Nubian Rights Forum & 2 others v Attorney General & 6 others; Child Welfare Society & 9 others (Interested Parties) [2020] eKLR agencies will expose them to intrusion. 409. Mr. Ochieng further contended that NIIMS is unlikely to face the shortcomings of the Ghana Card and India’s Aadhaar system given that the government has drawn vital lessons from some of the few errors made by the two systems. Furthermore, reports indicate that India and Ghana faced challenges in the implementation of their integrated information systems due to the fact that the registration exercises were carried out by private entities which created multiple data entries for financial gain. Further, NIIMS differs from Ghana’s Card and India’s Aadhaar system since the data capture software has been developed by the government, taking into consideration the country’s unique needs and aspirations. As such, it was of paramount importance that the government migrates to a single integrated database despite fears of technological failure which are in any case speculative and remote. 410. He further averred that in dealing with some of the challenges associated with developing new systems, the government organised several benchmarking trips to countries with similar systems, including Netherlands, Estonia, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Moreover, substantial public finances have been expended towards the deployment of NIIMS, and the orders sought by the Petitioners would run afoul of the principles of public finance enshrined in the Constitution. Mr. Ochieng averred that it would be unreasonable to establish and implement a system without learning from systems around the world and the NIIMS system has been hinged on extensive research on systems around the world. 411. It was his averment that globally, data is under constant and continuous threats of breach from criminal elements who seek to access and misuse it but, to mitigate this risk, there’s always a permanent surveillance, protection, update and upgrade of systems. He further averred that in establishing the NIIMS system, the State seeks to secure protection of national security, prevention and investigation of crime, especially in view of increasing terrorist attacks in Kenya and heightened public safety concerns and provision and delivery of national services. Moreover, with present global trends in development, it is impossible to avoid digitization of information, even personal information, but the crux of the matter is in securing the data. 412. Mr. Ochieng averred that in any event, the registration was voluntary and all religious rights and beliefs were waived by those who profess them for the purposes of registration upon them weighing and finding that the system was satisfactory. He asserted that the Kenyan State will ensure that biometrics are only deployed when necessary and appropriate, and it is alive to its international obligations to respect human rights when collecting, processing, storing and sharing biometric information. 413. It was his position further that there are various security levels applied to protect data collected by the government to ward off any invader since the data is encrypted and access is restricted using highly sophisticated mechanisms that are almost impenetrable. According to Mr. Ochieng, the system’s securities are designed to be in line with the international best practices guaranteeing confidentiality and integrity of data stored, and the system has undergone sufficient tests and trials and has shown itself to be resilient to attacks. 414. Mr. Ochieng averred that the Indian system was contaminated during the process of data collection. He disagreed with the 1st Petitioner’s expert witness, Mr. Anand, asserting that it was not scientifically or academically sound or appropriate for the witness to quote his works and newspaper articles as authority on the propriety of the system he sought to criticize. The witness was also not, in his view, adequately grounded to swear on the facts of the system resources and infrastructure manned by the 5th Respondent for the protection of data. He noted that the company that Mr. Anand works for was one among many companies that could make suggestions on appropriate best practices and the 5th Respondent was not bound to take its suggestion. 415. Mr. Ochieng maintained, from his knowledge as an IT specialist, that the system is secure, not susceptible to breaches by malicious actors or abuse by public authorities, and undergoes constant surveillance, upgrades and updates by a competent team of men and women. Accordingly, the recent Marriott or Quora breach and India’s http://www.kenyalaw.org - Page 60/174