning people against sharing their Aadhaar numbers to protect themselves against fraud. It had also warned people to be vigilant when verifying their Aadhaar cards as well as that of others, this especially applies to employers and business owners who wish to employ people but need to verify their Aadhaar. In line with such issues where cases of fraud are prevalent, you can resort to using the VID for your own security purposes.
It should be noted that one’s VID can be used any number of times. Also, keep in mind that when you do share it, the agency or entity that gets that number would be getting your eKYC information as well, which is all the same information that your Aadhaar card would provide. The benefit is that the Aadhaar number cannot be acquired from it and it cannot be traced. Instead, the UIDAI would notify the entity that the person has indeed verified the Aadhaar card and that this was a formal means of verification. By no means will an agency require the specific, original Aadhaar number for verification. In the event that they do, it has to be under some form of law, which the UIDAI will review to validate their need for the number under said law. Fair to say, it is all by the book and you as the cardholder is protected.
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