Digital Locker – Share Important Documents Digitally

Digital locker is an authentic and easy to use tool to store, sign and share the electronic documents across government organisations digitally.

What is DIGILocker?

Digital locker or DIGILocker is an important initiative of Department of Electronics & Information Technology (DEITY) under Ministry of Communications & IT, Government of India. This initiative is in support of the Digital India programme to reduce unnecessary wastage of paper, time and human efforts. This is the centralised system to store and use the documents online to reduce the wastage of time, paper and manpower. Digital Locker provides a secured online space to store important documents in digital format.

Objectives

• Digitally empower the citizens
• Minimise physical documents
• Authentic documentation to minimise fraud and forgery
• Easy access through web portal and mobile applications
• Reduce government administrative overheads
• Anytime and anywhere access of e-lockers
• Authentic access to resident data

Features of DIGILocker

Digital locker has many useful features for online storage, digitally signing and online sharing of important e-documents. Digital locker has safety and security features for online documents similar to safe locker or folder locker for physical documents.

Storage Space

Digital Locker provides 10MB free online storage to secure important documents and certificates in softcopy in different formats that can be easily shared through e-mail.

Uniform Resource Identifier (URI)

This is the feature through which the link or URLs of the important documents and certificates from various government departments can be stored digitally.

The E-sign Facility

This is the facility provided by the locker through which user can sign the copies of important documents electronically and send them across government and other organisations.

Adhaar Linkage

In order to apply for digital locker, a person should possess a valid Aadhar Card Number and mobile number that is registered with the Aadhar Card.

Allowed formats

Digital Locker allows users to store the document in pdf, jpg, jpeg, png, bmp and gif format within the limit of 1 MB per document.

Application Procedure

To avail the Digital Locker facility, you have to sign up on the official website for Digital Locker. The following steps are to be followed for availing Digilocker.

Step1. Log on to official website for the Digital Locker, https://digitallocker.gov.in

Step2. Register or Sign Up

Step3. Enter 12 Digit Adhaar Card number. Once you do this, you will be given two options to move further i.e. Use One Time Password (OTP) or Use Fingerprint. You may choose any one of the two options as per your preference.

• Use One Time Password (OTP) – If you choose OTP option then you will get a text message for OTP. You have to enter the OTP at the prescribed place and click on validate OTP button. You can generate Username and Password once the OTP is accepted.
• Use Fingerprint – You need to have a biometric device to scan the fingerprint. If your mobile number is not registered, then you can authenticate using the fingerprint. Fingerprint will be captured and matched with the fingerprint recorded at the time of Aadhar registration. You will be asked to generate username and password after validation of the fingerprint.

Step4. Create Your Username and Password in prescribed manner

Step5. First time login to the official website

With these simple steps, you have your DigiLocker Account. You can login to your digital locker account in three different ways.

1. Using Aadhar Number and OTP.
2. Using Username and Password.
3. Using Facebook or Google ID validation.

Working of Digital Locker

There are many government organisations and departments such as Income Tax and CBSE that issue documents and certificates in digital format to individuals, firms and corporate entities. While availing services from various government and private organisations, these documents and certificates are to be submitted. User of the digital locker can share the stored documents with the respective departments and government agencies. Users of the Digital Locker can upload, view, electronically sign and share the digital documents using the username and password provided while signing up.

Stakeholders

There are three categories of stakeholders involved in Digital Locker. Here is a discussion on each of them.

Issuer

The entities issuing electronic documents are called issuers. Government departments, government agencies, trust and corporate entities are the major issuers of the documents and certificates in electronic format. They make the standard format of the document and make the softcopy of the documents available to other entities.

Requester

The government agencies asking for the electronic documents are called requesters. The electronic documents and certificates need to be submitted to various government departments and agencies such as Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), Central Board of Excise and Customs (CBEC), Universities, Regional Transport Office and Passport Office. They need the digital copy of the documents for various procedures.

Residents

An individual that avails the Digital Locker service is known as a resident. All the residents of India who possess a valid Aadhar Card No. may avail the Digital Locker.

Components

There are three components in Digital Locker facility. Here is a brief description of them.

Repository

The storage space where the electronic documents are stored in the standard Application Program Interface (API) is called repository. The main functions of the repository include collection of digital documents and keeping them in standard API for authentic real-time access.

Access Gateways

This is the mechanism through which Digital Locker Users and requester agencies may get real time access to electronic documents. Through access gateways, the documents may be availed in uniform way across repositories.

Digital Locker Portal

Digital Locker Portal is the directory of the registered issuers, gateways, repositories, guidelines, policies and forms. Digital locker portal can be considered as a dashboard that provides real time transaction volumes of the total electronic documents accessed.

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