Every Aadhaar PDF downloaded from the UIDAI website is digitally signed by UIDAI. That signature is your proof the document is genuine and hasn't been altered. Yet most people open their e-Aadhaar in Adobe Reader, see a yellow question mark, and worry the document is fake, when in almost every case the signature is perfectly valid. This guide shows you how to properly validate an Aadhaar signature, both online and in Adobe.
The easiest way: validate online (no software)
Use our Aadhaar signature validator. Drop your e-Aadhaar PDF onto the page and it will detect the UIDAI signature, recompute the document hash, verify the signature cryptographically, and, because it already trusts the official CCA India root certificate, tell you clearly whether your Aadhaar is genuine and unchanged. It even shows a "UIDAI Digital Signature Detected" banner and the signing authority.
Crucially, your Aadhaar is never uploaded. The entire check runs inside your browser using WebAssembly, so this sensitive document never leaves your device. That makes it the safest way to validate an Aadhaar online.
- Remove the password if needed: see below, or use our remover tool.
- Open the Aadhaar validator and drop your PDF.
- Read the result: UIDAI detection, document integrity, and signature status.
First, remove the Aadhaar PDF password
The e-Aadhaar PDF is password-protected. The password is the first four letters of your
name in capital letters followed by your year of birth, for example,
RAVI1990 for Ravi born in 1990. To validate (or freely open) the file, you'll usually
want to remove this password first. Our
Remove Aadhaar PDF password tool does it in your
browser without uploading anything, and the UIDAI signature stays intact.
Why Adobe shows a question mark, and how to fix it
Adobe Reader marks Aadhaar signatures as "validity unknown" because it only trusts certificates on its own Approved Trust List and your operating system's store. UIDAI signs Aadhaar PDFs through licensed Indian Certifying Authorities (such as Protean, (n)Code Solutions, eMudhra or Capricorn) whose chain leads up to the Controller of Certifying Authorities (CCA), India, a legitimate root that Adobe simply doesn't include by default.
To get a permanent green tick in Adobe, import the CCA India root once:
- Download the CCA India root certificate from
cca.gov.in. - In Adobe, open Menu → Preferences → Signatures.
- Under Identities & Trusted Certificates, click More.
- Go to Trusted Certificates → Import and select the certificate.
- Select it, choose Edit Trust, and tick "Use this certificate as a trusted root".
You only do this once per computer; afterwards every Aadhaar PDF shows a green tick. If you'd rather skip the setup entirely, our online validator already trusts this root for you.
How to read the validation result
A Valid (green) result means the UIDAI signature verifies and the document is unchanged: your Aadhaar is genuine. A Warning typically just reflects a trust chain that couldn't be fully established in the verifying software (the same cause as Adobe's question mark); the signature itself is still cryptographically correct. An Invalid result, where the document is reported as modified or the signature fails, is the real warning sign and worth investigating. For a deeper explanation, see why a PDF signature shows as not valid.
Why validating your Aadhaar matters
Aadhaar is accepted as proof of identity across banks, telecoms, government services, and employers. Fraudsters sometimes circulate edited Aadhaar PDFs. Validating the digital signature is the definitive way to know a particular Aadhaar file is the authentic one issued by UIDAI and that not a single detail has been altered. It takes seconds and, with our tool, costs nothing and risks nothing.
Validate your Aadhaar now
Open the Aadhaar signature validator and check your e-Aadhaar in seconds, privately, in your browser. To understand digital signatures more generally, read what a digital signature is.