NEW DELHI: Two days after getting slammed for its old helpline number 1800 300 1947 appearing in the contact list of several mobile phone users across India, the Unique Identity Authority of India (UIDAI) took on rumour mongers on Sunday and said that vested interests misused Google's "inadvertent" act to create fear and tarnish the image of Aadhaar.
The UIDAI, in a statement also stressed upon the fact that a number stored in the contact list cannot steal data from a mobile phone.
"Just through a helpline number in a mobile's contact list the data stored on the mobile phone cannot be stolen. Therefore, there should be no panic to delete the number as no harm will be caused. Rather people may, if they so wish, update it with UIDAI's new helpline number 1947," the authority said.
Last week, a French security expert who goes under the pseudonym Elliot Alderson and describes himself as the "worst nightmare" of the UIDAI, in a tweet had raised alarm on presence of a UIDAI contact number in contact list of mobile phone users without their consent.
His tweet scared many mobile phone users, however, Google on Friday admitted that the number was added by it 'inadvertently' along with police and fire number 112 in 2014 and has since been continuing through sync mechanism.