Tarun Wadhwa

Tarun Wadhwa is a senior research associate with the Think India Foundation, where he analyzes the issues and challenges that India is facing due to urbanization. He is also a researcher with the Hybrid Reality Institute, a research and advisory think tank focused on the intersection of technology trends and geopolitics.
 
Tarun is currently completing a book that explores the global rise and convergence of digital identity systems.
 
These technologies have been quietly reshaping the world, as they change how we move across borders, interact with governments, conduct commerce, fight terrorism, and arrange our society. They are even changing the very definition of citizenship itself.
 
His book aims to track the progress of these systems as they have spread and impacted the lives of people in every corner of the globe. It will explore potential for innovative reforms, assess cyber-security risks, discuss the dangers posed to civil liberties and analyze the new types of social contracts that will result from the widespread usage of these transformative technologies.
 
His research includes an in-depth analysis of India’s ambitious Aadhaar identity program. In addition to being one of the grandest technology experiments ever attempted, the system will soon serve as the largest case study for these technologies globally.
 
His book explores the systems of dozens of nations and features interviews with many leading global thinkers, CEOs, scientists, academics, and military and government officials.
 
Tarun earned his BA in Political Science at The George Washington University in 2010. He graduated Singularity University in 2011.
 
Watch TEDxGotham 2011: Tarun Wadhwa — National Identity in the Digital State. Read his LinkedIn profile.