Jerry Fishenden

Digital Government at the Crossroads Introduction Governments have launched a series of ambitious digital strategies over recent decades to improve how they operate and interact with citizens. However, many of their anticipated benefits ...

“Digital Government at the Crossroads”—in this article for the Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics, and Art I explore why ‘digital government’ needs a rethink and reset to help democracies learn smarter, react faster, and adapt better to the growing challenges they face

Digital Government at the Crossroads Introduction Governments have launched a series of ambitious digital strategies over recent decades to improve how they operate and interact with citizens. However, many of their anticipated benefits ...

“Digital Government at the Crossroads”—in this article for the Cambridge Journal of Law, Politics, and Art I explore why ‘digital government’ needs a rethink and reset to help democracies learn smarter, react faster, and adapt better to the growing challenges they face

TransformGov Talks : Seventh event · Luma Speakers Antonio Weiss on his new book, "AI Demystified" Becky Miller, Defra, on designing policy with complex evidence live stream will be here : …

🚨 6PM, WED 16 July 🚨

Join us for the eighth TGT at the MoJ or online, with:

* Andrew Knight, Head of UK Government's Policy Design Community
* ​Emilia Hogarth, Head of Communities - Transforming Public Procurement, Cabinet Office

lu.ma/6hvitdyr

Please share! Thanks 🙏.

Fracture: The Collision Between Technology and Democracy—and How We Fix It - Digital Government Network Drawing on over thirty years of digital transformation initiatives to explore how governments can get their mojo back—and learn smarter, react faster, and adapt better.

my guest article for the Digital Government Network giving some insights into my book 'Fracture. The collision between technology and democracy—and how we fix it'

digitalgov.network/fracture-col...

Fracture: The Collision Between Technology and Democracy—and How We Fix It - Digital Government Network Drawing on over thirty years of digital transformation initiatives to explore how governments can get their mojo back—and learn smarter, react faster, and adapt better.

my guest article for the Digital Government Network giving some insights into my book 'Fracture. The collision between technology and democracy—and how we fix it'

digitalgov.network/fracture-col...

TransformGov Talks : Seventh event · Luma Speakers Antonio Weiss on his new book, "AI Demystified" Becky Miller, Defra, on designing policy with complex evidence live stream will be here : …

🚨 6PM, WED 25 June 🚨

Join us for the seventh TGT at the MoJ or online, with:

* Antonio Weiss on his new book, "AI Demystified"
* ​Becky Miller, Defra, on designing policy with complex evidence

lu.ma/jkd8jbzu

Please share! Thanks 🙏.

A puffin stands on a cliff edge looking out to sea

Two hungry gulls sit on a van’s roof at the back of a fish and chip shop

A bonxie (great skua) hovers overhead

A gannet in flight, a piece of seaweed on its beak for building its nest

A few snaps of the local birdlife here in #Shetland

Back with the tammie norries … as the excellent Wikipedia entry tells us: “they breed in muckle colonies on seawart cleuchs or islands, nestin in craggy scores or in bourie ben the yird”

George Wendt, who played a beloved barfly on 'Cheers' and found another home onstage, dies at 76 George Wendt, an actor with an Everyman charm who played the affable, beer-loving barfly Norm on the hit 1980s TV comedy “Cheers,” has died. He was 76.

BREAKING: George Wendt, who played a beloved barfly on "Cheers" and found another home onstage, dies at 76.

Gov.uk One Login loses certification for digital identity trust framework | Computer Weekly Computer Weekly has learned that a key technology supplier to One Login chose to allow its certification to lapse, and as a result One Login has also been removed from the accreditation scheme.

Another one for the digital identity crowd...

The government’s GovUK One Login digital identity system has lost its certification against the government’s own DIATF trust framework for digital identity systems. Read the full story here:

www.computerweekly.com/news/3666238...

I need a bigger bingo card!

Too short of time to read through 30 years of strategies to digitally reform and modernise government? No problem! Here's your friendly AI "bingo card" digest of some of the most regularly re-used soundbites ...

I don’t know if it’s the plans or comms at fault—or both! ICAO DTCs (digital passports) & ISO mDLs (driving licences) have long been the direction of travel for state verified, minimal disclosure credentials (attributes). But the messaging is confused & not helped by a failure to work in the open

the constant binary flipflop between state-centric OR market-centric digital ID ignores the nature of identity—which (in a democracy at least) is citizen-centred, contextual and relational. It requires multiple parties (both state and many others) to validate and issue verifiable credentials

Digital ID sector calls for changes to government data legislation | Computer Weekly The digital identity sector is calling on the government to amend its forthcoming data legislation, and to change policy around use of the Gov.uk Wallet – which was technology secretary Peter Kyle’s f...

ah, the latest episode has landed in the UK's ~28 year quest for digital identity...

"the sudden...announcement...gave...the impression digital identity was being nationalised...a threat of a national ID card by the back door"

www.computerweekly.com/news/3666228...

Love living in London, although also looking forward to being back in Lerwick again soon

TransformGov Talks : Fifth event · Luma For our next event we have the following two excellent speakers. Catherine Day, Cabinet Office, on the cross-government participatory methods forum The Cabinet…

🚨 EVENT KLAXON! 🚨

The next @transformgovtalks.bsky.social event will be at the MoJ and online on Weds April 30th with the following great speakers.
* Catherine Day - cross-government participatory methods forum
* ​Cabinet Office Test, Learn and Grow team

Register here : lu.ma/c3wlyoz0

Which users? Which needs? Why user-centred design is not enough The updating and rebrand of the pan-government website to GOV.UK is the latest refresh in a long journey to bring together government information and transactions in one place, from the first itera…

👍 This is good. I was trying to raise similar concerns in this old piece …

These alleged failings with GOV.UK One Login remind me of similar issues I encountered in major government programmes ~8 years ago:

After this week's revelations over security problems in One Login and growing industry concerns over UKgov digital identity policy, my latest take on where we are:

UK digital identity turns to drama (or farce?) over industry fears and security doubts -

www.computerweekly.com/blog/Compute...

Dev, DevOps and trusted systems Software’s coming home Software development and technical architecture design have been taken back in-house over the past 5 years—ending the era when Whitehall departments outsourced almost e…

ntouk.wordpress.com/2017/01/28/d...

"Programmes where there’s inadequate separation of roles, with developers checking-in and approving their own code into production. Programmes with privileged processes running, yet no-one’s quite sure who owns them or what they’re doing. Programmes where no-one’s trained in writing secure code."

These alleged failings with GOV.UK One Login remind me of similar issues I encountered in major government programmes ~8 years ago:

Government faces claims of serious security and data protection problems in One Login digital ID | Computer Weekly The Government Digital Service was warned about serious cyber security and data protection problems in its flagship digital identity system, with insider claims that the data of three million users ma...

"security failings [with One Login] have still not been addressed ... the information security of the three million users of One Login remains at risk."

(sigh) still not corrected by the Beeb ... frustrating they can't get basic facts right

And it's not only factually wrong, but also seems confused (why refer to it as an "online wallet" if it's a secure phone app? 🤔)

Labour MPs call for digital IDs to tackle migration The MPs say digtal ID would help counter illegal off-the-books employment, in an open letter.

This doesn't explain how digital ID solves anything? Employers/landlords are already legally obliged to check the right to work/reside.

"An online wallet already allows users to store government-issued documents on their phones" No. "You can't download or use GOV.UK Wallet yet." www.gov.uk/wallet

How government can get its digital mojo back The second edition of Fracture. The collision between technology and democracy—and how we fix is out. It draws on over thirty years of “digital transformation” initiatives to explore ho…

"Without meaningful transformation, governments will be unable to tackle the ever-growing policy challenges they face, and democracy—and public trust—will continue to decline."

Some background here:

The second edition of 'Fracture. The collision between technology and democracy—and how we fix it' is out

A photo of a small stack of hardback second editions of my book "Fracture. The collision between technology and democracy—and how we fix it."

... another day, another workshop ...