National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA) is the important Government Firm that holds the data of all the people living in Pakistan and abroad has once again come into big news. But, just like every time, it’s not remembered in good words.

As a Pakistani Citizen, every single person's data are available to this government Organization. However, even in this advanced technological world, the data of this organization has been compromised. FIA, which is the Federal Investigation Agency, has given the news this Thursday.

The Additional Director Tariq Pervez of FIA Cybercrime Wing has revealed this news to the National Assembly Standing Committee on the briefing. As a whole Pakistan nation, this news is like an alarming situation.

The data of every Pakistani citizen is compromised and could be used for any dangerous activity.

If we specifically talk about the Data breach issue, he has clarified that the whole NADRA data is not compromised. However, the SIM verification process that happens with the details of every single person's NIC card has been compromised. However, he didn’t provide any deep explanation for that.

Even with the SIM Verification process involvement being a major concern over the Data breach, there is a lot to care about. Pakistan's government has a huge amount of budget over online security concern. However, such issues are still appearing that pretty much raises questions over the poor handling of security. Therefore, the budget that is spent on security feels like a baseless attempt.

If we talk about other countries, they are very professional and advanced towards their citizen's data. The government of China is a good reference to be talked about here. They are phenomenal when it comes to securing the privacy of their citizens. The local companies make the prototype they are following. On the other hand, Pakistan doesn’t seem to use a single serving of their own country. Everything is outsourced from other countries, which might be the major reason they have these issues.

In the past, the Ethical hacker’s community of Pakistan has highlighted the blunders that have happened with the other government organizations of Pakistan. But, they are still not taking it seriously to any level. Therefore, such activities are expected to have happened in the future if no step is taken from them.

Coming back to the main issue, the director has once again highlighted the issue with the justification that the whole NADRA data is not hacked. Only the biometric system that is used for the verification concerns is compromised.

The real culprits were still not traced by the cybercrime wing department because every time they try to take action, the data of the person that comes out to them are of Womans or elderly persons. So, therefore, it's making issues for them every time.

Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) Chairman Maj Gen Amir Azeem Bajwa retired has said in an interview that door-to-door selling of SIMS are prohibited as per their rules since the government has imposed the verification procedure. Therefore, the sale of illegal SIMS has decreased to 600%.

With such strict rules, illegal methods are still used by the Culprits to take the Thumbprints. Due to these reasons, two of the well-known Mobile phone’s operators’ companies were charged 50 million and 100 million Fines. However, more than 0.5 million SIMS have been blocked till now.

In October, more than 26,000 Fake SIMS information were found. Also, it’s stated in the interview that the complaints can be lodged against those who are constantly sending messages for Fraud financial activities.

In August 2021, a new mobile application was launched where citizens could use smartphones for biometric verification. Back in April, the data of more than 115 million Pakistanis were reportedly sold out in the Darknet. Also, the Interior Ministry has claimed that the data was not leaked from the NADRA end.

Whatever would be the case in that terms, it's still an alarming situation for the people of Pakistan and the government itself. If no strict action were taken against these issues, the situation would get worse.

In recent times, many people have also claimed that their money is automatically transferred from the HBL account to others in the Pakistani forums. Therefore, we would say that those activities might have a strong link with the data breach of every citizen's information available to the NADRA.

Not only is the situation worsening for the people living in Pakistan, but it can also affect all those peoples who are overseas Pakistanis. They would even face many riskier situations if things were not handled at the right time and the right way.

One significant issue also arises here: why FIA was providing this news when the culprit managed to do the work quite quickly. It would clearly show that the FIA is also not interested in making a system where these issues can easily be highlighted before the culprit does any wrong thing. If it highlights from that end, everything will sort out in the early stage.