India Drops Plan for Mandatory Aadhaar App on Smartphones
India's government will not require smartphone manufacturers like Apple and Samsung to pre-install the Aadhaar biometric identification app on devices. The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) had proposed this in January, but the plan faced opposition from major tech companies. Aadhaar, which assigns a unique 12-digit identity number linked to biometric data, is used by nearly 1.34 billion residents for various verification processes, including banking and telecom services.
Published 3 days ago • 18 Apr 2026, 12:23 PM IST