A Union Digital Centre's Shared Login
A union digital centre has one computer used by three part-time entrepreneurs who serve about 150 citizens a week. To save time, all three share a single login for the government service portal. The password is written on a card taped under the desk. Last month an entrepreneur used the shared login to submit a land record application for a relative without collecting the required fee, and the transaction was traced to the shared account. The centre also keeps scanned national ID cards of applicants in a folder on the desktop, and the computer connects to an open Wi-Fi router with the default password unchanged. The upazila office now requires an audit trail showing who submitted each application.
1. Explain why the shared login is the root cause of several problems here, not just the missing fee.
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A shared login removes individual accountability. Because the portal records only one identity, the audit trail cannot show which of the three entrepreneurs submitted the land application, so the upazila's new requirement cannot be met. The missing fee is a symptom: with no individual attribution, any of the three could act improperly without detection.
The password taped under the desk compounds this. Anyone entering the centre, including citizens, can read it and act as the centre. That turns a three-person problem into an open one.
The scanned national ID cards add a data-protection problem: they are personal data stored without access control, so a shared account also means shared access to citizens' identity documents. The open Wi-Fi with a default password exposes the same machine to outsiders on the network.
So the fix is not only recovering the fee but restoring individual identity, access control, and a record of who did what.
2. Recommend concrete changes, ranked by urgency, that the centre can make this week.
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Create three separate accounts, one per entrepreneur, each with its own strong password, and stop sharing credentials. This directly satisfies the audit requirement and is the highest priority.
Remove the password card and store passwords in a sealed envelope held by the centre's supervisor, or use a password manager on the machine.
Restrict the desktop folder of scanned IDs: move it to an encrypted folder or a password-protected archive, and delete scans once the application is processed. Keep only what is needed.
Change the Wi-Fi router's default password, use WPA2 or WPA3, and disable remote administration.
Add a simple paper or spreadsheet register of applications logged out at the end of each shift, as a backup record.
Ranking is by risk and effort: separate accounts and removing the written password are cheap and close the biggest gap; data restriction and network hardening follow; the register supports the audit trail.
3. A citizen asks to see another applicant's submitted land record on the centre's computer. How should the entrepreneur respond, and on what principle?
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The entrepreneur should refuse to show another person's record. The principle is confidentiality and purpose limitation: personal data collected for one citizen's application may be used only for that purpose and disclosed only to that person or to authorised officials.
The entrepreneur can explain politely that records are private, offer to check the citizen's own application status, and direct any official query to the upazila land office. If an official needs the record, the request should come through the proper channel and be logged.
This also protects the centre: showing one citizen's data to another would breach trust and could expose the centre to legal and reputational risk. Confidentiality is not an obstacle to service; it is part of the service.