Perceptions, Satisfaction, and Trust Perceptions, Satisfaction, and Trust stories behind the data A majority of people who experienced difficulties with Aadhaar Figure 16: Net satisfaction with Aadhaar, by state were still satisfied with the ID: there was no significant difference in % of respondents “Because of the Aadhaar link, no one can cheat us. Before, illiterate people were easily cheated and made to sign anywhere. Now, both the Aadhaar number and thumbprint is needed to verify everything.” satisfaction between people who had or had not experienced a recent denial of service; most people (81%) who had errors in their Aadhaar information were satisfied, and a majority (67%) of people said they Pavithra S, Provision & Xerox Store Owner, Karnataka were satisfied if they were excluded from a service due to Aadhaar- 88% National average related problems. Source: SoA Human Centred Design Research 2019 Northeastern states with low enrolment levels reported lower satisfac- Most people trust that the Aadhaar system protects their data and their welfare benefits, although some continue to worry about misuse of the ID tion levels.60 In general, people without Aadhaar were far less likely to be satisfied with it, marginalised groups (homeless and third-gender people) also reported lower satisfaction.61 Almost everyone (90%) felt that their data were well protected in the Aadhaar system.54 And most welfare recipients (61%) also saw Aadhaar as protecting access to their benefits: they believed that Aadhaar prevents other people from accessing PDS rations, MGNREGS jobs, and social pensions in their name. Not everyone had equally high levels of trust. People who did not have Aadhaar were more ambivalent. Many (24%) of them said they did not know whether or not data were well protected and some (9%) did not believe that data were well protected in the Aadhaar system.55 stories behind the data Almost equal numbers of people considered the protection that Aadhaar offers as one of its greatest benefits (8%), and the risk of Aadhaar being “Many of my friends have faced problems with biometrics and ration, but they don’t take it too seriously. These things happen. We can’t fight over every small thing.” misused to be one of their most important concerns with Aadhaar (8%). Some people (2%) had experienced fraud, which they believed was related to Aadhaar; they were less likely to believe that their personal Prashant, Driver, Karnataka information was well protected in the Aadhaar system.56 Prashant lives in Bangalore, with his wife and young child. When he This was a common sentiment expressed by many who had first moved to the city, he missed two months’ worth of rations on experienced delays in getting a service due to difficulties in linking Figure 15: Satisfaction with Aadhaar account of a delay in linking his Aadhaar and household ration card. their Aadhaar, or navigating parts of the service process like % of respondents Every four or five months, his monthly rations were late or missed biometrics. Even those who missed a welfare service for months entirely due to a problem with the biometric process at the ration did not perceive it as ‘denial’, as long as they got the service in the store. As far as he was concerned, ‘the common man depends on the end. Many people we spoke to held the belief that Aadhaar was Overall, the vast majority (92%) said they were very satisfied or government,’ and Prashant did not see the hiccups he faced as worth created by the government with good intentions, and therefore, any somewhat satisfied with Aadhaar (see Figure 15).57 Across the country, complaining about. problems resulting from it would eventually be resolved. Overall, the vast majority of residents are satisfied with Aadhaar, including many who face Aadhaar-related difficulties more people reported satisfaction with Aadhaar than dissatisfaction: in all but one state covered in our survey, Aadhaar received a Source: SoA Human Centred Design Research 2019 net positive satisfaction score (see Figure 16).58 While there were variations in the exact levels of satisfaction between states, there were few differences among demographic groups.59 KEY FACTS Eighty-one per cent of Aadhaar holders said they would provide 1. Aadhaar when given a choice of which ID to use. 28% of people say that Aadhaar’s main perceived benefit—that 3. it is universally accepted—also represents its largest challenge: their data; 61% of welfare recipients trust that Aadhaar they worry about the risks of linking everything to one ID 2. 54. 55. 56. 23 have been able to access that service without Aadhaar. For people who had no other ID, it is reasonable to assume that they might not have been able to avail a service which requires identification without Aadhaar. By comparison, 5% felt it was not well protected. Among those who had Aadhaar, 91% said data were well protected, 5% said they did not know, and 5% said data were not well protected. Among those who did not have Aadhaar, only 67% said data were well protected, 24% said they did not know, and 9% said data were not well protected. Since 95% of people who did not have Aadhaar said they want it, we should not conclude that lower levels of trust lead people to deliberately choose to forgo Aadhaar. Fourteen per cent of those who experienced such fraud felt their data were not well protected, com- 57. 58. 59. pared to 4% of those who had not experienced any fraud. SoA pulse survey 2019. Numbers do not sum because of rounding. SoA pulse survey 2019. In order to gain an overview of satisfaction levels, we created a net satisfaction score by summing the share of people who were “very satisfied” and “somewhat satisfied” and subtracting the share of people who were “very unsatisfied” and “somewhat unsatisfied”. Meghalaya is an exception: net satisfaction was slightly negative (it rounds to 0%): almost equal numbers of people expressed satisfaction and dissatisfaction. SoA pulse survey 2019. For example, satisfaction levels (somewhat or very satisfied) were relatively similar across age [adults less than 71 (91.7%), elderly 71 and above (89.0%)], gender [male (91.4%), For 8% of people, Aadhaar has provided first-time access to ID; 90%of people trust that the Aadhaar system protects prevents others from accessing their benefits 4. 92% of people say they are very satisfied or somewhat many of them have subsequently gained first-time access to satisfied with Aadhaar; among people who experienced services, such as SIM card, bank accounts, PDS, MGNREGS or exclusion from a service due to Aadhaar, 67% still say social pensions they are satisfied female (91.7%)], caste [OBC (90.9%), SC (91.7%), ST (93.3%), intermediate caste (91.8%), upper caste (93.0%)], and to a lesser extent, religion [Buddhist (91.0%), Christian (80.2%), Hindu (92.0%), Muslim 60. (89.4%), Sikh (94.1%)]. SoA pulse survey 2019. This is mostly because a larger share of people in the Northeastern states said 24