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New Intl
Telecom Regulations Treaty Drafted A new global telecommunications treaty was agreed to on 13
December, during the World Conference on International Telecommunications
2012 (WCIT-12) convened by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU),
the United Nations specialised agency for ICT, in Dubai. Attended by nearly
2000 delegates from 193 member states of the ITU, the WCIT-12 was called to
review the 24-year-old International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs),
the current binding treaty to facilitate international interconnection and
ensuring efficiency and public usefulness and availability of information and
communication services. The new draft of the treaty sets out general
principles for ensuring the free flow of information around the world, and
includes new provisions emphasising efforts to assist developing countries
and the right to freedom of expression over ICT networks, and promote
accessibility of ICT technologies for persons with disabilities. The treaty
also contains a resolution to create a single global number for access to
emergency services, and new text mandating greater transparency in the prices
set for mobile roaming. In a statement released at the end of the conference,
Dr Hamadoun I. Touré, Secretary General of the ITU, said, “This treaty
contains many gains and achievements including increased transparency in
international mobile roaming charges and competition, an extremely important
win for consumers.” “Information and communication technologies can now play
a greater role in driving sustainable development, in particular with new
Articles that provide recommendations for dealing with the growing scourge of
e-waste and promoting greater energy efficiency.” The treaty, however, has
only been signed by 89 nations. Disagreement over provisions granting
governments greater control over the internet led to 55 countries either
refusing to sign or reserving the right to sign later. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Beyond
ICT: The Newest Digital Revolution The history of human social development is, to some extent,
the history of human scientific and technological progress. Humanity achieves
scientific and technological progress by pushing its physical and mental
limits and breaking away from the restrictions of time and space. This has
been true in times both ancient and modern. Our ancestors built beacon towers
and invented the wheel, while we have ubiquitous Internet connection and
vehicles capable of reaching outer space. In the course of our scientific and
technological development, two epoch-making inventions have been the steam
engine and the computer. The steam engine ushered in the industrial age by
providing far more power than what manual labor and beasts of burden could
generate. The computer brought us into the information age through data
processing capabilities that far outperform the human brain. The past century
has witnessed several waves of progress made possible by information
technologies, including those used for communications (telegraphy, telephony,
and broadcasting), home entertainment (radio, TV), computing, and the
Internet. Information technologies drive economic growth worldwide and
reshape the way people live and work. At present, we are evolving from a
"society on wheels" to a "society on the network."
However, information systems are still regarded as aid tools and support
systems, keeping the digital and physical worlds somewhat parallel and
compartmentalized. Now, as the digital and physical worlds begin to merge,
the development of the Internet of Things has proven to be an effective catalyst
of information-based developments and is sure to bring groundbreaking changes
to all of humanity. Beyond information and communications, the increasing
integration of the digital and physical worlds will lead to a new digital
revolution. British philosopher Karl R. Popper divides human society into
three parts: the physical world, the mental/psychological world, and the
world of products of the human mind (also known as the world of objective
knowledge). In the future, the physical world will be married with the
digital world to form a new world. This integration will bring tremendous
changes to the way we live and work, the way businesses operate, and the way
society functions — a new age of digital citizens, digital enterprises, and
digital society. •Heavy reliance on networks will usher in an age of digital
citizenry. Nowadays, the ways in which people communicate, acquire
information, study, have fun, shop, make friends, and pair-bond are quite
different from what we saw just two decades ago. People not only have more
means to stay connected and obtain information, but have exceeded the
constraints of their physical location or time zone. With the developments in
this short time span, rather than waiting days or even months for letters to
arrive, people now contact others in real time via email, instant messaging,
and social networking. Likewise, people can read the news online anytime,
anywhere, rather than clinging to their TVs or radios. Wikipedia and other
interactive platforms allow people to easily find answers to their questions,
without having to wade through voluminous encyclopedias or wait for office
hour-working librarians. Internet users exceeded 2.4 billion in 2012, over
34% of the world's population, with this figure growing roughly 8% each year.
There are also as many as 1.1 billion smartphone subscribers right now, an
increase of 42% over 2011. However, this is just the beginning. As digital
lifestyles are adopted, digital citizenry will shape the behaviors of
next-gen consumers, changing the way people live, and shaking up numerous
industries. For example, traditional video sales and rental stores are
disappearing, and the 244-year old Encyclopedia Britannica is no longer
printed. It is very likely that in the next few decades, children will ask
why the word newspaper contains the word paper in much the same way as our
children today ask why the media is still referred to as the press. •The age of digital business is drawing near, as seen by our
commercial dependence on networks for production and operations. Network
developments have significant influence on business activities. Which
business today can even continue to operate if its network fails? E-commerce
is booming and extending its reach into every consumer buying decision,
whether involving digital content (e-books and digital music), cars, or home
appliances, or even small items like snacks and slippers. In 2012 alone,
electronic retail sales worldwide totaled $1.1 trillion. Information
technologies will be further applied to enterprise production and operations.
Rather than being tools or support components, ICT will become integral to
production, decision-making, customer relationship management, service
provisioning, marketing, and logistics. ICT will be employed in the building
of end-to-end systems that work in real time, playing a role in each and
every link, from idea generation to product conceptualization to precision
marketing to efficient operations to on-time delivery. In other words,
digitization will become a key characteristic of the future enterprise. A
borderless internet gives rise to a digital society. Thanks to the
boundary-free nature of the Internet, a large number of borderless virtual
communities and societies have come into being. A plethora of these communities
will combine to form a digital society that transcends borders, cultures, and
races. Facebook is home to over one billion users (or netizens), making it
the third largest "citizenry" in the world. This type of digital
society, which mirrors while extending beyond the physical world, will
undoubtedly impact many aspects of social administration and transformation,
including politics, economy, law, culture, news & media, security, and
ethics, among others. As a communications tool and support system, information
technologies have significantly changed the way in which people live and work
over the past few decades. They also spawn new economies and industries while
reshuffling traditional ones. No doubt, the increasing integration of the
physical and digital worlds will have a more tremendous impact on society.
Such integration will direct ICT development in a way that can better serve
society. Smart infrastructure presents opportunities for further ICT
development. Technologically-speaking, ICT innovations mainly fall into five
groups: mobility, broadband interconnectivity, social networking, cloud
computing, and big data processing. The objective of these innovations is to
transform the physical world into a smart world underpinned by smart ICT
infrastructure, making the latter key to advancing information-based
development. •From big data to "big” wisdom, the IT systems of
carriers and enterprises are evolving from post-processing support systems to
real-time business systems. This transition marks a fundamental change in how
IT functions. We are living in what may be the “big bang” of information. In
2012, up to 2.4 zettabytes of data (that’s 2.4 billion terabytes) was
generated globally; it would take as many as three trillion DVDs to store all
this data. By 2020, the amount of data generated is expected to grow
fourteen-fold. This data will have two major sources. The first is from the
huge amount of transactions between enterprises and between enterprises and
consumers. The second is from countless interactions on the Internet, social
networks, enterprise service networks, and the Internet of Things. Social
networking will be particularly pervasive; it will be emblematic of all
applications, not just for social networking utilities like Facebook. Typically,
big data has four characteristics: variety, volume, velocity, and value.
Velocity and value are most important. By combining the analytical
capabilities of the human brain to determine behavioral patterns and the data
processing capabilities of computers, we can quickly analyze big data and
leverage digital assets to develop valuable diagrams that show relationships,
intentions, consumption patterns, interests, and mobility. From big data to
"big" wisdom, IT systems will be capable of understanding not only
the present preferences of customers but also their future tendencies. This
will make social administration, corporate decision-making, and individual
lifestyles smarter and more logical. Therefore, IT systems for both
enterprises and carriers shall no longer function as post-processing support
systems. Rather, they will become real-time business systems that facilitate
business operations, a transition that marks a fundamental change in IT. •As traditional IT enterprise architecture is no longer capable
of processing the huge volumes of data being encountered, an
Internet-oriented cloud computing architecture is needed. The rebuilding of
data centers will prove the basis of supporting big data. Over the past two
decades, most enterprises have applied client-server architecture for their
IT. Although these systems were constantly upgraded, their technical
architecture was not, making each upgrade repetitive and not transformative.
With client-server, the server primarily stores small volumes of enterprise
transaction data, leaving most data scattered across employee PCs (clients).
As Internet technologies have continued to develop, data has begun its
migration from the PC to the cloud, causing a sharp spike in data volume for
the latter. The need to store such vast volumes is exactly what is driving
innovations in computing and storage architectures, and giving rise to the
emergence of cloud computing architectures that feature virtualization,
parallel computing, distributed storage, and automation, making for a
dramatic change over the traditional architectures. In fact, this new push is
considered the third major wave of IT transformation after those related to
the mainframe and client/server architecture. Presently, traditional
enterprise IT architectures are no longer capable of processing the
voluminous amounts of data that they take in. To answer this need, an
internet-oriented cloud computing architecture is required. This architecture
will form the basis of both big data and "big" wisdom. •Low-bandwidth networks are hindering information-based
development and user experience improvement. A ubiquitous Gigabit network is
a prerequisite for any digital society. To lay the foundation for a
Terabit-network society, next-gen research is needed. As public and private
clouds develop, the amount of data they carry is sure to mushroom, as the
analysis of data is more effective when its storage is centralized. To drive
this migration, ubiquitous networking with greater bandwidth is required to
support data upload and data usage. Ubiquitous broadband makes cloud
computing accessible. Devices across the entire industry chain, including
content creation devices (video cameras), cloud computing devices that
process information, and terminals where information is generated and
consumed (PCs, tablets, etc.) all now support high-definition video, even
smartphones that cost only $150. However, the global network, which has an
average bandwidth of only 3.1Mbps, is still unable to support high-definition
video, leading to the aforementioned hindrances to user experience.
Therefore, we must accelerate the construction of Gigabit networks to enable
seamless ultra-broadband access, the basis for building a digital society. We
must also intensify our research into and innovation efforts for technologies
such as next-generation mobile access, next-generation digital subscriber
line (DSL) access, passive optical network (PON) access, next-generation
Internet, and all-optical networking (AON). This focus on future networks
will lay a solid foundation for building a Terabit-network society. •To support evolution from a "hard" pipe to a
"soft" pipe, we should develop programmable, scalable,
application-agile, automatic, and open intelligent networks. Software-defined
networking (SDN) will lead to the development of next-gen network
architectures. Technologies are enablers of network development. In the past
two decades, driven by advancements of technologies from time-division
multiplexing (TDM) towards all-IP, networks have undergone three different
revolutions: analog to digital, fixed to mobile, and narrowband to broadband.
At present, All-IP networks are undeniably the mainstay for telco and
enterprise networks. However, as networks grow, with information flowing in
and out in uncertain directions and technologies being upgraded rapidly, it
is important that networks be flexible, intelligent, scalable, and automated.
Equally important is a change in how we think about network architectural
design. The core concepts for cloud computing development, such as
virtualization, software decoupling from hardware, centralized resource pool
scheduling, automatic deployment, high scalability, and on-demand service
provisioning, provide valuable references for network development.
Introduction of these concepts into the design of network architectures and
products can form the concepts of SDN, including forwarding and control
element separation (FORces) to centralize network control and resource
scheduling, software decoupling from hardware to virtualize network
functions, network function development of cloud-based architecture to
realize automatic deployment and high scalability, and application-aware
network development to improve network capabilities, among others. By
adopting these concepts, we can lead the developments of next-generation
product architectures and network architectures, establish an intelligent
application-aware network that can intelligently schedule traffic, improve
user experience and network utilization, support traffic-based operations,
and generate new revenue streams. •Intelligent terminals will not just be tools for
communications; they will become extensions of our own senses. Terminals of
the future will be context-aware and have intelligent sensory capabilities.
What makes a terminal intelligent is far more than just its CPUs and
operating system - It also relates to its sensory capabilities. By using
various sensors (compasses, accelerators, gyroscopes, barometers, global
positioning systems, light sensors, microphones, cameras, touch screens,
temperature sensors, and infrared instruments), we can extend the human
sensory and nervous systems in the form of intelligent terminals, bringing us one-step away from true
brain-machine interaction. These intelligent terminals will be context-aware,
and able to both sense and predict behavior through features such as
auto-completion. By combining cloud-based big data analysis capabilities with
context-aware terminals, we can provide personalized and intelligent services
that realize true human-machine interaction, enabling a dramatic improvement
in the user experience. To respond to the ICT transformation being driven by
the integration of the physical world and digital worlds, Huawei has
developed a pipe strategy that covers cloud-based data center infrastructure
(used for information storage and processing), infrastructure networks (used
for information transmission and delivery), and intelligent terminals (used
for information creation and consumption). Huawei has also set up its 2012
Laboratories, dedicated to researching next-generation technologies, while
developing a SoftCOM (Software Defined Network + teleCOM) network
architecture development strategy.
Huawei will openly partner with industry peers to raise information society
to a new level. From
http://www.telecomasia.net/ Best
Broadband Cities in the World The latest Net Index city statistics revealed that Hong Kong
has the highest average broadband speed, followed by 1.Hong Kong Central District – 45.93Mbps 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. In South Africa Edenvale is currently ranked as the area/city
with the highest average broadband speed, followed by Midrand and Sandton. 1.Edenvale – 6.73 Mbps 2.Midrand – 5.94 Mbps 3.Sandton – 5.73 Mbps 4.Paarl – 5.19 Mbps 5. 6.Brits – 4.35 Mbps 7.Worcester – 3.91 Mbps 8.Randburg – 3.54 Mbps 9. 10.Boksburg – 3.42 Mbps From
http://mybroadband.co.za/ World Bank
Publishes Report on ICT in Africa is still at the beginning of its growth curve in the
use of ICT in key sectors of the economy and now is the time for rigorous
evaluation, replication, and scaling up of best practice, according to the
eTransform Africa report produced by the World Bank and the African
Development Bank with the support of the African Union. The report identifies
best practice in the use of ICT in agriculture, climate change adaptation,
education, financial services, government services and health. It also
highlights the role of ICT in enhancing regional trade and integration. The
report includes more than 20 case studies of ICT transformation in action in From
http://www.telecompaper.com/ Earlier
today, my colleague Graeme Philipson wrote of the establishment of the
Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) to be an amalgam of Defence's Cyber
Security Operations Centre, the Attorney-General's Computer Emergency
Response Team (CERT) Australia, ASIO's Cyber Espionage Branch, elements of
the AFP's High-Tech Crime Operations capability and all-source assessment
analysts from the Australian Crime Commission, according to the Federal
Government's much anticipated posture document on the future of Australia's
National Security. Showing the extreme importance of cyber security, we find
the announcement featured prominently on page 40 of the 44 page document.
Accepting that this is the Federal Government's current position on Cyber
Security, iTWire asked a number of industry experts for their thoughts. Adam
Biviano, Senior Manager, Strategic Products, Trend Micro ANZ was generally in
favour, "Trend Micro welcomes the Government's initiative as an
important move in the fight against cyber crime. "Law
enforcement and governments have always played cat and mouse with criminals.
The reality is that while there is money to be made from attacking computer
systems, then criminals will never give up." Biviano continued,
"Combining the key agencies into a single centre is a sensible approach.
"With cyber crime, accurate intelligence is critical for implementing
strategies to effectively tackle the problem. Having a centralised strategy
to stave off cyber attacks. Combine this with the law making and enforcement
capability of government and you have the foundation for a solid security
strategy." In a press release, the Australian Computer Society agreed,
"Besides The risk to critical infrastructure including banking and
finance, emergency services, energy and utilities, food, health care, IT and
communications, mass gatherings transportation and water, there is also a
significant economic risk arising from cyber crime and terrorism. In our past
submissions to the government the ACS have made the case that the best form
of defence is for the Government to regulate and control practitioners who
lead and manage our nations' ICT based critical infrastructure." AVG's
Security Advisor, Michael McKinnon agrees, "The establishment of the
Australian Cyber Security Centre is encouraging, and not at all surprising
given this follows a worldwide trend at the moment." McKinnon continued,
"For example, the European Cybercrime Centre announced earlier this
month, and "The
ACS will continue our work with the government, industry and ICT
practitioners to further the understanding of cyber security in To address
this, I would point out that having a number of organisations all covering
the gamut of research, investigations, technical advice and remediation work
is somewhat wasteful and broadly, I would agree with the proposal. But (and
there's always a but!). My concern is that we are very likely to be pushing a
lot of civilian-focussed work into an organisation that must, by its very
design be subject to all kinds of military-style security levels and
restrictions. Prime Minister Gillard's document tends to dwell more strongly
on the Government's requirements in this area to the possible detriment of
private industry. And the more DoD-based the organisation becomes, the harder
it will be for third-party organisations (equipment and service providers,
for instance) to get a seat at the table. Trend Micro's Biviano seems to
agree with this assessment, "I would be keen to understand further how
the new ACSC will interact with not only other tiers of government but also
business. It will be interesting to see what tactical actions the ACSC
delivers over the medium to longer term. What interfaces will it create for
other tiers of government, and businesses? As there is a wealth of
intelligence to be shared, what will be their interaction strategy with the
private security industry?" Echoing this emphasis on private industry,
AVG's McKinnon adds, "For Business and From
http://www.itwire.com Azerbaijani
Communications and IT Ministry Announces Plans for 2013 As 2013 has been declared the Year of ICT in From
http://en.trend.az/ From
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/
NIELIT has been playing a key role in improving the reach and
scope of IT related education in the country. What is your vision for the
organisation? There is going to be a vast increase in the scope of work that
NIELIT has been doing. NIELIT has been set up to carry out Human Resource
Development and related activities in the area of Information, Electronics
& Communication Technology (IECT). The organisation has its headquarters
in The organisation is engaged both in the formal and non formal
education in the area of IECT. It also concentrates on developing industry
oriented quality education and training. It is establishing standards for
becoming the country’s premier institution for examination and certification
in the field of IECT. Today NIELIT is a National Examination Body, which
accredits institutes/organisations for conducting courses particularly in the
non- formal sector of IT Education & Training. Our vision for the
organisation is to make NIELIT an institute of national importance in the
field of IT, electronics, e-Governance and education. NIELIT can become of a
stature that is similar to the IIT or IIM, with the permission and the blessings
of the Hon’ble Parliament. At times students face problems as they are unable to access
course content in their own language. What steps is NIELIT taking to help
such students? NIELIT has developed CCC e-content in all the constitutionally
recognised Indian languages except in Santhali. The e-contents of CCC has
also been devel- oped in Mizo and Kokborok. The e-contents have been made
available on a dedi- cated e-learning portal “http://elearn.doeacc.edu.in”
for free access by students. We are in the process of developing e-content
for other courses and we are also planning to conduct online examinations.
NIELIT is now undertaking projects concerned with capacity building in the
field of e-Governance. Tell us about it. As you might know, NIELIT will be
undertaking projects to conduct e-Governance training for various cadres of
Central and State Government officials with funding support of Department of
Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances. NIELIT has conducted one workshop for the
Cabinet of Bihar. It is also conducting e-Gov Capacity Building for senior
officers in Delhi Government. Capacity building in the area of e-Governance
is of great importance to the nation, and we are keen to contribute our mite
in it. To take this up, our team of senior directors was in NISG (National
Institute for Smart Governance), Tell us about the work that you have been doing for NPR.
NIELIT is the Nodal Implementing Agency on DeitY (Department of Electroncs
and Information Technology) for the data digitisation for the creation of
National Population Register (NPR) project of Registrar General of India
(RGI). Data digitisation work for UT Chandigarh has been completed on pilot
basis in March 2012. In Phase I, the data digitisation work of 25 urban zones
have been completed and data digitisation in respect of 19 rural zones are
expected to be completed shortly. In Phase II, for 48 rural zones, the
contract has been awarded to successful bidders and work is in progress and
is expected to be completed by March, 2013. You have been associated with IT Industry for almost 28 years.
Before taking over as MD, NIELET, you had been serving as Managing Director,
RajCOMP, and Director Technical RajCOMP Info Services Ltd. In that capacity
you had been instrumental in executing many IT and e-Governance Projects for
the Government of Rajasthan. Tell us about the main issues that you have
faced in bringing the benefits of IT to the masses. Every IT project comes
with its own set of unique challenges. And when the project is from the field
of e-Governance, then the challenges become more complicated, as in such
cases we also have to look at governance issues, along with IT. When a
project is being implemented, multiple issues related to Vendor Management,
Technical Management, Finance Management, HR Management, Legal Management and
over and above the Expectation Management come to the fore. It is possible
that the expectation of the end-users, the citizens, could be totally
different from the expectations of the policy makers. It is a difficult task to bridge the gap between the two sets
of expectations. Also there can be mismatch in terms of time, cost and even
the vision of any project due to changes in government or administrative
setup. While conceiving any e-Governance project, we tend to think that automation
will automatically result in e Governance becoming a reality. We tend to
forget that the IT component in any e-Governance project is only 10 to 15
percent. The major component is management and implementation of the decision
and policy of the government, and that is a much tougher task. At times, the
financial considerations make it impossible for us to go for the best
possible technology in e-Governance projects, so this too is a challenge. We
are unable to hire the most talented experts as they require a higher salary,
the government norms restrict the salary that can be paid to the experts.
Moreover, when we are implementing e-Governance projects, we think of pilots
only and pilot hardly get rolled out because of multiple reasons. “e-Governance projects will not be able to deliver at the
ground level unless there is capacity building in a big way.” During the last
few years Rajasthan has achieved lot of success in e-Governance
implementations. In your opinion what is the most critical factor for the
successful execution of e-Governance Projects? The capability of government
departments to work as a cohesive team is important. A good team leader and
support from the seniors are the key factors for success of e-Governance
project. In Rajasthan, I achieved a degree of success in execution of NeGP
Projects, after joining as the Managing Director of Rajcomp in June 2009. The
projects that I was involved with are the CSC, State Data Centre (SDC), State
Wide Area Network (SWAN), e-District, State Service Delivery Gateway (SSDG),
etc. I have also contributed in the successful launch of the RPSC online.
This all had been possible because of kind support that I have received from
the Secretary (IT), Shri Sanjay Malhotra, Principal Secretary (IT), Shri
Shrimant Pandey. I was also guided by the vision of the leader, Hon’ble Chief
Minister, Shri Ashok Gehlot. In your opinion what is the importance of field experience in
the success of e-Governance projects? Should the government departments focus
on having at least a few people who have the experience of working in the
field? e-Gov Projects face major challenges in terms of shortage of experts
having knowledge of technology with the IT companies. It also faces challenge
in terms of commitment from the top and ownership of the project. It has been
observed that those who have driven motorcycle in the field are different
from those who know how to drive motorcycle on the blackboard. I am pointing
out to the fact that issues being faced in the field are different from those
discussed at policy making forums. At planning stage a project might seem
very a project is very simple but when it is being implemented in the field,
multiple issues related to Vendor Management, Technical Management, Finance
Management, HR Management, Legal Management and over and above the
Expectation Management starts. So field experience is of utmost importance. You have taken over as the Managing Director of NIELET, a
Government of India organisation, engaged in capacity building. What are the
main challenges that you are facing in the new assignment? The new challenge
is a part and parcel of the assignments I have been executing because unless
and until capacity building in the field of IT and e-Governance is undertaken
for government employees and citizens, we will not be able to bring the real
fruits of IT to our citizens. e-Governance projects will not be able to
deliver at the ground level unless there is capacity building in a big way.
In my humble opinion, my new assignment is nothing more than a continuation
of the activities that I have been part of during my earlier years of
service. It provides me with opportunities for using my past experiences of
working with actual projects to design new course content and better ways of
delivery through IT tools. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com The The Philippine Government Electronic Procurement System (PhilGEPS),
in partnership with the Land Bank of the From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Now that President Obama's second term is under way, the IT
community is looking to federal CIO Steven VanRoekel to shed some light on
technology policy for the next four years. At a Jan. 22 hearing of the House
Oversight and Government Reform Committee, VanRoekel spoke on the topic of
"Wasting Information Technology Dollars: How can the Federal Government
Reform its IT Investment Strategy?" According to a report in fedscoop,
VanRoekel's testimony represented a continuation of priorities set when he
first assumed his position in 2011, following the departure of Vivek Kundra.
The top three IT priorities of the Obama administration are to innovate in
service of the public good, maximize the return from investment in IT and
focus on cybersecurity. “Building on the progress of the last four years, my
objective is to balance cost savings with innovation by continuing to cut
costs while we invest in technology that securely services the American
people,” VanRoekel said. Legislators expressed concern over estimates that
nearly half of federal IT dollars are devoted to maintaining "obsolete
and deficient IT resources." VanRoekel responded that older systems are actually
better insulated from the latest cybersecurity threats, which seem to focus
on taking down newer systems. Also among VanRoekel's stated priorities,
according to Information Week, is a shift from owning physical IT assets to
investing in technology-as-a-service. VanRoekel was joined at the hearing by
Government Accountability Office Director for Information Technology
Management Issues David Powner and former Congressman Tom Davis, as well as
industry representatives from SAP, Brocade, VMWare and Microsoft. From
http://www.govtech.com/ |
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New Paper
from the Association for Progressive Communications and the Internet Society
Connects Internet Protocols and Human Rights “Like Internet protocols, human rights standards attempt to
articulate principles that will apply universally over time, as ideas and
conditions evolve,” a new paper argues. Commissioned by the Association for
Progressive Communications and the Internet Society, the issue paper released
today compares the standards-making processes as well as the principles
underlying human rights on the one hand and Internet protocols on the other.
The technical and the legal come together in this unusual but useful exploration
of the fundamental intents behind Internet protocols and the human rights
framework. Co-authors Avri Doria and Joy Liddicoat, respectively protocols
specialist and human rights advocate, incorporated valuable contributions by
the Internet Society’s Nicolas Seidler and Markus Kummer and dialogue from
the Internet Governance Forum 2012. “There are some shared principles between
Internet protocols and human rights,” the main authors say in their
discussion of this interconnectedness. “They generate continuities and
discontinuities which could inform and assist those who seek to defend human
rights and to maintain a free and unencumbered Internet.” The main contribution of this paper is the examination of
selected Internet protocols and human rights and the discussion around the
impacts of the points of convergence and divergence. “We see this discussion
as a process,” said Markus Kummer, Vice-President for Public Policy at the
Internet Society, insisting that comments in reaction to the paper are welcome.
“It is our hope that this discussion will engage human rights activists,
policy makers and the Internet technical community in a dialogue about ways
that they can collaborate. It is our belief that human rights considerations
are part of the DNA of the Internet and that a dialogue between these
communities will be beneficial to promote a rights-fostering Internet.” “This
opportunity for human rights and technical communities to collaborate shows
there is more we can do together to promote and protect both human rights and
the Internet,” said Joy Liddicoat. “We are grateful for the Internet
Society’s support for this research and look forward to more dialogue in
2013.” The issue paper is part of APC’s Connect Your Rights! project, the aim
of which it is to make the links between the internet and human rights. The
project is conducted with support from the Swedish International Development
Cooperation Agency (Sida). It is also part of the Internet Society’s core
mission to promote an open Internet as a necessary foundation for people to
exercise some of their key fundamental rights in the online environment,
including freedom of expression and freedom of association and peaceful
assembly. From
http://www.apc.org/ New Intl
Telecom Regulations Treaty Drafted A new global telecommunications treaty was agreed to on 13
December, during the World Conference on International Telecommunications 2012
(WCIT-12) convened by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), the
United Nations specialised agency for ICT, in Dubai. Attended by nearly 2000
delegates from 193 member states of the ITU, the WCIT-12 was called to review
the 24-year-old International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs), the
current binding treaty to facilitate international interconnection and
ensuring efficiency and public usefulness and availability of information and
communication services. The new draft of the treaty sets out general
principles for ensuring the free flow of information around the world, and
includes new provisions emphasising efforts to assist developing countries
and the right to freedom of expression over ICT networks, and promote
accessibility of ICT technologies for persons with disabilities. The treaty
also contains a resolution to create a single global number for access to
emergency services, and new text mandating greater transparency in the prices
set for mobile roaming. In a statement released at the end of the conference,
Dr Hamadoun I. Touré, Secretary General of the ITU, said, “This treaty
contains many gains and achievements including increased transparency in
international mobile roaming charges and competition, an extremely important
win for consumers.” “Information and communication technologies can now play
a greater role in driving sustainable development, in particular with new
Articles that provide recommendations for dealing with the growing scourge of
e-waste and promoting greater energy efficiency.” The treaty, however, has
only been signed by 89 nations. Disagreement over provisions granting
governments greater control over the internet led to 55 countries either
refusing to sign or reserving the right to sign later. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Laws to
Protect Internet Freedom Required With social networking site Facebook boasting of 1 billion
members globally and micro-blogging site Twitter claiming millions, opinion
was divided on whether the freedom of expression was under threat in the
digital age. "Censorship of content should be the last resort as curbing
a particular content online actually amplifies its spread over the
internet," said Sunil Abraham from Centre for Internet and Society. He
was speaking at a panel discussion organised by London based Index on
Censorship and the Editors Guild of India on the issue at the India
International Centre Tuesday evening. "The government has refused to
amend Section 66(A) of the IT Act which is used to curb free speech on the net,"
said Guild chief TN Ninan who moderated the debate. "The law treats
digital media differently than the print media," he said. Director of
Free Speech Debate, From
http://www.guardian.co.uk/ AFRICA: From
http://www.ventures-africa.com/
Video game consoles like Sony's Playstation 3 and Microsoft's
( MSFT ) X-Box 360 are in the last stages of their product cycles, and this
has led to a decline in sales for video game developers like Electronic Arts
( EA ). EA reported a 19% year-on-year decline in packaged goods revenue in
its last earnings announcement. This might be attributed to the fact the EA
is waiting for the next generation consoles, Playstation 4 and X-Box 720, to
develop video games specifically designed for the platforms. Since the
product cycle hasn't refreshed after 2005, the company has decreased the
number of games released per year from 36 titles in fiscal 2011 to How Can Electronic Arts Capitalize on According to data compiled by Nintendo, Electronic Arts published
the best selling games in Europe and Electronic Arts could boost revenues by as much as 20%, if it
is able to bring Asian revenues to even half the level of North American
revenues. Electronic Arts has a gross profit margin close to 60%. However,
high research and development costs and selling, general and administrative
expenditures lower cash flows. R&D costs are around 30% of revenues for
the last four years and SG&A consumed around 25% of the revenues. We
expect these figures to remain roughly the same in the coming years. However,
gross profit margins might increase due to the fact the Electronic Arts is
shifting to an online sales structure. Digital revenues accounted for 33% of
Electronic Arts's total net revenues in the September quarter of 2011. In
2012, they accounted for 46%. While the exact margin for digital revenues is
not provided by the company, the management has suggested that they offer
higher margins, and we agree with this view. Zynga ( ZNGA ), which is
entirely focused on digital revenues, has margins around 70% and can be used
as a benchmark for Electronic Arts. We expect gross profit margins to
approach 70% by the end of our forecast period. From
http://www.nasdaq.com/ Over 100 million EU citizens would find it easier to use
online public services to look for a job, register a car, submit a tax
declaration and apply for a passport or driving license thanks to new rules
proposed today by the European Commission on the International Day of People
with Disability. The Commission's proposal for a Directive on the
accessibility of public sector bodies' websites would introduce mandatory EU
standardised accessibility features, from the end of 2015, for 12 types of
websites. Mandatory accessibility would apply to essential government
services like social security and health related services, job searches,
university applications and issuing of personal documents and certificates.
The proposed new rules would also clarify what web accessibility means
(technical specs, methodology for assessment, reporting, bottom up testing),
and governments would be encouraged to apply the rules across all services,
not only the mandatory list. From
http://europa.eu/ European
Parliament Endorses First Ever Digital Freedom Strategy With a large majority the European Parliament today adopted
the first ever Digital Freedom Strategy in the EU’s foreign policy. Dutch
Member of European Parliament Marietje Schaake (D66/ALDE) and Rapporteur for
the report is happy with the broad support. Schaake: “The Parliament
unequivocally acknowledges that digital freedoms, like uncensored access to
the internet, are fundamental rights which deserve equal protection as traditional
human rights. I have set out a number of concrete points of action to be
incorporated in the EU’s trade and development policies. New technologies
bring huge opportunities, but people can only really enjoy them if we also
tackle the threats emerging from the rise of ICTs, for example by
authoritarian regimes.” Struggle for human rights Over the past months Schaake has managed to put the
revolutionary impact of the internet and new technologies on societies and
our day-to-day lives on the EU’s political agenda. “The struggle for human
rights increasingly has a technological side”, Schaake says. “Prisons are
populated by dissidents confronted with their own internet and mobile
communications.Irancontinues the building of a virtual bunker, which eventually
will cut off the Iranians from the World Wide Web through the creation of a
‘Halal Internet’. Plans are presented to make anonymous blogging
inChinaillegal andRussiais stepping up the monitoring of online traffic.” Concrete actions Unrestricted access to an open internet is an important
enabler of fundamental rights, an indispensable prerequisite for enjoying
universal human rights such as freedom of expression and freedom of assembly,
and for ensuring transparency and accountability in public life. Schaake’s
report on A Digital Freedom Strategy in EU Foreign Policy includes many
concrete measures. EU’s trade and association agreements, development
programs and accession negotiations should be made conditional on respect for
digital freedoms. Collected digital evidence, like smart phone pictures and
clips of human rights violations should be admissible in court proceedings.
Moreover, the EU should stop the export of digital arms: technologies used by
authoritarian regimes to track and trace human rights activists, journalists
and dissidents. “These kinds of exports toIran and Credibility The EU should help build the basic ICT infrastructure in
developing counties, and provide wireless tablets to enable (online) education.
To be a credible defender and advocate the EU domestically has to maintain
high standards of digital freedom. The strategy calls on the EU to codify the
principle of net neutrality, like the Global player The EU should globally take the lead in promoting and
protecting digital freedoms, Schaake explains. “EU is the world’s largest
trading block, but it is also a community of values. It should use its power
and act as a global player. The global and borderless nature of the Internet
requires new forms of international cooperation and governance with multiple
stakeholders. Technologies should be used to promote transparency and
freedom.” Crowd-sourced report MEP Schaake used an innovative way of writing her report. She
posted a discussion paper online on the EU’s digital freedom strategy in its
external actions, and invited various stakeholders to provide input through
crowd-sourcing. Many internet users, NGO’s, governments and businesses did
so. “This is one of the many opportunities of the Internet: bridging the gap
between citizens and politics”, says Schaake. From
http://www.marietjeschaake.eu/
Boosting the
European ICT Sector - Turning the Spotlight Towards the Next Generation I strongly hope that we will see a shift to a longer-term
perspective on this issue in the months and years to come. Broadband growth
is the key to new services and new jobs, and holds huge potential for
contributing to the EU’s economic recovery. At Huawei, we are eager to
provide the tools European operators need to drive this process forward. As
an ICT industry leader, we are well positioned to provide virtually any kind of
equipment for both fixed and mobile networks. While we are at the forefront
of efforts to pave the way for next-generation networks, we are also
developing solutions to enable existing networks to cope with huge amounts of
data. We have established close cooperation with all the top telecom
operators and will work to take these efforts further in the future. I
believe that our leadership, our expertise and our know-how can be of great
assistance to the European industry as well as to the next generation of ICT
leaders. I would like to make a few points on cyber security in this context.
This issue also ranks high on the Commission’s ‘to-do’ list which sets out
the objectives of preventing cross-border cyber incidents and stimulating a
larger European market for security and privacy-by-design products. Cyber
security is a critical issue which cannot be addressed through a
‘one-size-fits-all’ approach. As information technologies are constantly
evolving, so are cyber risks. We need to look at all stages of the value
chain – from component development and purchasing to assembly and placement
of the final product – and ensure that adequate checks and balances are in
place. This will allow us to manage risks, identify threats and make
adaptations where necessary. Overcoming misconceptions that can make us the target of
protectionist measures is crucial if we want to contribute efficiently to
taking the European ICT sector to the next level. There is one more item on
the EU’s digital task list for the following two years which I would like to
highlight. Investments are needed not only to build next-generation networks,
but also to provide the right set of skills to the next generation of ICT
leaders. The Commission calls for the launch of a grand coalition on digital
skills and jobs to avoid a shortage of skilled personnel: if no action is
taken, an estimated 700 000 ICT jobs could go unfilled by 2015. Huawei has
taken a proactive approach to the development of ICT skills in From
http://www.neurope.eu/ EU Cyber
Security Strategy and Directive Announced Today The European Commission (EC - the executive arm of the
European Union) has finally published its long-awaited European cyber
security strategy, and supported it with a Directive ‘concerning measures to
ensure a high common level of network and information security across the More typical of the industry’s response is that from
Symantec’s Ilias Chantzos, senior director of government affairs, EMEA &
APJ: “Symantec welcomes the EU’s cyber security strategy and shares a
commitment to its broad objectives... it is definitely a step in the right
direction.” John Yeo, EMEA director at Trustwave, takes a more reflexive
view, calling it a curate’s egg. “The threat of harsher penalties for
businesses that fail to protect private individuals’ data will undoubtedly
cause companies to take a closer look at the measures they have in place to
secure sensitive data.” That is a good thing. But he wonders about the EU’s
cost saving claims which state the strategy will “save companies costs of up
to 2.3 billion EUR per year and increase EU GDP by 4% by 2020.” He suspects
that the larger multinationals will benefit the most (despite the fact that
they are the ones objecting the most), but that “the elephant in the room is
the impact on the 23 million SMEs within the EU.” He notes that the EC
already acknowledges that "the most important individual business
constraint reported by SMEs is the compliance with administrative
regulations,” and suspects that this will only make things worse for SMEs.
What isn’t yet known is how the Directive will be implemented in individual
countries, and how many of the 23 million SME’s will be drawn into that third
proposal of the Directive. Who will benefit, he asks. “Security companies,
lawyers and multinational organizations look set to benefit whilst SMEs will
be burdened with more expense in an already strained economic climate.” And
the key question and the fundamental drive behind the strategy: will it help
consumers feel more confident in sharing their data online? “I very much
doubt it,” says John Yeo. “The increased publicity around the data breaches
and associated fines likely to arise from the changes could easily lead to
desensitization, or the belief that suffering a data breach is inevitable.” From
http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/
Trust and
Cooperation Key to EU Cyber Strategy, Says EC The strategy and an accompanying proposal for a Directive on
Network and Information Security (NIS) across the European Union is expected
to be published today, February 7 2013. At the ISSA London 2013 European
conference on February 5, Ann-Sofie Ronnlund the EC’s directorate-general for
communication networks, content and technology, told the audience that due to
increased cyber threats, the European cyber security strategy is focused on
addressing insufficient national preparedness and boosting co-operation
across the EU. “We need to work together to counteract the cyber risks and
the incidents that are happening cross-border. We need to ensure a safe and
resilient digital environment in respect of fundamental rights and EU core
values”, Ronnlund said. The EC strategy has three main aims: to prevent and
fight cybercrime; to strengthen the security and resilience of networks and
information security systems; and to establish a more coherent European cyber
security policy. The proposed legislation on Improve the security of smart grids and industrial control
systems Fight botnets Raise awareness Develop cyber security standards and procurement policies Encourage research investment Develop industrial and technical resources at an EU level The European Cybercrime Centre (EC3) at Europol in From
http://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/
A new analysis - published in November 2012 - shows that the
online communication between citizens and business with the public sector
should be doubled by From
http://www.epractice.eu/ Finland’s
ICT 2015 Group Publishes Recommendations More than 200 experts have contributed to the proposals to
support long-term growth in the Finnish ICT industry. Strategy for ICT sector growth Major proposals in the report include the construction of a
unified national IT architecture which would make it easier to create
electronic services across organisational boundaries. The report also calls
for a ten-year, EUR 20 million programme for research, development and
innovation that would bring together the central players in the industry,
such as universities, research centres, companies and investors. A new
funding programme worth EUR 25-40 million should provide adequate finance for
start-ups and companies in the growth phase. The report also calls for more
training in the games, security and big data sectors of the industry, more research
in the mobile sector, and the creation of an open data ecosystem. From
http://www.investineu.com/ The Constitution of Slovenia guarantees protection of personal
data and From
http://www.i-policy.org/ The Department of Health (DH), From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ NORTH
AMERICA: City planners and their IT teams are setting big goals -- and
facing big challenges -- in the development of tech-enabled "Future
Cities," our survey results show. The global population recently passed
7 billion, and more of us are cramming into the world's cities, putting more
pressure on municipal infrastructures and services. This changing demographic
presents a civic management challenge of unprecedented scope and complexity,
one that requires innovative technologies and well-conceived implementations
to succeed. I live in the InformationWeek's Future Cities Survey, completed in October
by 198 municipal IT pros, reveals that most are still in the early stages of
these efforts. Only 7% of survey respondents describe their city strategies
as progressive and well conceived. More than five times that many, 38%,
describe those strategies as poor or nonexistent. Half say their cities are
somewhere in-between -- well planned in some areas but not others. As a
starting point, metropolitan IT teams are looking to make government run more
smoothly. The most-mentioned area of initial focus, cited by 39% of survey
respondents, is government operations. That includes the systems and
applications used for the business of government, such as 311 and other
IT-enabled public services. Other areas of Future Cities activity are public
safety and crime prevention (30%), communications infrastructure (28%) and
transportation systems (26%). New York City's recently unveiled Domain
Awareness System, co-developed with Microsoft and to be marketed to other
cities, incorporates aspects of all three areas in a citywide surveillance
platform -- to the chagrin of privacy watchdogs. The most sought-after
benefits of city IT planning and implementation are more efficient delivery
of public services (66%), improved infrastructure (44%) and lower costs
(44%). That's the low-hanging fruit. More intriguing is that 36% of
respondents to our survey see Future Cities technology investments improving
quality of life for citizens. For example, the city of Which technologies have the greatest potential to improve
municipal operations? Mobility and bandwidth top the list of our survey
respondents. Mobile devices and apps were rated as having very high or
extremely high potential by 71% of respondents, followed closely by broadband
networks (70%) and wireless services (62%). Many cities are already taking
steps to accommodate smartphone-carrying citizens and visitors. Mayors and other city officials need help from the private
sector to move ahead. When we asked who should lead Future Cities efforts,
the vast majority of respondents (66%) cited public-private collaboration.
The most promising areas for working together are improving K-12 education
(identified as very important or extremely important by 57%), expanding
access to wireless and broadband networks (57%) and ensuring the
cybersecurity of critical infrastructure (54%). Businesses have a stake in
the outcome of these and other Future Cities projects. The most frequently
cited business benefit, mentioned by 69% of survey respondents, is access to
improved municipal infrastructure and services. Other potential benefits
include lower business costs (cited by 45%) and making companies more
competitive (38%). Citizens must be involved as well, and social media is
seen as the best way to facilitate their input. While social media ranked
dead last in our list of 17 technologies that could improve municipal
operations, 60% of respondents say the Web and social media are a prime way
for the public to participate in Future Cities activities, and 53% cite
crowdsourcing technologies. The high marks given to public-private
partnerships and man-on-the-street brainstorming suggest that municipal IT
pros understand that Future Cities programs have their best chance at success
when all stakeholders are involved. To facilitate that discussion, we
launched a new online community, UBM's Future Cities, in October. It's a
place where city leaders and planners, business executives and municipal
technologists can bounce ideas off one another. For example, the site just
posted a conversation with Manny Diaz, president of the U.S. Council of
Mayors and the former mayor of From
http://www.informationweek.com/
Federal IT
Priorities in Obama's Second Term Now that President Obama's second term is under way, the IT
community is looking to federal CIO Steven VanRoekel to shed some light on
technology policy for the next four years. At a Jan. 22 hearing of the House
Oversight and Government Reform Committee, VanRoekel spoke on the topic of
"Wasting Information Technology Dollars: How can the Federal Government
Reform its IT Investment Strategy?" According to a report in fedscoop,
VanRoekel's testimony represented a continuation of priorities set when he
first assumed his position in 2011, following the departure of Vivek Kundra.
The top three IT priorities of the Obama administration are to innovate in
service of the public good, maximize the return from investment in IT and
focus on cybersecurity. “Building on the progress of the last four years, my
objective is to balance cost savings with innovation by continuing to cut
costs while we invest in technology that securely services the American
people,” VanRoekel said. Legislators expressed concern over estimates that
nearly half of federal IT dollars are devoted to maintaining "obsolete
and deficient IT resources." VanRoekel responded that older systems are
actually better insulated from the latest cybersecurity threats, which seem
to focus on taking down newer systems. Also among VanRoekel's stated
priorities, according to Information Week, is a shift from owning physical IT
assets to investing in technology-as-a-service. VanRoekel was joined at the
hearing by Government Accountability Office Director for Information
Technology Management Issues David Powner and former Congressman Tom Davis,
as well as industry representatives from SAP, Brocade, VMWare and Microsoft. From
http://www.govtech.com/ Cyber
Information Sharing Bill Gets New Life in House Although last year's efforts to pass cybersecurity legislation
in Congress were repeatedly stymied by gridlock, the top Republican and
Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee say 2013's a whole new ball
game. Reps. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) and Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.), the
chairman and ranking member of the Intelligence Committee, respectively,
cosponsored one of several cybersecurity bills in the last Congress, the
Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA). It cleared the House,
but died in the Senate in the midst of a White House veto threat. But A more narrowly tailored bill Rogers and Ruppersberger reintroduced CISPA Wednesday in a
form they say is more narrowly tailored and that should solve the previous
privacy concerns the White House and civil liberties groups expressed last
year. As opposed to the more overarching cybersecurity overhaul the Senate
considered in the last Congress, the House Intelligence Committee bill
focuses only on information sharing. The government's intelligence community
would be ordered to come up with a secure way of sharing classified cyber
threat signatures with Internet service providers and other private sector
companies. Those companies, in turn, could voluntarily share threat
signatures with the government and would receive liability protection from
any lawsuits that could otherwise arise from transmitting proprietary data.
But Limited use of information In addition to oversight and an annual report by the
Intelligence Community Inspector General, the revised bill would clamp down
on the government's use of any information it gets from private companies
under the program. Last year's bill, for example, would have let prosecutors
use that shared information in child pornography investigations or matters relating
more broadly to "national security" investigations. This year's
edition says agencies can only use the information they get from the private
sector for "cybersecurity purposes." Nonetheless, the new bill drew
criticism from at least one civil liberties group. The Constitution Project
issued a statement saying it could still be used to authorize domestic spying
and hand over personal information to government agencies. "The
safeguards for privacy rights and civil liberties contained in this cybersecurity
bill are woefully inadequate," said Sharon Bradford Franklin, the
organization's senior policy counsel. "While the goal of protecting our
nation's networks from cyber attacks is a laudable one, Congress must also
address the very real threat this legislation poses to Americans' privacy
rights and civil liberties." Ruppersberger claimed he and Threat level is high The threats, according to Rogers and Ruppersberger, are
two-fold: intellectual property theft and the possibility of destructive
cyber attacks on U.S.-based IT systems. To the first point, Ruppersberger
cited the National Security Agency's estimate that foreign actors stole $300
billion worth of trade secrets from From
http://www.federalnewsradio.com/
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A top government spokesman said Foreign reporters said they hope more facilities will be
provided to assist their reporting on From
http://www.china.org.cn/ Laws Urged
to Cover Theft of Online Data Specific laws are needed to combat the theft of personal data,
according to experts, after seven men were charged in China Daily called one of the owners on the list, who said he
received many unexpected calls from insurance salesmen — but he was surprised
and concerned to hear his own information was actually being sold. "A
thief calling you and standing in front of your home may break in at any
time. That's more dangerous than receiving harassing promotion calls,"
he said. Many laws and regulations cover the issue of private information —
including about 40 enacted by the national legislature, 30 by the State
Council and 200 by ministries, and banking and insurance regulatory
commissions. However, Yang Lixin, a law professor at Renmin University of
China, said the legal framework lacks a clear definition for
private-information protection. "Courts pay less attention to the offense
because there is no detailed explanation or definition on the subject,"
said Yang. Ruan Qilin, a professor at China University of Political Science
and Law, said many suspects arrested in a police crackdown of the crime last
year were released, after the evidence collected failed to be strong enough
to prosecute, because of the weak definitions. Ruan added that From
http://www.china.org.cn/ Huge From
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/
Mobile
Payments to Be Launched in The Fair Trade Commission (FTC) of From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ 2 Zhejiang
Cities Launch TWO cities in Zhejiang Province have launched a From
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/
From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Web Use
for Campaigns to Be Liberalized Political parties have agreed to liberalize use of the
Internet for election campaigning ahead of this summer's House of Councillors
vote, a move that could significantly change the landscape of campaigning in
both national and local elections. The ruling Liberal Democratic Party and
the main opposition Democratic Party of Japan have compiled respective bills
to revise the Public Offices Election Law and other related laws and will
soon begin interparty talks on the revision. Most parties have agreed on such
points as liberalizing the use of e-mail and social networking services (SNS)
for election campaigns. At the plenary session of the House of
Representatives on Thursday, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe demonstrated his
forward-looking stance toward using the Internet for such purposes. "The
Internet is an effective way to convey opinions to a large number of
people," Abe said. "After each party discusses the issue, I'll make
efforts to allow [Internet] use in election campaigns as soon as
possible." Although political parties agreed on steps to liberalize
Internet use for campaigns before the 2010 upper house election, no
legislative action was taken. Since then, there has been huge growth in the
number of users of SNS sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Under these
circumstances, parties held internal debates over the extent of Internet
liberalization for campaigns and considered measures against defamation,
deception and other malicious actions. The resulting draft compiled Thursday
by the LDP included the following steps toward liberalization: -- Election campaigns using e-mail and websites will be
liberalized for candidates, parties and others. -- Legal penalties will be devised for posting false information
and defamation against candidates on the Internet. The draft also stipulates that only political parties will be
allowed to post paid campaign advertisements on the Internet. Keeping up with the times The parties agreed in 2010 guidelines to bar e-mail use and
seek voluntary restraint on Twitter use for election campaigns. However,
these days, with an increasing number of people using both e-mail and SNS,
political parties are considering liberalizing both for election campaigns.
However, as sending unsolicited e-mails may annoy voters, the parties' drafts
include different restrictions for the use of e-mail. The LDP draft states
e-mail can be sent only to people who agree in advance to receive them. The
DPJ draft stipulates that sending e-mail to an unspecified number of people
would be allowed, but not to people who decline to receive them. Regarding
online advertising for campaign runs, the DPJ and Your Party proposed
allowing parties as well as individual candidates to place paid Internet ads
that are within the range of legally permitted expenses for election
campaigns. After the parties work out the details of such points, the LDP
aims to submit the bill to revise the law with opposition parties by the end
of February and to pass it during the current Diet session. If the bill is
passed, Internet use for election campaigning will be liberalized in time for
this summer's upper house election, and will apply to all future votes,
including local elections. The move to allow parties to use the Internet for
election campaigns is expected to lead to a change in strategies to appeal to
voters. "Candidates with little name recognition and parties with weak
organizations will be able to attract voters' attention, especially young
people," a junior DPJ member said. However, an LDP member said, "I
think the effects [of using the Internet for campaigning] will be limited, in
addition to costing a lot of time and money." In other countries,
including the From
http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/ NFC-Based
Guide App Launched in The Government of Tokyo, Japan, has launched a mobile app for Android-based
smartphones to help residents with special mobility needs find their way
around From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Cabinet approval for Mongolia’s first satellite in late 2012 makes
clear the height of the country’s ambitions for improving information and
communications technology (ICT) provisions. Although a satellite launch is an
ambitious objective, improving on-the-ground infrastructure will prove to be
just as significant, and as challenging. In November, the cabinet approved
the “National Satellite for Communications of Mongolia” project, the
centrepiece of a collection of goals identified as part of a national vision
to transform the economy into a knowledge-based economy by 2021. Although the
country has long relied upon space communications to link its widely
distributed population, there is no domestic satellite in service. Instead, $ It has been anticipated that the satellite project will earn
some $ Currently, 175 soums (villages) out of 331 are connected by From
http://www.i-policy.org/ |
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The Information and Communications Technology Office of the
Department of Science and Technology (DOST-ICTO) unveiled its upcoming
flagship programme called “Smarter Philippines”, which aims to leverage ICT
to boost the country’s economy by touching on several core industries.
According to Alejandro Melchor III, deputy executive director for ICT
industry development at the ICTO, the “Smarter Philippines” consists of the
following components: Smarter Governance, Smarter People, Smarter High-Tech
Industry, Smarter Computing, Smarter SMEs, Smarter Agriculture World
Development, Smarter Environmental Healthcare, Energy and Transport, Smarter
Disaster and Mitigation, Public Safety and While the programme is yet to be launched, Melchor revealed
that some of its components are now in operation in key areas such as
disaster risk reduction, transparency and governance, and in bringing IT-BPO
investments in cities outside of Metro Manila. For disaster risk reduction,
DOST launched the “National Operational Assessment of Hazards (NOAH)
Programme which aims to respond to the urgent need for a reliable flood
warning system in all major river systems and watersheds in the country. It
is designed to set up a more responsive disaster preparedness system to
reduce loss of lives, and damages to properties due to rain-triggered natural
hazards. Just last month, a mobile version of the programme was launched so
that Filipinos can access information relevant to current weather conditions
right on the palm of their hands. Meanwhile, under its Smarter Cities
component, the government is pushing for its Next Wave Cities Programme,
which seeks to create employment opportunities in the countryside by
promoting different provinces as suitable BPO destinations. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Philippine
City to Computerise Land Titles Lucena City branch’s Registry of Deeds in Quezon, the From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The The Home Development Mutual Fund (HDMF), or more commonly
known in the Philippines as the Pag-IBIG fund, launched the ‘Pag-IBIG Citi
Prepaid Card’ as part of its efforts to provide more than 12 million fund
members a more convenient and secure way of receiving and using their loan
benefits. HDMF is the provident financial institution in the From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) is targeting to roll-out
the pilot phase of its enhanced electronic Tax Information System (eTIS) in
the National Capital Region by July as part of the agency’s continuing
efforts to enhance tax administration in the country. The eTIS is one of the sub-components
of the BIR’s US$54.3 million Revenue Administration Reform Project (RARP) which
aims to increase tax revenues over time and address issues posed by
corruption, tax administration inefficiencies and lack of transparency, by
introducing state of the art technologies to enhance the country’s overall
tax administration system. The implementation of eTIS will entail a reengineering
of BIR’s core business processes to provide a fully efficient and enhanced
tax administration that can be used by the agency nationwide. Once the system
is in place, it is expected to improve the trustworthiness of actions and
decisions based on tax data. These, in turn, will improve tax compliance
monitoring, reduce client contact and opportunities for negotiated
assessments, increase the detection of misreporting and enhance the value of
reports. Furthermore, improved compliance, audit and enforcement tools
are expected to contribute to a sustainable program of tax administration
leading to increased tax revenue collection. According to BIR Commissioner
Kim S. Jacinto-Henares, once the eTIS is rolled out in the National Capital
Region, the agency hopes it can fully implement the system nationwide by
mid-2014. "We really want to automate our operations to lessen
face-to-face transactions, therefore reducing the opportunities for
corruption, and to make the process of paying taxes easier,” she said.
"This digitisation will also help us obtain, track, and analyse data
faster, giving us more information that we can use in refining our operations
and improving our revenue collection.” From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The "Do Not Call" registry will allow people to opt
out of receiving intrusive marketing messages like telemarketing calls, faxes
as well as text and multi-media messages including those sent via smart phone
applications such as WhatsApp and Viber. The committee, on the other hand, is
established to advise the commission on matters relating to the key roles,
administration and enforcement of the Act. "During the transition
period, the commission will work closely with sectoral regulators and
associations to help organizations comply with the act to adjust their data
protection practices, and embark on public education and engagement programs
to help consumers better understand how they may protect their own personal
data from misuse," local media Channel NewsAsia quoted Leong Keng Thai,
chairman of the commission, as saying. According to earlier report, the act covers
all private sector organizations engaged in data activities within From
http://news.xinhuanet.com/ True Corp plans to launch AIS chief executive Wichian Mektrakarn said that at this
stage, AIS has focused on the Last year AIS, DTAC and TrueMove test-launched the
non-commercial From
http://www.nationmultimedia.com/
From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Thai Govt
Expands Free Wi-Fi Project to the Province From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Ending the long-awaited licences for From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Electronic Government Agency (EGA) under Thai ICT Ministry has
recently announced its progress and plan for 2013 to further enhance the development
and use of Government Cloud. Dr Sak Segkhoonthod, President and CEO of the
EGA announced that the EGA’s focus in 2013 will be to provide more Software
as a Service (SaaS), creating a Government Application Centre (GAC), and
pushing forward Open Government IT project to further integrate data and
services for citizens, and lastly implementing ‘Smart Box’ programme to
connect with and deliver government services for remote communities. “SaaS
will be the key system on our G-Cloud, while the GAC will become the centre
of applications for public sector,” he said and added that the development of
GAC is expected to be launched at the third quarter of this year. The past
year, the EGA already prepared necessary enterprise architecture for the
GAC’s network, and liaised with several agencies in preparedness for the
official launch, according to him. Regarding the integration of government IT project under Open
Government initiative, Dr Segkhoonthod said that we have seen major
collaborations for service and data consolidation among key ministries and
agencies for the past year, such as the recent launch of ‘One ID Card for
Smart Farmers’ programme, in collaboration with Agriculture and Cooperatives
Ministry, the ICT Ministry, Interior Ministry, and Natural Resources and
Environment Ministry. “Other major collaborations will be made available to
cover public health, social welfare, education and several others,” he added
and explained that agencies can use the Application Programming Interface
(API) created by the EGA to further develop their own system. Launched in
April 2012, “There have been total of thirty three agencies benefiting
from the G-Cloud as of now,” Dr Segkhoonthod said. This year, the EGA will
increase its investment on G-Cloud and aims to service sixty more projects.
Dr Segkhoonthod also announced that the EGA has successfully linked 1,199
government agencies from national, provincial, and regional levels, to the
Government Information Network (GIN) over the G-Cloud and support services
such as Government Financial Management Information System (GFMIS),
Teleconference. The EGA planned to expand the connection further to 2,000
more agencies, and initiate two more new services including Flood Alert
System and GIN Web Conference. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ An installation of analytic software will help integrate data
from CCTVs of different sources, said Thai ICT Minister Group Captain Anudith
Nakornthap. Following last week’s task given by the Thai Prime Minister over
the possibility of integrating CCTVs networks nationwide to boots security
operations, narcotic solution, and traffic control, the ICT Minister told
reporters that the ministry is likely to suggest the use of smart analytic
software to connect all CCTVs networks owned by different agencies via data
centre. "The use of software and the new system will be shared among
related agencies, without replacing the existing CCTVs," he added and
said that this solution will reduce the countrywide investment cost on CCTVs
by 50 per cent. The ICT Ministry will be responsible on procuring the
software, and IT related issue, while the use of the system will depend upon
the tasks of each agencies, according to him. The ministry is now pushing
forward an establishment of joint committee with the ministry of Interior,
Defence, and the Royal Thai Police to finalise this project. The minister
expected to summerise the solution and present the project at the cabinet
meeting by end of February. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The National Assembly switched its focus to the approval of
new and amended laws on Friday after debating development projects since the
ongoing session opened last Tuesday. Members began by discussing the draft of
a Law on Electronic Transactions, which is required for But the management of such transactions remains a challenge
because the existing laws and regulations do not cover issues related to
consumer protection, the electronic certification of licences, and the
recognition of electronic documents. It has become essential for The draft law comprises 10 parts and 55 articles. The first part
refers to the purpose of the law and government policy in relation to
electronic transactions, and gives explanations of the vocabulary used. The
second part talks about electronic documents and agreements, the third covers
electronic licences, the fourth talks about electronic transactions within
government organisations, the fifth covers mediation, the sixth relates to
prohibitions, the seventh discusses the settlement of disputes relating to
electronic transactions, the eighth talks about management and inspection,
and the ninth part talks about policies for those who perform well in this
field and measures to be taken against violators. From
http://www.vientianetimes.org.la/
The Vietnam Customs officially launched its electronic customs
(e-customs) procedures nationwide as part of the agency’s 2020 development strategy
which aims to reduce the manual and checking of goods from the current rate
of 15-20 per cent to under 10 per cent by 2015, and further decrease it to 7
per cent and below by 2020. According to Deputy Head of the General
Department of Customs’ Reform Board Tran Quoc Dinh, the initiative comes
after seven years since the country first introduced e-customs procedures in
customs offices located in Hoh Chih Min city and the northern From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The State Bank of Vietnam (SBV) has issued a circular that
mandates the formal creation of a national credit information database to
give credit institutions an oversight of the industry and to help them
achieve efficiency in their internal operations. The circular governs the
State Bank’s departments and entities, the SBV branches of provinces and the
cities directly under the central government, credit institutions and foreign
bank branches, borrowers and other relevant stakeholders. According to an
official statement from SBV, the national credit information database aims to
support SBV’s role in managing and supervising banking operations in the
country, help credit institutions prevent and mitigate risks in their
operations and assist borrowers to get access to bank loans, thereby contributing
to the socio-economic development. The circular is expected to take effect on
1st of July, 2013. From http://www.futuregov.asia/
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Information Minister Hasanul Huq Inu on Monday said work to
formulate various guidelines is underway to ensure more freedom of the mass
media. “The mass media are enjoying freedom in From http://www.unbconnect.com From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Creating
World Class IT Infrastructure in HP is the global leader in IT. The company also has a
significant presence in India.What is your outlook on the government market
in The e-Governance field has made lot of progress during the
last few years. What kind of work is HP doing in the e-Governance area? In
e-Governance area, we have done fairly extensive amount of work. We look at
the e-Governance vertical from the state perspective, centre perspective and
the PSU perspective. We distinguish between the three verticals because
different kinds of solutions are required for each. In the centre, we have
organisations like the UIDAI, the NIC and many e-learning portals that are
doing excellent e-Governance work. The centre decides the policies and
framework in accordance to which the e-Governance solutions are developed and
implemented. The power reforms that have been undertaken during the last few
years have led to a lot of e-Governance happening in the sector. The
Accelerated Power Development & Reforms Programme (APDRP) has been
very successful. The banking and insurance sector is also growing very fast in
the country. The government is
also taking lot of new initiatives in the name of financial inclusion. How is
BFSI sector doing for you? In the Banking, Financial Services and Insurance
(BFSI) area we enjoy a pretty good market share. We are doing lot of hard
work in this area. We would appreciate if the government could speed up the
process of new solutions development and deployments. There are some large
tenders that we got more than one or two years ago, and now we are waiting
for them to take off. We are the lowest bidder for these projects. The price
at which we are prepared to work is highly competitive. Please tell us about the ways in which the rupee-dollar
fluctuations are having an impact on your business? Some of our government
bids were placed when the dollar was hovering in the range of Rs. 44-45.
Manpower can be managed, but on the customs duty we have no control. We are
struggling due to the dollar-rupee price fluctuations. We are working in
various government ministries to find out ways by which we can manage the
rapid currency fluctuations. It is not only us; no OEM can absorb such high
fluctuations. That is one of the reasons that some of the large and complex
projects we execute take a lot of time and the organisation goes into making
losses. The PSUs are more manageable. It is rare for any PSU tender to go on
for more than one year. Even in states the projects get executed in a more
timely manner, probably because there could be lot few pulls and pressures
being faced by regional governments. In the last two years we have seen lot of new initiatives
coming up. We have projects like the UIDAI and many others being launched by
the government. What are the ways by which such projects have contributed to
the growth of the government market? Earlier we used to have small teams
based out of What is your view of the kind of work that HP is doing? HP is the only organisation which has
such a wide range of products and solutions. We are offering a range of
devices, technologies, desktop to laptop to handheld devices, server,
storage, networking and much more. So we are the only company that has all the
software tools, which can be managed and optimised to the last dot. Then, we
have technological services and enterprise services to ensure our delivery
capability to deliver from a normal project to most complex project, which
may be required in government. We are in a position where we can work it out
and help the government. What is the impact of your solutions? Can you give
us some examples where your solutions are at work? We have executed the
e-Procurement Project for the Government of Karnataka. We have done the
entire e-Procurement for them. Karnataka is the first state in the country to
have the e-procurement system. We did implement this project and the impact
today is so paramount that this is rated as one of the best e-auction and
e-procurement sites across In the BFSI space, creating the core banking solutions have
been the thrust area. It has created bid e-inclusion. We have done work for
Bank of Baroda and Bank of India. Another project that I would like to
mention is the one that we have done for the Director General of Employment
and Training (DGET). This is a vocational training programme, one that is
dedicated to creating skilled workforce for crop mixing and other things. We
have also worked with the NIC very closely for the completion of large and
complex IT projects. The projects that we have done with the NIC are now
being used by government departments at the centre and in the states. Going
forward, how do you see the business outlook changing in Currently our population is close to one billion; it could
even be more than one billion. To cater to the needs of so many people you
need high-end technological solutions. We need to develop and implement
technologies that will enable us to make a difference in the life of every
human being. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Goa’s New
IT Policy to Have Thrust on ESDM Sector CM “It is our patriotic duty to promote manufacturing of
electronic systems design products in This session was followed by a panel discussion on “ From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Sanjaya Dayananda, head of Microsoft business at MillenniumIT
said Lync has a secure and reliable communication system works with existing
tools and systems for easier management and lower cost of ownership. "In
this project, MillenniumIT has proven their capability and in some cases
exceeded our expectations throughout the implementation process," Senaka
Harischandra, chief information officer of MAS Holdings said in a statement.
"With this implementation MAS expects a significant reduction in time
and cost of travel between the factories and office sites situated both
locally and overseas, resulting in greater productivity and speed all
round." From
http://www.lankabusinessonline.com
Deputy Immigration Controller Hamid Fathulla said on Sunday
that with the introduction of the Passenger Information System (PIS),
Immigration would receive information on passengers before their arrival in From
http://www.haveeru.com.mv |
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From
http://en.trend.az/ Broadband
Internet Development Project in Approval of the project on development of broadband Internet
in From
http://en.trend.az/ Azerbaijani
Communications and IT Ministry Announces Plans for 2013 As 2013 has been declared the Year of ICT in From
http://en.trend.az/ Azerbaijani
IT Company Presents Tax Administration Modernization Project in "e-Government creation experience based on example of
Azerbaijani IT company SINAM's tax administration modernization project
(ITAS) and technological innovations of Oracle information technologies"
conference was held in Bishkek, the company said today. According to the
Information Policy Department of Kyrgyz Government, representatives of
presidential apparatus, parliament, government, donor community, banks and
other institutions and companies were invited to participate at the
conference. The purpose of the event - acquaintance with available experience
on creation of e-government at the regional and global levels, further
development perspectives, finding the ways of bilateral cooperation in this
direction. It should be noted that presently state bodies of It should be noted that, for the first time in From
http://en.trend.az/ Information
Kazakhstan 2020 Draft Program Approved At today's meeting the Сabinet approved the draft state-run
program Information Kazakhstan 2020. Transport and Communications Minister
Askar Zhumagulov tabled the document. The program is purposed to introduce
information and communication technologies in all economic sectors. It will
let solve tasks in order to raise efficiency of public administration system
and contribute to the development of the country's information space. The
draft program foresees further implementation of modern communication
technologies, digital television, and active use of new technologies. From
http://engnews.gazeta.kz/ A From
http://en.trend.az/ The Deputies of the Majlisi Namoyandagon ( From
http://en.trend.az/ The law 'On mass media' has come into force in Turkmenistan
establishing regulations for collection, dissemination of information,
determining rights, obligations and responsibilities of individuals,
journalists and entities, as well as regulating their activities, an official
Turkmen source said on Monday. The article of the law states that the right
to establish a mass media institution belongs to state administration bodies,
local executive authorities and local self-government, political parties and
other public associations, legal entities and Turkmen citizens who have
reached the age of 18, or their associations. The state guarantees the right
of mass media for freedom of expression. 'No one can prohibit or prevent the
media from disseminating information of public interest', the law says.
Turkmen citizens have the right to use any form of mass media to express
their opinions and beliefs, search, receive and disseminate information. The
new law also guarantees free access of Turkmen citizens to the reports and
materials of the foreign mass media. Turkmen government policy is based on
the principles of banning: media censorship except in cases stipulated by the
country's legislation; creation of bodies for preliminary control of
information; influencing entities, preparing and distributing information and
pressurising journalists to present incorrect and biased information in the
media. The law also noted that the liability grounds for media abuse are:
using information of the media which happens to be state or other secrets
protected by law; an appeal to the violent change of constitutional order,
propaganda of war, violence and cruelty, racial, ethnic or religious hatred,
discrimination or intolerance, distribution of pornography and other criminal
acts. From
http://en.trend.az/ From
http://en.trend.az/ |
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Earlier
today, my colleague Graeme Philipson wrote of the establishment of the
Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) to be an amalgam of Defence's Cyber
Security Operations Centre, the Attorney-General's Computer Emergency
Response Team (CERT) Australia, ASIO's Cyber Espionage Branch, elements of
the AFP's High-Tech Crime Operations capability and all-source assessment
analysts from the Australian Crime Commission, according to the Federal
Government's much anticipated posture document on the future of Australia's
National Security. Showing the extreme importance of cyber security, we find
the announcement featured prominently on page 40 of the 44 page document.
Accepting that this is the Federal Government's current position on Cyber
Security, iTWire asked a number of industry experts for their thoughts. Adam
Biviano, Senior Manager, Strategic Products, Trend Micro ANZ was generally in
favour, "Trend Micro welcomes the Government's initiative as an
important move in the fight against cyber crime. "Law
enforcement and governments have always played cat and mouse with criminals.
The reality is that while there is money to be made from attacking computer
systems, then criminals will never give up." Biviano continued,
"Combining the key agencies into a single centre is a sensible approach.
"With cyber crime, accurate intelligence is critical for implementing
strategies to effectively tackle the problem. Having a centralised strategy
to stave off cyber attacks. Combine this with the law making and enforcement
capability of government and you have the foundation for a solid security
strategy." In a press release, the Australian Computer Society agreed,
"Besides The risk to critical infrastructure including banking and
finance, emergency services, energy and utilities, food, health care, IT and
communications, mass gatherings transportation and water, there is also a
significant economic risk arising from cyber crime and terrorism. In our past
submissions to the government the ACS have made the case that the best form
of defence is for the Government to regulate and control practitioners who
lead and manage our nations' ICT based critical infrastructure." AVG's
Security Advisor, Michael McKinnon agrees, "The establishment of the
Australian Cyber Security Centre is encouraging, and not at all surprising
given this follows a worldwide trend at the moment." McKinnon continued,
"For example, the European Cybercrime Centre announced earlier this
month, and "The
ACS will continue our work with the government, industry and ICT
practitioners to further the understanding of cyber security in To address
this, I would point out that having a number of organisations all covering
the gamut of research, investigations, technical advice and remediation work
is somewhat wasteful and broadly, I would agree with the proposal. But (and
there's always a but!). My concern is that we are very likely to be pushing a
lot of civilian-focussed work into an organisation that must, by its very
design be subject to all kinds of military-style security levels and
restrictions. Prime Minister Gillard's document tends to dwell more strongly
on the Government's requirements in this area to the possible detriment of
private industry. And the more DoD-based the organisation becomes, the harder
it will be for third-party organisations (equipment and service providers,
for instance) to get a seat at the table. Trend Micro's Biviano seems to
agree with this assessment, "I would be keen to understand further how
the new ACSC will interact with not only other tiers of government but also
business. It will be interesting to see what tactical actions the ACSC delivers
over the medium to longer term. What interfaces will it create for other
tiers of government, and businesses? As there is a wealth of intelligence to
be shared, what will be their interaction strategy with the private security
industry?" Echoing this emphasis on private industry, AVG's McKinnon
adds, "For Business and From
http://www.itwire.com Cloud Computing Trial
to Be Launched in The
Government of the State of New South Wales (NSW), From http://www.futuregov.asia Victorian
Government Reveals Revamped ICT Strategy During the
last two decades or so, successive Victorian Governments have been keen on
ICT industry strategy, but the Baillieu Government has now revealed how it
plans to improve its own use of technology. Announcing the Victorian
Government's new ICT strategy, the Assistant Treasurer and Technology
Minister Gordon Rich-Phillips said the 50-point action plan had been
developed following rigorous consultation with industry and the public. He
also took the opportunity to criticise the previous Brumby Government for
what he said was "at least $1.44 billion of taxpayers' money wasted in
cost blowouts on projects like HealthSMART, myki and the LEAP database."
The strategy notes the changes in Victorians' expectations about the use of
ICT to communicate with governments. While 78% of Australian internet users
accessed government services or information online in 2011, almost one-third
of Victorians were no more than somewhat satisfied with their last online
engagement with government. There's
also the increasing access to high-speed broadband (though the NBN only
warrants a single mention by name, and that's tucked away on the
Acknowledgements page), Big Data, the desire to think again about which ICT
services should be delivered in-house, and alleged gaps in ICT leadership,
governance and skills. Measures planned by the Victorian Government include
greater use of apps and mobile-friendly web sites, improved information
sharing between systems (with due attention to privacy, security, etc),
further release of Government datasets where appropriate (either free or at
minimal cost), and the use of interactive or social technologies for the
co-design and co-production of public services. The Government also intends
to bolster its project management and project assurance capability, adopt
modern delivery techniques such as Agile, engage with suppliers earlier and
more flexibly, reuse systems wherever possible, withdraw from direct delivery
of infrastructure services, and improve internal technical and governance
capability. " From http://www.itwire.com New
Standards Impose Rigorous Process for E-Waste Disposal New
standards designed to help divert e-waste from landfill by imposing a rigorous
process for its collection, storage, and recycling have been set by Standards
Australia. The new, joint Australian and New Zealand Standard, ‘AS/NZS
5377:2013 Collection, storage, transport and treatment of end-of-life
electrical and electronic equipment’, outlines minimum requirements for the
safe and environmentally sound handling of e-waste. Colin Blair, Chief
Executive Officer, Standards Australia, said the standard sets out principles
and minimum requirements for end-of-life electrical equipment in order to
maximise re-use, reduce the amount of waste going to landfill, safeguard
worker health, and minimise environmental harm. “The standard states that a
lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for
postponing measures to prevent environmental degradation or adverse health
and safety effects. The standard sends a strong message regarding the
environmental concerns of e-waste.” According
to Blair, the standard recognises that there are laws in place regulating how
to comply with occupational health and safety requirements and environmental
performance, and that Senator
Farrell said that householders and businesses could drop off unwanted e-waste
products “confident that the valuable materials they contain will be
recovered, and that any hazardous materials will not enter the environment.”
He said the standard also provided environmentally-effective guidelines for
industry and would help ensure that, from 1 July 2014, at least 90 per cent
of all materials in e-waste collected under the National Television and
Computer Recycling Scheme were recovered for use in new products.” From http://www.itwire.com NSW Government - Plan
Will Make The NSW
Government says it will make Mr Stoner
said the high-level Taskforce established to develop the action plan had
identified the “critical need for NSW to build on its digital strengths,”
with the sector playing a vital role in enabling innovation and productivity
gains across other priority sectors in the NSW economy. “The Taskforce
identified 50 actions for industry and government across seven areas
including digital leadership and skills, connecting regional communities,
open data innovation, growing The
Minister said the NSW Government would work with industry to pursue the
priority actions for the digital economy over the next 12 months: •
Introduce Innovate NSW, a new $6.7 million initiative to support deeper
collaboration to address the State’s key challenges and opportunities • Identify
actions to make it easier for all businesses, including SMEs, to bid for
government goods and services procurement contracts • Pilot
Smart Work Hubs to increase opportunities for teleworking •
Implement the NSW Government’s Open Data initiative as part of the NSW
Government ICT Strategy • Partner
with the Committee for • Continue
to roll out free and reliable internet access via WiFi hotspots to 139
country libraries across the State under the NSW State Library’s four-year
Revitalising Regional Libraries program, and • Continue
to implement the NSW State Library’s major digitisation program for its
collection and upgrade of its digital infrastructure. “ Wightwick
also said that the action plan offered solutions to a range of issues
impacting growth in the digital economy including export opportunities, innovation,
productivity, investment, skills, employment and workforce participation,
business conditions and global competitiveness. “Looking forward, only those
who can most effectively adopt and exploit opportunities to transform the way
they do business, develop new products and services, improve efficiency and
better serve their customers will be leaders in the global digital economy.”
Mr Stoner said the centrepiece of the Government’s response to the industry
action plan was a new framework underpinning economic development in NSW and
immediate actions government and industry would take to address the priority
issues highlighted by the taskforces. From http://www.itwire.com ITU Stalemate Could
Spur National Regulation Academics
warn of inevitable fragmentation of internet controls. The world's major
Internet companies, backed by An
increasing number of nations are alarmed about Internet-based warfare,
international cybercrime or internal dissidents' use of so-called "over-the-top"
services such as Twitter and Facebook that are outside the control of
domestic telecom authorities. Many hoped that the ITU would prove the right
forum to set standards or at least exchange views on how to handle their
problems. But the United States' refusal to sign the treaty even after all
mention of the Internet had been relegated to a side resolution may have
convinced other countries that they have to go it alone, delegates said.
"This could lead to a balkanisation of the Internet, because each
country will have its own view on how to deal with over-the-top players and
will regulate the Internet in a different way," said another European
delegate, who would speak only on condition anonymity. Without HARD LINE
IN NEGOTIATIONS Spurred on
by search giant Google and others, the Americans took a hard line against an
alliance of countries that wanted the right to know more about the routing of
Internet traffic or identities of Web users, including Russia, and developing
countries that wanted content providers to pay at least some of the costs of
transmission. The West was able to rally more countries against the ITU
having any Internet role than agency officials had expected, leaving just 89
of 144 attending nations willing to sign the treaty immediately. They also
endorse a nonbinding resolution that the ITU should play a future role
guiding Internet standards, along with private industry and national
governments. Some delegates charged that the Americans had planned on
rejecting any treaty and so were negotiating under false pretenses. "The
But the
suspicion underscores the unease greeting the A more
immediate prospect is stricter national regulations requiring Internet
service providers and others to help monitor, report and censor content, a
trend that has already accelerated since the Arab Spring revolts. Jonathan
Zittrain, co-founder of In the
meantime, activists concerned about new regulation can assist by spreading
virtual private network technology, which can national controls, Zittrain
said. Backup hosting and distribution could also be key, he said. "We
can devise systems for keeping content up amidst filtering or denial-of-service
attacks, so that a platform like Twitter can be a genuine choice for someone
in From http://www.itnews.com.au NSW Govt Plan to Make
The NSW
Government has detailed its strategy to boost the state's digital economy, as
part of the O'Farrell administration's plan to help the state adapt to
disruptive innovation and increasing competition from emerging economies. The
Industry Action Plan for the Digital Economy, released by Deputy Premier and
Minister for Trade and Investment Andrew Stoner, includes a $6.7 million
innovation initiative to identify opportunities and challenges for the state,
as well as smart work hubs and the implementation of the NSW Government's
open data initiative. The State will also seek to raise the profile of Victor
Perton, former Commissioner to the The
taskforce that developed the plan is being led by director of IBM Research,
Glenn Wightwick. "The Action Plan offers solutions to a range of issues
impacting growth in the digital economy including export opportunities,
innovation, productivity, investment, skills, employment and workforce
participation, business conditions and global competitiveness,"
Wightwick said. "The Government has shown its interest and willingness
to respond, but we still need to see the action and how real and effective
the initiatives are", said Ross Dawson, a futurist who has written
extensively on the global digital workforce. He added that From http://www.itnews.com.au Justice
Minister Judith Collins is to outline new measures to curb cyber bullying
within the next few weeks. Her intentions were signalled yesterday after
Rotorua coroner Wallace Bain repeated calls for laws to be urgently
introduced to control digital bullying in light of another teenager taking
her life after she set up a Facebook page targeting herself. Dr Bain found
that 17-year-old Micaela Pinkerton-Stothers from Tokoroa took her own life on
July 24, 2011 - the day after she and her boyfriend split up. It was first
believed she might have taken her life because of cyber bullying as a rumour
page on Facebook had hateful messages posted stating Micaela had had an
abortion. However, during the inquest into her death, one of her friends said
the pair had set up a gossip rumour page, with her posting the hurtful
messages herself, using another name. Micaela appeared distressed by the
rumours, crying to family and telling them she was being bullied. Dr Bain
said it appeared Micaela had not been targeted by bullies. However,
in his findings, he highlighted a story that ran in Rotorua's Daily Post
about a gossip page that was naming and shaming local youth, and another case
involving 15-year-old Hayley-Ann Fenton, who took her own life after being
sent threatening messages from her former boyfriend's wife. Dr Bain said
cyber and text bullying was a worrying trend and there needed to be law
reform on the issue. He repeated previous calls for "laws to control
cyber bullying and cyber communication to be brought forward as a matter of
some urgency".Rotorua Facebook pages, now removed, have named people as
drug abusers and thieves. Dr Bain said young people were extremely vulnerable
to cyber and text bullying, sometimes resulting in their taking their own
lives. The inquest raised very unusual aspects including the setting up of
the Facebook page with the responses monitored. " ... in the court's
opinion, it simply reinforces the unsettled state of mind Micaela was
in." Another
issue was what young people needed to do if they received a suicidal-type
message from a friend, Dr Bain said. "Time and again a close friend will
send these messages and within a short period of time, will have committed
suicide. Young people are concerned about not breaching confidences ... yet
on the other hand, after the event, all wish they had been able to do
something about it and possibly got their friends some help." A
spokeswoman for Ms Collins' office said the minister had asked the Law
Commission to fast-track a review of the laws around telecommunications and
the internet. The minister is due to take those recommendations to Parliament
in the next two weeks. A public announcement due this month will include new
laws regarding incitement to instigate suicide whether the person commits
suicide or not, and updating existing digital laws. From http://www.nzherald.co.nz |
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E-Democracy:
Isn’t It a Key to Cease Corruption? It is now extensively accepted that Information and
Communication Technologies (ICTs) have an important role in national
development. The developmental prospective of information and communication
technologies have been broadly discussed in the scientific literature but we
still lack conceptual precision on the role of ICTs for success and failure
of national development process. In recent times ICT is exploit by citizens
and civil society for networking and improve advocacy and mobilization, local
and globally. Blogs, Facebook and online communities create new modes of
social contact. The use of ICT has influenced social movements and has also
had an effect on the social life and democratic freedoms in some societies.
The existing explanation of freedom and democracy, by the UN Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, states that every individual have rights to free
communication, religious and political participation, and to engage in
economic activity. These rights are defined as political, economic, and
religious freedoms. Many scholars connect political freedoms with
constitutional democracy (the right of individuals to elect their
governments). ICT offer new tools for well-organized public contribution in
the democratic process in the form of e-democracy, e-government, e-voting and
the propagation of opinions, thoughts, ideas, and rallying social action
about things that concern society. At present ICT can be used to improve the
democratic process in the form of e-government in which citizens are able to
effectively impact the decision-making process in a judicious approach within
and between institutions. In government, ICT not only can increase
accountability and transparency, and counter corruption through more
proficient administration and increased flows of information but also
strengthen good governance and improve interaction between government and
citizens. E-democracy can be closely defined as “e-administration”, where ICT
serves to modernize inter-governmental relations and flows of information
with the view to improve government services, transactions, and interactions
with citizens, businesses, and other arms of governments. E-democracy can
facilitate better service to citizens by: •Offering information via government web pages; •Facilitating access to government services, and; •Developing depersonalized services which reduce risk for
corruption. Generally, one can differentiate between three levels of ICT
use to advance democratic processes at the national level: 1.ICTs within government, with a view to improve efficiency in
interactions and information flows between government departments and state
organs. 2.ICTs in the interface between government and citizens, with
a view to improving interaction and feedback between government and citizens. 3.ICTs for empowerment of citizens and civil society
organizations. Presently, From
http://blogs.thenewstribe.com/
Government-backed
Monopoly May Be Needed for Broadband Networks, ITU Says A huge upfront cost to fibre optic networks around the world
means oliogopoly or monopoly situations may have to be accepted in many markets,
the UN standards agency says. Ever wonder what the industry leaders of the
telecommunications industry think the future holds for the future of ICT?
Well a 35-page report on the outcomes of discussions like that can be
downloaded from the International Telecommunications Union. Commonly known as
ITU Telecom, the United Nations agency establishes worldwide standards to
help smooth over compatibility issues. This is the agency that decides, for
example, what wireless speeds can be deemed “ From
http://www.itbusiness.ca/ AFRICA: DRESSED in white T-shirts bearing words 'e-revolution', a team
of employees of an Information Communication Technology (ICT) project joined
other Zanzibaris at the launch of e-government programme in the Isles. Fumba (entry point from "ICT changes are inevitable, we cannot dare to isolate
ourselves and remain behind while our colleagues in other parts of the world
move ahead," said Dr Shein emphasizing that Zanzibaris have to change so
as to fit in the fast growing world of information technology. Visibly joyful
Dr Shein informed enthusiastic Zanzibaris and delegates from the Chinese
Embassy that e-government is to increase greater efficiency in government
through the use of information and communication technology. He thanked From
http://allafrica.com/ ASIA:
Management World As the availability of high-speed broadband across Asia
creates boundless opportunities for service providers to generate new revenue
streams through the delivery of digital services, TM Forum announced today
that the focus of its Management World Asia conference and expo is aimed at
helping service providers across the Asia Pacific region transform their
business operations in order to manage the complex end-to-end value chain of
digital service delivery and harness a wealth of new opportunities. With •Transforming business models to capitalize on new digital
services •Turning data into dollars through effective customer
analytics and enhanced customer experience •Identifying practical techniques to monetize and manage
disruptive technology “In order to succeed, service providers must learn how to refine
their business models to exploit future services, develop innovative new
digital services, adopt and expand cloud computing services, and bolster
revenue assurance programs,” said Martin Creaner, president and CEO, TM
Forum, who leads off the conference with a keynote on March 12. “TM Forum’s
Management World Asia is a unique and valuable opportunity for the region’s
already successful leaders to come together, offer their insight and show
others how to succeed in a highly competitive market.” TM Forum’s Management
World conferences and expos stand apart by offering expert keynotes,
sessions, unrivaled networking opportunities, and TM Forum’s renowned
Training and Certification programs. Upcoming Management Worlds include: Management World, Nice, Management World Please contact TM Forum’s event sales team at
eventsponsorship@tmforum.org; Carine Vandevelde (+44 207 193 8678); or
Vanessa Lefebvre (+34 605 165 449) to discuss Management World Asia sponsorship
packages that are right for your company and your budget. Register now for
Management World Asia and receive maximum savings. From
http://finance.yahoo.com/ A new user-centric web-based platform, developed by EU-funded
researchers, promises to bring down the barriers to accessing e-government
services. A new user-centric web-based platform, developed by EU-funded
researchers, promises to bring down the barriers to accessing e-government
services. Public administrations across Inclusive e-government The Diego platform aims to overcome that problem. It is
designed with user-friendliness firmly in mind, allowing anyone, regardless
of their level of digital literacy, to access online services through an
adaptable and intuitive interface. And, as a web-based standards-compliant
system, it is accessible from any device, including smart phones, televisions
and digital kiosks in public locations. For administrations, implementing the
Diego system is cost-effective and relatively straightforward, even in cases
where they have legacy e-government systems that need to be updated or
transferred. 'The basic framework for the system is the same for all
applications and the use of open standards, and its provision as
software-as-a-service, helps overcome interoperability issues. However, some
services need to be tailored specifically to the requirements of individual
administrations. For example, data protection and data management laws are
different in every country, so how data is stored and accessed, whether
locally or using cloud resources, varies in each case,' Mr Echeverría explains.
The differences were underscored in seven pilot deployments of the Diego
platform involving public administrations in Saving time and cutting costs For administrations, the costs of implementing the system are
relatively low: it costs around EUR 150 per month to use the Diego platform
in a town of 10,000 to 15,000 people and, depending on specific requirements,
it takes just one or two months to set up. The system is continuing to be
used at many of the pilot sites, and IDI EIKON, in collaboration with other
project partners, is looking to deploy it with other public administrations
across In addition, the Diego researchers found that by introducing
users, some of whom had little or no ICT experience, to the platform, the
same people went on to access other services online. 'After using the system,
some elderly people went on to set up Twitter or Facebook accounts to
communicate with friends and family,' Mr Echeverría explains. 'We like to see
the platform as a training bicycle, in which access to e-services are the
support wheels that help people get on their way in the online world - it's a
big step forward to e-inclusion.' It is also an important leap toward more
widespread and effective e-government in From
http://www.i-policy.org/ European Commission
Releases Open Data Portal The European Commission, the executive body of the European
Union, launched a beta version of the Open Data Hub of the European Union
last week, a month earlier than the scheduled release date in January. The
data portal currently contains 5811 datasets from the European Commission,
freely available to the public to browse, download and use. The portal also
provides access to data from other institutions and agencies of the European
Union at their request. A large majority of the datasets (5634 sets) are
published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union. Other
publishers include the European Environment Agency, Directorate-General for
Health and Consumers, and the Publications Office of the EU. The website
states that the portal is “about transparency, open government and
innovation”, aiming to “promote and build literacy around From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Bulgaria:
After 13 Years of Preparations, The first five thousand Bulgarians, who have applied for an
electronic identity card will receive their cards over the next few days.
They will be able to use seventy services of From
http://paper.standartnews.com/
German
Government Should Make Its Software Available as Open Source, Committee
Advises Not every German migration to an open source IT infrastructure
has been a success, though. Compatibility problems and under-performing
spreadsheet and presentation programs in OpenOffice frustrated city employees
in From
http://news.idg.no/ German
'Egovernment' Transition Encouraged Researchers are trying to encourage German policy makers to
make the transition to “eGovernment”. The Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication
Systems (FOKUS) in “One of our partners is cBrain, whose integrated solution is
already being very successfully implemented in seven Danish government
ministries. We took a close look at the technology and discovered that it
would suit the needs of German government agencies very well.” While
electronic communication has long been an everyday reality in offices across
the German public sector the researchers found that case workers often only
use modern document management systems for recording digitized files, while
ignoring the technology in their everyday work. But the German government has
expressed a desire for a more integrated approach by outlining what it is
looking for in an ICT platform in its “Organizational Concept for Electronic
Administration”. The concept includes recommendations for a system enabling
electronic records management, modelling of electronic workflows, electronic
collaboration and integrating the various software applications for
specialist processes that have grown up over the years. “These building
blocks of eGovernment are supported by the Danish solution. As an option,
managers can also be included in digital processes via mobile devices,” said
Dr Tschichholz. Dr Tschichholz and his team have developed specific
application scenarios, and these are currently undergoing a field test in
German ministries. In the FOKUS eGovernment Laboratory, the research
scientists recreated sample workflows from the Federal Ministry of the
Interior and analysed how the Danish solution can be adapted to the
ministry’s work. “We showed, for example, how the solution can be used to
draft briefing documents, which the permanent secretary or minister can then
conveniently access on the move from a tablet PC,” said Dr Tschichholz, who
also uses the ICT platform at FOKUS for internal processes. Last year, the
team successfully presented the laboratory scenario to Cornelia
Rogall-Grothe, Federal Government Commissioner for Information Technology,
and the Danish Ambassador Per Poulsen-Hansen. At the CeBIT trade show, FOKUS
will demonstrate how mobile devices can be securely used for administration
work with the aid of the Danish ICT platform. From
http://eandt.theiet.org/ Moldova’s
E-Government to Slip The State Voter Register of Moldova is facing some delays,
while the automation of the electoral process has brought no results. This
information was officially announced by the Court of Audit of From
http://www.focus-fen.net/ Russian
Opinion: E-Democracy – A Tool or a Toy? Remember I talked about the way governments handle citizen
initiatives? The problem a lot of people have with it is that it prohibits
US citizens from adopting Russian orphans, including kids with disabilities,
who don’t seem to be popular among Russian adoptive parents. The opponents of
the law believe that despite a number of highly-publicized cases of American
families abusing adopted kids from A little more than a month in, the site had seen a fair number
of petitions that reached the required benchmark of 25,000 signatures with
little to no reaction from the government. Overall, at the time the general
opinion settled that "these petitions are ignored apart from an
occasional patronizing and inane political statement amounting to nothing
more than a condescending pat on the head" – as one petition put it.
Well, how’s that working out now? [hum imperial march]. I sense a disturbance
in the force. Seems like the website is not doing much… apart allowing
Americans to vote for building an actual Death Star. Here’s the petition
which managed to gather 25,000 signatures and, as such, warrant an official
reply from a White House representative. “We petition the Obama
administration to: Secure resources and funding, and begin construction of a
Death Star by 2016. […] By focusing our defense resources into a
space-superiority platform and weapon system such as a Death Star, the
government can spur job creation in the fields of construction, engineering,
space exploration, and more, and strengthen our national defense.” Unquote. You know, it’s actually kind of odd. On one hand, this is
obviously not something some wants – scratch that, I would love to see an
operational Death Star – but that’s just not feasible. On the other hand,
such a request is not… illegal, I guess – so the government has to actually
respond. And, well, respond it did. Cleverly titled “This Isn't the Petition
Response You're Looking For”, the response, authored by head of the White
House budget office’s science and space branch explained why the project is
not in best interests of the American people – in a tongue-in-cheek manner,
of course. “The Administration shares your desire for job creation and a
strong national defense, but a Death Star isn't on the horizon. Here are a
few reasons: The construction of the Death Star has been estimated to cost
more than $850 quadrillion. We're working hard to reduce the deficit, not
expand it. The Administration does not support blowing up planets. Why would
we spend countless taxpayer dollars on a Death Star with a fundamental flaw
that can be exploited by a one-man starship?” And then the text goes on to
feature real achievements of the aerospace industry – and not just American.
But still, back to the subject of e-petitions – judging by recent news, all
they’re good for is comic relief. Yes, there’s another petition, which rivals
the Death Star project in ridiculousness. Created January 3rd, it still has a long way to go before
expiring – and already it has gathered almost 10,000 signatures. Quote
“Direct the United States Mint to make a single platinum trillion dollar
coin! With the creation and Treasury deposit of a new platinum coin with a
value of $1 trillion US Dollars, we would avert the absurd-yet-imminent debt
ceiling faceoff in Congress in two quick and simple steps! While this may
seem like an unnecessarily extreme measure, it is no more absurd than playing
political football with the Moving on to matters more serious – cyber-security. Actually,
there’s a bunch of news in this regard – we’ll kick off this subject today
and continue tomorrow. A Russian citizen from Krasnoyarks is being accused by
the Federal Security Service of organizing a cyber attack on the president’s website.
The attack happened in May of 2012 – and turns out, the hacker’s actions
might have been a part of a greater plan. Care to hear who was behind it?
Allegedly, the dreaded Anonymous – an informal decentralized group of digital
vigilantes, anarchists, hackers or criminals – depends on who tries to
classify them and which of their actions are being focused on. Here’s the
deal: according to the Security Service, the detained hacker is responsible
for taking down the website May 9th, 2012. He did this using existing
software – software, authored and distributed online by, yes, the Anonymous.
These programs were aimed to take down governmental websites as part of the
Anonymous’ support for the ongoing protest actions in real life – the
so-called “March of the Millions”. This being said, the guy’s status as a
“hacker” is questionable – rather, a cyber-criminal with no intimate
knowledge of the field of cybersecurity who simply got his hands on a bunch
of programs created by real hackers. Probably this would also explain how he
was caught so easily. Still, he knew what he was doing and what legal
consequences his actions might have, so now he has to face the music, i.e.
the court. The defendant, Vasiliy Nikitin, claims he’s not only not a hacker,
but also a not very savvy user and he didn’t know what he was doing. While
his connection to the political opposition has not been established, his
browsing history shows he was a frequent visitor of websites with illegal
software used for DDoS attacks. So, was he a victim of own stupidity or a
pawn in a larger scheme? Well, if you’re into spy games and conspiracy
theories tune in tomorrow when we take a look at a larger digital threat,
recently discovered by Kaspersky Lab. From
http://english.ruvr.ru/ NORTH
AMERICA: A recent survey of large enterprise firms reveals that 75 per cent
of companies are investing more than $1 million a year on Big Data
initiatives. The potential for making better and faster business decisions is
pushing large companies to invest huge sums of money on Big Data initiatives,
according to a recent study conducted by consulting firm NewVantage Partners.
Over 75 per cent of the respondents said they pout no less than $1 million a
year while as much as 25 per cent of the firms pour in more than $10 million
annually into Big Data initiatives, a report on Computerworld.com said. A
number of reasons including risk reduction and creating higher-quality
products and services were cited as reasons for investing in Big Data, but
the companies said the “quantum leap” in benefits comes from accelerated
decision making or so-called time-to-anwser. If companies can get “valuable
answers” within 30 minutes it makes a lot of difference and changes the
business process dynamically, according to NewVantage. From
http://www.itworldcanada.com/
Although mobility has become a popular buzzword, the
government’s use of wireless broadband capabilities has been limited because
of concerns about security and reliability. “Warranted or not, there’s always
been a stigma within government circles that somehow wireless connections
can’t be secured as well as a physically wired infrastructure,” said Stephen
Orr, a distinguished systems engineer in Cisco Systems’ U.S. Public Sector
division. A number of converging developments in technology, policy and
culture, however, are finally giving federal IT officials more reasons to
believe in the ability of wireless broadband to securely transform their operations.
Specifically, changes taking place in the wireless industry include the
transition to the fourth-generation ( Why it matters It’s not just security issues that have hampered widespread
federal adoption of wireless broadband, said Brett Haan, a principal in
Deloitte’s federal telecommunications practice. Although the The fundamentals The availability of The hurdles How successful agencies are in using commercial wireless
broadband networks will ultimately depend on the amount of time and effort
they’re willing to put in at the very beginning of the process, Johnson said.
“We are seeing movement in this direction, but it’s to the extent that
agencies can effectively address the policy needs, the back-end technology reality
and the finance,” he said. “There is a road map that needs to be followed in
order to bring this to fruition.” In the area of policy, agencies must
realign their security rules and practices to address the new reliance on
wireless mobility, which might or might not include a bring-your-own-device
environment. “In thinking about security, agencies clearly need to think
about the back-end device management, device provisioning and obviously the
security protocols,” Haan said. “And those may differ between the agencies
and between the data itself, whether it’s publicly available data versus
confidential health care data versus truly national security data. These are
all issues that must be fully thought through.” Johnson noted that the
variety of technological options can complicate matters. “There are a lot of
disparate systems out there today, which could include different carriers and
different platforms that don’t necessarily interoperate,” he said. “So, for
example, if I want to use applications on a smart device and they’re being
hosted on a number of different platforms, how do I make sure that all of my
architectures actually integrate?” Finally, in today’s increasingly austere
fiscal environment, agencies must determine how much it will cost to deploy,
operate and maintain a more mobile environment using commercial wireless
carriers and then make a business case for the technology. It is not an
insurmountable hurdle, however. “Even in a tight budget crunch, you can
deploy solutions in a certain sub-segment of an enterprise,” Johnson said.
“That’s because to the extent that agencies can work out the policy and the
technology, they’ll use it.” From
http://fcw.com/ CIO
Council Report on Barriers, Gaps, & Opportunities for Government Use of The CIO Council has released a new report today under the
Digital Government Strategy that details the use of mobile technology in the
Federal Government (Milestone Action #10.2). The report will help inform
efforts to accelerate the secure adoption of mobile technologies at reduced
cost by identifying current barriers, gaps, and opportunities in the use of
mobile technology. This report is the result of a collaborative inter-agency
effort that involved almost two dozen Federal departments and agencies and
was led by the Information Security and Identity Management Committee (ISIMC)
of the Federal CIO Council. The ISIMC conducted interviews with 21 agencies
on their use of mobile technology for this report and made recommendations
that aim to reduce cost and speed up adoption of secure mobile technologies. From
https://cio.gov/ Federal Communications
Commission Streamlines and Modernizes International Reporting Requirements From
http://www.fcc.gov/ Transparency
- What to Consider Before Releasing Data to the Public Nearly every major city in the In the The CTG points out that both examples considered in this
research were fairly straightforward, but more attention needs to be devoted
to open government efforts involving more controversial data. The recent
upsurge in the national gun control conversation provides a perfect example
of the trickier side of open data. The New York Journal recently published an
interactive map of registered gun owners in Westchester and From
http://www.govtech.com/ 6 Ways to
Optimize Gov-to-Citizen Communication As technology and social media become more prevalent, more
government agency leaders recognize the importance of maintaining strong
relationships with their constituencies. Exactly how to accomplish effective
citizen engagement, however, is not always clear. To educate governments on
this matter, GovDelivery and EfficientGov hosted a webinar on Jan. 24
outlining best practices for digital communication -- knowledge gained from
working with more than 500 public-sector organizations worldwide, said
GovDelivery Communications Director Mary Yang. As government budgets continue
getting squeezed, organizations are faced with the responsibility of proving
return on investment before spending resources on projects, said GovDelivery
Product Marketing Manager Jennifer Kaplan. Being proactive in making
government services and data available, however, can lead to both savings and
improved customer service. And by building a permanent audience,
personalizing the content the audience receives, and analyzing and curating
that service delivery over time, governments will be able to meet their
communications goals, said Kaplan, whose presentation primarily focused on
the continued dominance of email as a communication platform. Make it easy to sign up! “It sounds simple, but there are a
few things to think about with the sign-up process,” she said. Reaching as
many people as possible leads to the most effective programs, so the sign-up
process should be easy and customizable. Users should be able to find the
sign-up function easily, and there should be channel preferences that allow
users to customize the content they receive. Kaplan also encouraged
governments to do research in order to stay relevant and familiar with their
audience, lest they lose them. Promote, promote, promote! “No one is going to
sign up for your communications if they don't know about them,” she said. “So
promote the heck out of it.” Kaplan demonstrated several best practices for promoting
communications, including government websites that effectively promote email
newsletters by prominently displaying the sign-up boxes on their websites.
Assess. Before you can improve the communications you have, Kaplan said, your
organization must assess the current situation to identify methods of
improvement. This can include mapping the structure of an organization,
identifying agency functions and thinking about the technology being used
throughout the organization. Automate. “We really see automation as the
biggest way to have a cost savings,” she said. “With automation, you can
leverage content you're already posting on your website or through internal
databases.” Automation can circumvent the need to invest in new IT infrastructure
or personnel to carry out many communication tasks. One example Kaplan
pointed to is the California Public Safety Department's integrated database
and communications system. Harness the Data. “There's a ton of data out
there. It's really important to not only harness this data, but keep it and
package it in a formatable way that you can share and analyze with others in
your organization,” Kaplan said. By analyzing data on a quantitative and
qualitative level, organizations can target their audiences in more relevant,
engaging ways. Engage. “You're competing for attention in the inbox from the
likes of the Amazons, the eBays, the JCrews and Nordstroms,” Kaplan said. So
creating attractive and engaging email newletters is crucial to getting people's
attention. From
http://www.govtech.com/ Greenville Utilities Commission (GUC), based in From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ More Three mobile trends are expected in the next four years: more
users, more connections and faster speeds. And these increases are projected
to impact government IT operations -- including how government agencies
connect with their constituents -- according to IT executives. According to a
new report, Cisco Visual Networking Index: Global Mobile Data Traffic
Forecast Update, 2012–2017, mobile data traffic is predicted to grow over the
next four years roughly capping 11.2 exabytes a month -- and major trends are
expected to take place as a result of the increase. Also according to Cisco,
in 2017 there will be 5.2 billion mobile users (up from 4.3 billion in 2012);
more than 10 billion mobile devices/connections, including more than 1.7
billion mobile-to-mobile connections (up from 7 billion total mobile devices
and mobile-to-mobile connections in 2012); and and average global mobile
network speeds of 3.9 Mbps -- a sevenfold increase from 0.5 Mbps in 2012.
Former Seattle CTO Bill Schrier, now a senior fellow at the Center for
Digital Government, which is owned by Government Technology's parent company
eRepublic Inc., said statistics in this report reflect how much more
businesses and consumers are moving to mobile devices as their main resources
for communication and Internet access – a trend with a significant impact on
state and local governments. “Government needs to make sure all the
functionality of their online presence is optimized for the screen size of
tablets and smartphones,” Schrier said. “That function includes not just
static information on the Web, but applications to pay bills, or view maps,
or take photos of problems and send them off to their government.” To accommodate this rising trend, Schrier said government
employees will need to become better accustomed to using mobile devices for
their job. Government jobs that involve public safety, such as police
officers and positions in field service, will be expected to have instant
access to information and applications to do their jobs properly. And in From http://www.govtech.com/
The State of From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ |
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From
http://www.china.org.cn/ E-Government
Services Reach More Chinese Cities E-government services are now available in more than 90
percent of From
http://www.china.org.cn/ Gov't
Staff Credit Cards Widely Adopted Government staff credit cards have been adopted across most of
From
http://www.china.org.cn/ 02/16/2013 Japan Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (JAIST) has
upgraded a higher-performance and larger capacity storage for its private
cloud environment to support its students and researchers. The new data
storage belongs to Dell Compellent, and it initially comes with three
petabytes. This news storage infrastructure is one of the world’s largest
Dell Compellent implementations. The JAIST can benefit from the new
infrastructure in accessing information quickly and efficiently protect large
amounts of important research data. The new storage arrays will bolster the
storage capabilities of FRONTIER (FRONT Information Environment)—a campus IT
platform built to support advanced teaching and research activities at JAIST.
This move is to strengthen the JAIST’s IT environment to help further advance
its world-class research. This private cloud environment is being implemented
with the aim to improve convenience for users and help achieve low cost, high
energy efficiency and streamlined management by centralising hardware
resources. The deployment is to centralise the management of large research
data sets created and accessed by individual researchers and teams. The JAIST
aimed to deliver necessary data for the users’ research activities quickly
and with high reliability by replacing two previous systems with Dell
Compellent. The upgrade allowed the JAIST to manage a large volume of data in
one solution. When updating its centralized storage system, JAIST faced a
number of challenges, including achieving fast data access and constructing
efficient back-up for large data sets. Another key requirement for JAIST was
to eliminate the issue of depleted IPv4 addresses and build an efficient
storage infrastructure with IPv6 compatibility. With the new infrastructure,
the JAIST can extend its infrastructure to the required scale provided by the
new 128-bit addressing scheme. The system also provides automated data
tiering which allows for automated management and movement of data between a
combination of SSD and SAS drives, and enables fast data access and
high-capacity with fewer disks. The storage system is also compatible with
IPv6 to build an efficient storage infrastructure. It also has advanced
snapshot features, which provide efficient storage of only the changes made
to stored data for fast local recovery. Another feature is advanced
replication that only replicates changed data provides disaster recovery for
petabytes of data. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Dr. Jong-Sung Hwang, Assistant Mayor of 1. How will the city plan to use mobile devices in the
delivery of e-government services? 2. How is 3. Can you give examples of mobile applications or services
you have launched? E-poll is one of the first mobile services of 4. How important are mobile devices/ smart devices for the
realisation of the Smart Seoul 2015. Mobile devices are critically important
for the realisation of Smart Seoul 2015. We are making the most out of mobile
technologies to launch new location-based services and to enable citizens be
connected anytime and anywhere. In addition, we strongly encourage public
employees with field duties to harness mobile devices to complete their
duties on the field. 5. So far, what has been the response from citizens on the
Seoul Metropolitan Government’s efforts to provide civil administrative
services on mobile devices? 6. Since From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Website on
Integrated Information on Dokdo Opens The Korean government opened a website which contains
integrated geographic and historic information on From
http://www.korea.net/ Digital security company Gemalto has said that From
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/
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Bobby Nazief, Special Adviser at Consolidating IT Systems The challenge is how to integrate our IT systems. We started
last year by consolidating infrastructure into the cloud. We plan to finish
this stage by the middle of next year and continue with systems integration.
We are in the middle of a transition. The IT system is serving the Ministry
of Finance (MoF) to manage national budget, revenue collection, taxes and
custom excise. However, each unit has its own IT system and infrastructure.
The value of the national budget that we are managing is 1300 trillion IDR
(US$30 billion); tax: 1000 trillion IDR (US$23 billion). If there are any
issues with the system, it means that there is a potential problem with
disbursement of the budget, and in revenue collection. The Finance Minister
saw a centralised IT system as a big advantage in terms of quality IT
management and quality of service among different units. Financial Management System The contract was signed back in 2009 and we have since had the
Oracle E-business Suite (EBS) that handles the budget management from
authorisation, disbursement, tax management to reporting. The EBS system is
also supported by Hyperion Budget Planning. The scope is budget preparation,
disbursement, and reporting. We plan to add fixed asset management, debt
management and integrate these to support the fiscal system of the MoF. When
we started the centralisation project, we didn’t know how many systems and
data we could consolidate. We focused on the infrastructure and when it was
ready, we asked ourselves whether we wanted to replicate what we already had.
We realised that the cloud provided a better solution and we didn’t have to
move the physical system. All we had to move were applications, which enabled
us to allocate the physical infrastructure more efficiently. Initially, the cloud helped us consolidate this
infrastructure, and now we are planning to ramp up cloud utilisation and move
to Platform-as-a-Service. We provide the infrastructure in the centralised
data centre, while the responsibility of managing the IT system is still with
the specific unit. It is very much like the concept of the cloud: the owner
of the system is still the individual unit, but they don’t have to worry
about the infrastructure as the central IT unit is providing it. The issue is
budgeting. Each unit is responsible for its own budget. How can you
coordinate it when the system is managed by one unit, while the output will
be obtained by another unit? We have plenty of knowledge but to provide top
quality service, we do limited outsourcing. We engage experts from the
private sector to work with our people for a limited time, to expedite an
exchange of expertise and knowledge. We are aiming at finishing the
consolidation next year and move all the hardware to one server room or data
centre. We will also complete the rollout of the budgeting system by end of
this year. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The Semarang Education Agency (SEA), From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Subang Jaya Municipal Council (MPSJ), He also added that the Council has been constantly expanding
online services while reducing the number of physical counters from sixteen
to nice since 2010. "Revenue collection online such as the bill payment
kiosk, only hub, bank and post office has seen an increase of 13 per cent or
MYR 6.6 million (US$ 2.18 million), while business transactions via the
My@MPSJ hub has increased MYR 3 mil (US$ 995,353 )," Kasbi said.
According to him, the new initiatives helps reduce cost while providing a
more conducive and convenient environment for the staff and citizens. A new
mobile application, ‘Mymobile’ would be launched later this year for citizens
to use it to pay bills, he added. The launch event welcomed Deputy Selangor
State Secretary (Development) Datuk Mohamad Roslan Sakiman who congratulated
the MPSJ on being a pioneer in introducing these programmes for citizens.
"This should be made an example for other local councils to ensure a
fast and efficient service for the public,” he said. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The Election Commission launched the country’s first ever
online portal which would allow citizens to monitor election-related
activities and access information explaining the electoral processes
involved. The initiative is part of the Commission’s on-going efforts to
prepare citizens for the upcoming 13th General Elections happening on 27
June. According to Tan Sri Aziz Mohd Yusof, Chairman of the Election
Commission, the portal was launched so that Malaysians are able to closely
monitor the elections and so that they would have a better understanding of
issues usually raised by voters, political parties and other concerned
stakeholders. The Portal provides basic information about the electoral
system in Malaysia, parts of the Parliamentary and State Assembly, the
reforms to be introduced in the next general election as, methods of early
voting and voting procedures for registered voters for citizens living
abroad. It also features In addition, citizens will get the latest
information on election candidates, starting from the nomination process up
to the proclamation of the winning candidates, and also the “do’s and don’ts”
during the campaign period and the election day. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Government
Call Centre Expanded in The government expanded its 1Malaysia One Call Centre (1MOCC)
last month to bring 25 ministries and agencies into the project. 1MOCC was
set up in November 2012 to create a single point of contact for citizens to
get in touch with all participating government departments and ministries.
The public can use five channels to communicate with the government -
telephone, SMS, fax, email and social media. The first phase of the project
involved 21 agencies, including the Prime Minister’s Department, Malaysian
Immigration Department and the Road Transport Department. The second phase
brings organisations such as the ministries of tourism, education, women and
health. Citizens can call 03-8000-8000 to make enquiries, file complaints or
give suggestions and feedback about any of the participating ministries. The
third phase is expected to be launched in March, and will cover all federal
and state agencies. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ As support to President Benigno Simeon Aquino III’s mandate to
move the Government towards a “straight path”, the Department of Interior and
Local Government (DILG) launched a website called “ Full Disclosure Policy
Portal“, which allows citizens to view the finances and other transaction of
Local Government Units (LGU). The portal is a joint collaboration between
DILG’s Bureau of Local Government Supervision (BLGS) and multilateral and
bilateral organisations such as the World Bank, Australian Agency for
International Development (AusAID) and the Canadian International Development
Agency (CIDA). It aims to assist LGU’s in complying with the requirements of
the DILG issued Memorandum Circular 2010-083 titled, “Full Disclosure of
Local Budget and Finances, and Bids and Public Offerings”. The latter
mandates provinces, cities and municipalities to fully disclose specific
financial transactions to keep their constituents informed of how the LGUs’
budget is managed, disbursed and used. By logging on to the FDPP, the public
can view important LGU documents such as annual budget reports, statements of
debt service, statements of receipts and expenditures; quarterly statements
of cash flow, annual procurement plans or procurement lists, items to bid and
bid results, abstracts of bids as calculated, and supplemental procurement
plans. Furthermore, details on the Special Education Fund (SEF) income and
expenditure estimates; reports of SEF utilisation; annual Gender and
Development accomplishment reports; Trust Fund (PDAF) utilisation; 20 per
cent component of the Internal Revenue Allotment utilisation; and reports of
Local Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Fund utilisation. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Philippine
Gov't Mulls of Taxing Online Stores The Philippine government is planning to impose taxes on
online stores by next year, a senior government official said Friday. Deputy
presidential spokesperson Abigail Valte, in a news briefing, said that the
proposal of Bureau of Internal Revenue ( BIR) Commissioner Kim Henares of
taxing online stores would provide the government considerable revenues.
"What Commissioner Kim Henares wants is for them to pay the right income
tax and the right value added tax (VAT) because they are still sales
and...that really is subject to VAT," she said. Henares has explained
that online shops are no different from the actual stalls that sell items or
merchandises to people. She stressed the need for online businesses to be
registered with the BIR to level the playing field in the buy-and sell
market. She also said that online businesses should also issue on-line
receipts. The BIR's proposal aims to boost tax collection next year and
protect the rights of consumers who wish to return or exchange the items they
bought, Valte said. There are traders and sellers in the From
http://news.xinhuanet.com/ Philippine
Province Adopts E-Accounting System The Department of Public Works and Highways in the From http://www.futuregov.asia/
The Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), the From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The The Philippine Government Electronic Procurement System
(PhilGEPS), in partnership with the Land Bank of the From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The The Philippine National Police (PNP) Directorate for
Investigation and Detective Management (DIDM) and Information Technology
Management System (ITMS) have recently ended the five-day training of 234
police officer on the use of e-Roques’ Gallery and e-Warrant System to
improve efficiency in criminal investigation techniques. The e-Roques’
Gallery and e-Warrant System are parts of the PNP e-Projects to use
technology in beefing up investigation operation. The e-Rogues Gallery is a
photo gallery database of wanted criminals and other suspected law offenders
posted online for easy reference by investigators and tracker teams. The
e-Rogues’ Gallery is linked to police stations across the country to share an
access to the same database. Likewise, the e-Warrant System provides police
stations a faster and better access to individuals with active or pending
warrants of arrests anywhere in the country. PSSupt Jerry C Linsagan, Chief
Regional Investigation and Detective Management Division, the PNP conducted a
briefing and purpose of the two systems in front of 234 police officers with
basic computer knowledge. The training of e-Rogues’ was held in Camp Crame,
Quezon city, while the one for e-Warrant system held at Camp Algar, Cagayan
De Oro City. The participants of the training were required to enhance the
new knowledge in their works, as well as passing it on to other police
officers assigned in investigation and detective patrol. They will also be
assigned as encoders to perform a regular update of the wanted criminal
gallery which is linked to and shared the same database with police station
across the archipelago. The other electronic initiative of the PNP includes
PNP e-Blotter system which is a management tool eyed in the formulation of
effective anti-crime strategies and the modernization of the PNP’s crime data
base. It was launched in 2012. From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The Ministry of Finance launched ‘SG Budget From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ The Ministry of Defence of From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Residents
Can Rate Civil Servants Online in An online rating system for civil servants of From
http://www.futuregov.asia/ Bank Data
Released for Turbulent 2012 HA NOI (VNS)— Figures released by the State Bank have shown
that at the end of 2012, the total assets of the entire domestic banking
system recorded a growth of 2.54 per cent compared with 2011, meaning that
last year’s total for the entire system rose by nearly VND126 trillion (US$6
billion). The data also shows that most of these assets were contributed by
State-owned commercial banks, which saw a rise of VND232 trillion ($11
billion), or 11.78 per cent. In contrast, the total assets of join stock
banks declined VND102 trillion ($4.8 billion) compared with 2011. The State
Bank also said that the equity of the banking system rose more than VND35 trillion
to nearly VND426 trillion, a growth of 8.97 per cent. Compared with 2011, the
equity capital of most credit institutions increased. However, financial companies have seen both equity and charter
capital decrease compared to 2011. With figures from commercial banks
included, the total charter capital of credit institutions reached VND392
trillion by the end of last year, a rise of 11.24 per cent. The year 2012 was
considered a turbulent and challenging period for the entire banking sector
as many issues arose relating to credit quality, bad debt and cooled credit.
The banking system witnessed soaring bad debts while profits declined
dramatically. According to a source from the State Bank, the total banking
profit last year stood at VND28.6 trillion, a decrease of nearly 50 per cent
compared with 2011. While the profits of large scale state-run commercial
banks remained stable, profits of join stock banks are estimated to have
dropped by half. Last year, Return
on Assets (ROA) and Return on Equity (ROE) of the banking system reached 0.79
per cent and 10.34 per cent respectively. From
http://vietnamnews.vn/ |
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Governments across the world are adopting e-Governance. In each
department and in each state government, one finds a plethora of IT projects
in various stages of implementation – conceptualisation, implementation,
deployment and up-gradation to latest technology. One also finds many
abandoned projects. For each successful project, one can count an equal if
not higher number of failed IT projects. A survey of e-governance projects by
a Professor in Development Informatics in the University of Manchester in
developing and transition economies revealed that as many as 85 percent
e-Governance projects are either partial failures for not having attained all
the intended goals, or total failures- having been abandoned soon after
implementation. The common reasons for such failures include lack of internal
ownership, absence of vision or strategy, poor project management, inadequate
technological infrastructure, unwillingness to adopt IT enabled governance
techniques and obstacles in transitioning legacy government data to a
computerized format. Traditional governance systems are usually not amenable
to computerization, and insufficient business process reengineering is also
cited as a major reason for the failure of e-governance projects. I present
here some ideas for enhancing the success rate of e-Governance projects. Think Big, Start Small, Scale Fast. Keeping it simple by
taking baby steps is more likely to succeed. In other words, evolutionary
ideas are likelier to succeed than revolutionary leaps. This is because of
limited capacity of the government on the technological and human front.
Therefore, e-Governance projects should build carefully and sustainably on
the existing ICT usage base. Instead of directly trying to implement large
scale process re-engineering and backend computerisation, the stages of
e-governance should be kept in mind. In the first phase, e-Governance merely
means a simple presence on the web which provides the public with relevant
Government to Citizen (G Examples of such services are filing tax returns,
extending/renewal of licenses, online application for visa and passports,
online voting and e-procurement applications. Phase three is made complex
because of security and personalisation issues, such as the necessity of
digital (electronic) signatures to enable legal transfer of services. It is
also the phase which requires maximum process reengineering and change
management within the government functioning. The fourth phase is when all
information systems are integrated and the public can get G Avoid Big Bang Waterfall Method. Requirements for regular run
of the mill projects in the IT industry are usually captured to the last
detail in various project documents such as functional requirement study,
requirement traceability matrix, high level design, system requirement study,
low level design etc which are duly vetted by the client. These requirements
are then communicated by business analysts to the software development team
so that they may translate the requirement into software, working peacefully
in their zones of comfort. Once the development is completed, the client
checks the software against the earlier documented requirements and
acceptance testing is done. The project is thus rolled out as in a smooth
waterfall model, without much change in requirements from one stage to the
next. On the other hand, adopting the waterfall method for
e-governance applications runs the risk of failure since this method is not
capable to cater to the change in requirements and priorities, which is the
rule rather than exception in the government setup. Government departments
typically perform multiple functions involving complex processes. New tasks,
schemes and projects are added ever so often. For many functions, there are
no documented standard procedures and processes. For others, the actual
practice varies from one office to another even within the same department.
Such continually evolving and non-standardised processes compound the problem
of capturing and freezing the requirements for software development in a
single cycle. Information/ requirements which were relevant at the time of
initial study by the software development team may become redundant by the
time the product is readied for user acceptance by the concerned department. This would cause initiation of another cycle of study,
documentation, development and testing, causing a hiatus in the project
rollout. By the time the next version of software is presented, the department
officials may have lost interest or even more likely, priorities may have
changed, especially with a new boss at the helm of affairs who would be keen
to put his stamp on the project. This leads to an endless loop of requirement
study and subsequent development- a sure recipe of failure. Therefore,
adopting the traditional waterfall method for software development within the
e-Governance domain is likely to be time con-suming, especially if
application software is to be developed de novo or even if there is a
commercial off the shelf product readily available. Adopt Agile. Instead of taking years to completely automate
all the processes of a department or an activity using the traditional
waterfall software development life cycle, an agile methodology is more
likely to succeed. Agile software development is an interactive process that
allows small development teams to develop software in a collaborative
environment that is responsive to business change. Development is done in
short iterations, each iteration adding incremental functionality to the
software. This methodology involves prototyping – the use of a working model
of the final system, which users can see, comment on, and have revised before
the final version is produced. This ensures that the design matches real user
needs. It also provides the flexibility to quickly react to changes in the
environment. From the government officials’ perspective, however, it needs
greater involvement, commitment and focus on the working product. The e-mitra application software for
the Common Service Centres and the LITES project (MIS for the Pending
Government Court Cases) are examples of successful of e-governance
implementations in Rajasthan following the agile methodology. Government procurement framework, however, does not facilitate
adoption of agile methodology, since it is typically based fixed cost models.
Rajasthan, as also some other states have found a way out for building
software using agile methodology by getting work done on man-month rates,
discovered through open bidding processes. It is suggested that even in cases
where traditional waterfall methodology is used, software can be built
incrementally in stages. A related methodology is prototyping – the use of a working
model of the final system, which users can see, comment on, and have revised
before the final version is produced. Another recommended practice is
piloting – implementing the e-government system on a small scale at a single
site or office; learning and improving the system; and only then rolling out
on a large scale to all sites. Adoption of these methods has been shown to
increase the chances of project success. Internal Ownership and External Facilitation Are Both
Necessary. Because of their very nature, e-Governance projects need external
facilitation and encouragement. In fact, an e-Governance project may not even
be conceived without external support and encouragement. However, without
ownership within the department for whom the e-Governance project is being
implemented, e-governance initiatives may never be successful. Not only
should the strategic and critical components be decided by the internal users
but they should take complete ownership of the project. Any project, IT or
non- IT, is doomed for disaster if totally outsourced. While the role of
vendors in triggering the conceptualisation of a project should be welcomed,
it should not so happen that the government department loses control and the
project is totally vendor driven. Private companies can definitely play the
part of subject matter experts and update government functionaries with the
latest technological developments and trends in e-Governance across other
states thereby aiding them in conceptualizing and implementing IT projects.
However, at the end of the day, it is the responsibility of the concerned
government department to freeze requirements and specifications in keeping
with their needs rather than in line with the features of COTS software. It may be noted that the Government Department of Information
Technology or e-governance Societies and companies, which most of the States
have established, in this sense, are also outsiders and cannot totally take
over the role of the end user government department, when they are asked to
implement a project. The requirements of the departments are best understood
only by internal department users, and so, a project executed independently
by the state IT Company, Society or Department for another government
department without involvement and ownership by the client department is also
likely to fail. The role of the State IT departments is to encourage and
facilitate e-governance and act as a change driver; establish the IT
infrastructure including the data centre, network and the CSCs for use by
other government departments; build generic and application software for use
by multiple departments; act as the technology consultant to government
departments and build standards and meta data. Top-down Approaches Are Likely to Result in Failure After long
drawn out consultations with senior officers of all involved government
departments, we in Rajasthan built software for application for and delivery
of various certificates – bona fide residence, caste, income, solvency, etc.
Government orders were issued by the departments providing legal sanctity to
these certificates. The objective was to make available at the doorsteps of
villagers digitally signed certificates through the CSCs so as to reduce the
time and money involved in travelling to the tehsil office. The application
was launched with great fanfare by the Hon’ble Chief Minister. It was
expected that this citizen centric scheme would be demand driven as it would
save not only money and time but also provide hassle free services to the citizens.
However, the scheme did not take off as expected even after a couple of
months despite training and publicity. A quick evaluation revealed that it had increased the burden
of the sanctioning officers (the Tehsildars) as the process of affixing digital
signatures was very slow and cumbersome. The application software was then
improved to be more user friendly for Tehsildars and computerized issuance of
digitally signed certificates quickly gained popularity, amongst both
citizens and department officials. An important lesson was learnt in the
process. The first attempt at the project – which took a top-down approach –
was a failure. The second attempt ensured that the lower and middle level
users were involved with the project. Their ideas were incorporated into the
design, and the process of involvement also helped develop their commitment.
Involvement of the lowest level of functionaries right from the beginning is
essential for gaining the support of the users. The Project Must Answer “What’s in it For Me?” for all Key
Stakeholders Key stakeholders – officers, employees, operators, users,
citizens, etc – must support an e-governance initiative. To garner
stakeholder support in any project, it must prove advantageous to that
stakeholder. Many e-governance projects fail as the employees feel that their
job is threatened or their position undermined. While allaying such fears,
the application software should offer benefits like reducing filing hassles
or repetitive work. Benefit to the citizens, especially, must be kept
uppermost in mind while conceptualizing e-Governance projects. If a project
offers no or little utility to citizens, it is likely to die a natural death. In other words, the e-governance project must provide each
stakeholder with at least some positive answer to the question: “What’s does
this project have in it for me?” Project Management Skills are Critical for Success It is well documented that e-governance projects have cost and
time overruns. Very often, major risks and issues in the project are not
addressed in a timely fashion. The end product is often not in line with the
user requirements. Such phenomena point to poor project management. It needs
to be understood that project management is different from general
management, especially so in the e-Governance arena. If a manager is managing
his department well, it is not necessary that he will be a good project
manager. Use of project management software is recommended. Since knowledge
of project management tools is limited in the government, option to use the
project management software of consultants and system integrators should be
explored. Sustained Leadership is a Prerequisite Yeates, D. & Cadle, J. (1996) in their book Project
Management for Information Systems differentiate between managers and leaders
as follows– “The difference between leadership and management was once summed
up in the following way by someone looking out of our office window in Covent
Garden in central London: ‘Imagine there’s a sudden power failure in the
London underground rail system. The system halts and all the lights go out.
In the central control room someone is marshalling resources, implementing
the standby facilities, rescheduling the trains, calling the emergency
services. That’s management. Someone else is walking along the darkened
platform with a torch bringing a trainload of people to safety. That’s
leadership.’” e-Governance projects are complex; involve multiple
stakeholders, many times interdepartmental; and entail reengineering age-old governmental
procedures and change management. They need effective managers as well as
inspirational leaders. Effective leadership is needed to ensure a strong focus while
directing, pushing or encouraging the government officials in the
implementation of e-governance projects. Moreover, the leadership has to be
sustained as these projects are long term. Frequent change in government
functionaries puts e-Governance projects in jeopardy. e-Bhumi and Aadhaar
based PDS system of Andhra Pradesh are but a couple of examples which have
succeeded due to sustained and effective leadership. L1 Based Selection May Prove To Be Penny Wise Pound Foolish Much work has already been done across However, it is not likely to yield the desired application
software required for complex e-governance projects. Software is an
intellectual property, which cannot be developed by a vendor selected on cost
considerations alone. The quality of the software will depend on the quality
of the software development professionals and the development and testing
processes used by the vendor. A Combined Cost and Quality Selection method
is, thus, highly desirable. Moreover, the technical scoring criterion needs
to be appropriately designed. A criterion giving high weight to the size,
experience and repute of a company may not suffice. The quality of the whole project
team, the development methodology and the testing strategy and tools should
also be scrutinized while evaluating the proposals. Success entails 99% perspiration, 1% inspiration E-governance projects are not technology projects as much as they
are governance projects. Indeed, the ‘e’ in e-Governance is only a small
element. Getting the ‘governance’ right is the harder task as the road from
project conceptualisation to implementation involves a multitude of tasks and
activities including procurement, stakeholder management, process
re-engineering, change management, training and capacity building, etc. This
requires sheer hard work and perseverance, motivated by a strong desire to
serve the public and an unwavering commitment to improve governance. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Over the last few decades, citizens’ expectations from governments
have increased, thereby enhancing the pressure on the governments to improve
public service. Fortunately, a wonderful combination of modern ICT
technologies like cloud computing, Various governments around the world and many state
governments in our country are expanding the scope and use of e-governance in
efficient, hassle free and cost effective delivery of information and public
services. The objective of governments, especially in our country, so far has
been to provide electronic services to the citizens. We have followed a
service-centric approach in our country. The Electronic Delivery of Services
Bill, 2012 is further testimony to this approach. Similarly, in Rajasthan,
the transparency in Public Procurement Act provides for electronic
procurement as a means of public procurement. While this is desirable as this
is an important function of governments, it is to be understood that all
services need information or data –census, election, ration related, land
records or even documents or information presented through websites – and so
an information-centric approach is also necessary. The information-centric approach focuses on data creation and
its regular updation in electronic form, without worrying about the final
form of presentation – web pages or through the mobile or in printed format.
The spotlight is on making available reliable, accurate and up to date data,
which is device-agnostic. This will require, where data is unstructured,
converting it into structured data with the help of meta data. While
preparing, storing, organising and managing data, one must focus on
customers’ requirements. I use the word customers because they include not
only citizens but also government users – both internal to the department as
well as external for inter-department sharing, thereby avoiding duplication
of data. This information can then be made available using open and
interoperable standards through web APIs for use by various agencies. This
approach is useful because it separates the data layer from the final
presentation layer. The same data can be used to present it on a desktop,
laptop or smart phone. Moreover, the data can made available to a citizen in
the form of information or to the software developer for use in application
software to deliver citizen-centric services or to another department for
inter-departmental use. Such an approach helps us in providing
services—“anywhere, anytime, on any device”. There have been varying degrees of success in the area of
e-governance in our country. Governments which have demonstrated leadership
through the will of political leaders, senior officers, CIOs and line staff
to support e-governance have succeeded more than others in providing
information services electronically to the citizens. Besides political will,
it requires an army of committed IT and e-governance champions, managers and
technologists from the public and private sector. Governments need to
seriously work on creating this workforce. The Government of Rajasthan has
taken a number of steps in this direction. It is the first state to have a
created a separate cadre of IT professionals in the Department of Computers
in 1989 (later rechristened Department of Information Technology and
Communication). We are pioneers, along with From
http://egov.eletsonline.com UP Plans
to Roll Out 60 e-Gov Services by 2013 “We are evaluating all possible services, which could be
rendered through common service centres in rural areas. We have also formed a
committee of district magistrates in some districts to evaluate the kind of
services, which can be provided electronically. We would be setting up 17,000
more common service centres in UP in near future, and are trying and testing
various pilot programmes under e-Governance scheme,” National Informatics
Centre Deputy Director General (UP) S B Singh said. The state government is
working in collaboration with three companies to bridge the digital gap
between urban and rural There are around 12,828 CSCs in the state and the government
plans to roll out 18,745 more by early next year. The state government had
launched 26 e-Governance services under Departments of Food & Civil
Supplies, Panchayati Raj, Urban Development, Revenue, Women Welfare and Child
Development, Training & Employment, Handicap Welfare and Social Welfare. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com “E-Governance
Has Gained Momentum in the Country” How do you see the development of e-Governance ecosystem in
the country? e-Governance has already acquired considerable amount of
momentum in the country. There is a healthy competition in the states to
implement new e-Governance ideas in every area where there is an interface
between citizens and the government. There is now a growing realisation in
the government circles that the ability of the government departments to
deliver is being acutely tested. There is so much pressure due to rising
population and increase in the general expectations of the people that
despite the best efforts, there is a mismatch between the capacity to deliver
and the expectations. And this gap between the general expectations from the
rising population and the capacity of the government to deliver can be
bridged only through modern technology and e-Governance. It is during the last five to seven years that e-Governance
has really gathered momentum. Many new initiatives have been launched and
have been well received by the public. Can you name some e-Governance
projects that you think have brought maximum benefits? The point is that
different departments, states and ministries are involved in the creation of
these e-Governance projects. Each of them has its own set of priorities and
aims. Different e-Governance projects are serving different sections of the
population and so it is not desirable that we compare them. Many states are
doing exceedingly well in providing benefits to the common man through the
electronic route. Now we are trying to encourage the states that rather than
reinventing the wheel every time, they should try to replicate the successful
models from other states. So now we are having many successful e-Governance projects
getting replicated across different states. While implementing tried and
tested applications, with some minor customisation, you can avoid the risk of
creating something that might not be as useful as expected. For instance,
there is the e-Pass project from Andhra Pradesh that is going to be
implemented in a number of other states that have shown interest. Similarly
the Human Resource Management, application developed by the National
Informatics Centre (NIC), is being tried out and implemented in a number of
states. Vision for Year 2013.“Our vision for 2013 consists of
successful implementation of the e-District project, successful implementation
of pilot projects for taking advantage of NOFN project and the rapid
replication of successful e-Governance projects” Is there a move being made
to put the successful e-Governance projects on some kind of app store, from
where the interested states can access them in an easy manner? Precisely. We
are working with the idea of creating an e-Governance app store. Different
states will be able to access the app store and pick up the apps that are
most suitable for the specific needs of their population. What kind of growth
can we expect in e-Governance systems in the country? Now e-Governance has
acquired considerable amount of acceptability with the public and the
governance circles. I see e-Governance as something that has now acquired a
critical mass and in the coming years we can expect a quantum jump in the
number of initiatives being launched. A larger proportion of services will be
delivered through e-Governance systems. In the central ministries, a large
number of e-Governance projects have already been implemented under the
National e-Governance Plan (NeGP); a number of other ministries are in the
process of implementing their own e-Governance systems. e-Governance will
gain even more momentum by the fact that it will soon acquire a statuary
backing. In a number of states the Electronic Delivery of Services
(EDS) rules have been notified. Model EDS rules have already been circulated.
Some states have already notified these rules; others are in the process of
doing so. This will make it mandatory for government departments to deliver
services through the electronic mode. At the Centre also the EDS Bill has
already been examined by the Standing Committee of the Parliament. Its
recommendations have been received, have been processed and the revised Bill
could soon go to the Parliament. The UIDAI project has now advanced across We have a substantial amount of digital divide in the country
because of which educated people residing in urban areas are taking advantage
of the e-Governance systems, while those living in rural areas are unable to
do so. How do we ensure that the digitally illiterate sections of our
population are also able to access the e-Governance initiatives? You see,
every citizen in the country has the right to receive better e-Governance
facilities. It does not matter if he is educated and urban, or digitally
illiterate and poor. Each and every citizen in the country must enjoy easy
access to public services conveniently, without having to run to various
government departments. Whether he is living in rural area or in urban area,
he must have access to the government services from his doorstep. This is the
vision of the NeGP. However, I agree that those who are more affluent and
have access to personal devices can take better advantage of e-Governance
systems. And there is also the issue of digital illiteracy. All these issues need to be addressed
and that is why the NeGP thought of the Common Service Centres (CSCs). Today the CSCs have spread all across the country. Currently
we are having close to one lakh CSCs, and the idea is to gradually increase
their number to 2.5 lakh, in which case we will have one CSC operating in
every Panchayat in the country. So the CSCs are rendering digital services in
the rural areas also. Of course, in rural areas we are also facing issues
like connectivity, power supply, but these issues are also being addressed.
Some of the CSCs are not proving to be financially viable. There is lot of
talk about increasing the scope of the
services that are being provided by the CSCs. Please tell us about it.
Now under the new flagship programme, the e-District, the CSCs are going to
play a very important role. Under e-District, the CSCs will become the front
end for delivery of a very large volume of benefits and services. As far as
the financial viability of the CSCs is concerned, I would say that it is a
circle. If the CSCs render more services, they become more financially
viable. It also depends upon how many essential services are being made
available through them. It depends on the back-end digitisation and the creation of
other infrastructure by the state. Once the CSCs become popular, they become
viable also. Even in the project for direct transfer of financial benefits,
it has been decided that the CSCs will be an important vehicle. Hence they
are being appointed as Business Correspondents for such transactions. This
can give them a new impetus and significantly improve their viability.
Healthcare and education are the two areas of concern in the country. Many
sections of our population find it difficult to access quality healthcare and
education. What is your vision for improving these critical areas through the
use of ICT? A lot of work is being done for improving the healthcare and
education sector through the use of modern digital technologies. We have
telemedicine in healthcare sector and digital education systems in education
sector. Many states have already started using digital means to monitor the
general healthcare parameters; they are using it to keep a track of the
health of patients, of pregnant mothers, etc. Digital tools are also being
used for distribution of medicines at subsidised rates or for free.
Similarly, modern education is being revolutionised through the usage of
modern technology. The payroll management of teachers, the monitoring of
presence of teachers in classrooms located in remote areas or even the
evaluation of the students is being done digitally. What are the main challenges in the path of e-Governance in
the country? How do you plan to overcome these challenges? Of course, there
are difficulties to be faced in everything that you do. Many of these
initiatives require a dedicated team. But the departments where the
e-Governance initiatives are being launched are already overburdened with existing
work. So what we have felt is that unless there are dedicated mission teams
and empowered mission leaders, the project implementation suffers. That is an
important element; the other element is that of capacity building. The
success of e-Governance is dependent upon the government officials in the
department being fully comfortable with the digital technologies. These
challenges are already well-recognised and a number of steps are being taken
to encourage the creation of dedicated teams and capacity building. A
committee has recently been set up by the Hon’ble Prime Minister under Nandan
Nilekani to look at the entire issue of creating a human resource for
e-Governance projects. The National Optical Fibre Network (NOFN) is now being laid
down to provide connectivity to all the panchayats in the country. What kind
of impact will this system have on e-Governance systems in the country? NOFN
is a very ambitious project, as it plans to connect all the 2,50,000
panchayats in the country through high-speed network. At present Optical
Fibre Cable (OFC) connectivity is available in all state capitals, districts,
headquarters and up to the block level. NOFN will achieve its objectives by
utilising existing fibres of PSUs (BSNL, Railtel and Power Grid) and laying
incremental fibre to connect to panchayats wherever necessary. Thus,
connectivity gap between panchayats and blocks will be filled. Up to the
panchayat level, we will be having high-speed broadband, but ultimately it
will depend on the users to find out the ways by which this kind of
connectivity is to be put to use. So it is the different Ministries and the
States that will have to take advantage of the NOFN by providing services
through a process of connecting all their offices to the panchayats. Currently,
we are trying to demonstrate how this high-speed network can be put to good use through pilot
projects, which are on in three states, namely – Andhra Pradesh,Rajasthan and
Tripura. We are also trying to convince various state governments that by
December 2013, when the NOFN is expected to be completed, they should have
enough applications to take advantage of the high-speed connectivityto the
panchayat level. In a linguistically diverse country like From
http://egov.eletsonline.com The Internet is a critical socio-economic enabler, which has
deep impact on the economy, social order, law and order and the fabric of the
nation itself. Its impact is only going to amplify as we move forward,
especially when things start getting connected to each other and when the
next generation of the Internet, IPV6 enabled Internet, starts getting rolled
out. It would imply that your automobile
can get connected to the cloud computing facility of the manufacturer
for automatic analytics of the health of the automobile. As per some
estimates, the number of Internet- connected devices globally crossed 6
billion in 2011, and is expected to reach 15 billion, twice the size of the
world’s population, before 2016. More than six billion mobile phone
subscriptions are in use today, and the number is expected to cross 8 billion
by 2016. Mobile data traffic reached 597 petabytes in 2011, twice the amount
of 2010, and is estimated to cross 10 exabytes by 2016. Broadband
subscribers, estimated at 1 billion in 2011, are forecast to grow at 40
percent per annum, and reach 3.5 billion in 2016. As a large part of the
growth is to take place in the developing countries of Asia, The Internet started as a means of sharing information amongst
scientist working in different institutions. From that, it is becoming —if
not already become—the communications backbone of the world. It is a major
economic driver, provides banking and other financial services to world’s
business, provides a global market place and is replacing the conventional
print and visual media. Internet is now ubiquitous in today’s world. Cutting
off an enterprise or a country from the internet would have severe
consequences. This of course immediately also brings out the dangers that are
emerging in such an interconnected world. The Internet can be used to bring
down the telecommunications network of different countries, its banks and
even its’ power grid. In Therefore, a clear governance structure for the Internet, that
is aligned to the long-term growth of the Internet and that is aligned to the
interests of the economy and national security, is necessary for a healthy
socio-economic functioning of a modern economy. Internet Governance includes,
but is not limited to, the following key issues: •
Infrastructure and management of critical internet resources, including
administration of the domain name system and Internet protocol addresses,
administration of the root server system, technical standards, network
neutrality, and multilingualisation; • Issues in
the use of the Internet, including spam, network security and cybercrime; • Issues of
wider impact such as Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs), freedom of expression,
data protection and privacy rights, consumer rights and International Trade;
and, •
Developmental aspects, in particular, capacity-building. From a socio-economic perspective, it impacts issues such as
sovereignty over the Internet/ Free usage of Internet and interconnects,
issues of Transborder data exchange and therefore its impact on Cloud
Computing, issues of Data protection, the freedom of Internet, privacy,
cyber-warfare and the issue of global ban on use of Cyber-weapons and
cyber-security. Under the existing system of Internet governance, the
International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) performs two
principal functions: • The
Internet Assigned Names Authority (IANA) function whereby it controls entries
to the authoritative Root Zone File of the Internet • The
management of the Domain Name
System (DNS) and the allocation of Top Level Domain (TLD) names. The function of allocation of TLD has been recently renewed as
a perpetual contract, known as the Affirmation of Commitments between ICANN and the US Government.
The IANA function has also been renewed for a seven-year period beginning 01
October 2012. The IANA function is overseen by the National Telecommunication
and Information Administration under the US Department of Commerce. Technical
standards are set by the Internet Engineering Task Force [IETF]. The central
elements of the Internet’s logical infrastructure, also called Critical
Internet Resources, thus continue to be managed by private entities such as
ICANN and IANA under contractual arrangements with the US Government. The
United Nations established the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in 2005 to
discuss the issues of Global Internet Governance. However, UN/IGF does not
have the organisational structure or the mandate to agree on decisions and
the enforcement mechanism to implement them. There is therefore an urgent
need to bring in participation by Governments, especially from the developing
countries, in order to establish a multilateral, transparent and democratic Internet
governance mechanism that functions with the full involvement of Governments,
the private sector, civil society and international organisations, without
according a pre-eminent role to any single Government or organization.
Government of From
http://egov.eletsonline.com What changes and improvements did you notice on e-Governance
front in the year 2012? What policies and reforms are you looking forward to in 2013
for making the e-Governance sector more successful? A major policy that will
decide the fate of e-Governance is the one that can track and measure the
progress of any initiative. A proper roadmap must be in place for the sector
to drive this long-term systematic change to be successful. Rather than
having different online portals for various initiatives, there should be an
initiative to have a common single portal with a sin- glesign on policy for
all public services. States need to work with the Centre to come up with
better policies. Initiatives need to be prioritised to be implemented based
on the ease of implementation and its criticality. Business processes that
need to be restructured must be identified early on and redesigned keeping in
mind the acts, laws and regulations that govern them. The push from the
Central Government to give software development and hosting work to National
IT companies needs to be re-thought if we want to be on par with other
developing nations. e-Governance must also focus on mobile apps since that is
the future of ICT. In what ways do you think your company can engage more with
the government for ICT initiatives in the year 2013? ESDS is a high
specification, carrier-neutral, fully-managed data centre built on the
concept of Talking about sectoral reforms and expectations, what are some
specific expectations from the government for your specific sector? From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Challenges
and Opportunities in e-Governance Uschi Schreiber, Managing Partner, Global Government &
Public Sector Industry Centre, Ernst & Young (E&Y). “I am touched by
seeing the passion that technology arouses in people; this clearly indicates
an awareness of the difference that technology will bring to their lives,”
says Uschi Schreiber, in conversation with Nayana Singh. Provide us with an
overview of the work that Ernst & Young (E&Y) is doing with
governments worldwide. E&Y works with government clients in several
places. These clients belong to both developed economies as well as emerging
markets. When it comes to emerging markets, the governments are facing the problems
of poor infrastructure. The growing trends of urbanisation is the result of
more jobs being available in urban areas. This is resulting in increasing
demand for education, in such places. In the emerging markets, the
governments are facing very long term issues. Some of these include critical
issues such as ageing population. These developed economies face the need of
replacing outdated infrastructure. To add to this, there is the challenge of
very short term political cycles which make it difficult to carry out
longterm plans. We have witnessed our clients seeking new solutions to
address tricky and difficult long term issues. There is also a third category
of countries – the breakout of economies like What steps must government of What is E&Y’s outlook on growth? The forecasts that I am
coming across, indicate that the breaks in economy would continue to persist.
However, You recently had E&Y Global Government Leaders conference
in Mumbai. What are the key takeaways from the conference? The conference has
reinforced our belief in our strength globally and our efficiency of
functioning in both government as well as in public sector. We have the most
intelligent workforce and we work with the best clients. Through the
conference we got to know that our clients are looking for some new
solutions. Some solutions have become really outdated with the government. We
are working with the governments as their partners to develop those
solutions. What are the key areas that central and stage governments in From
http://egov.eletsonline.com e-Governance
Initiative of MoUD Among the major e-Governance initiatives being implemented in
Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD) and in its various attached offices are e-Awas in Directorate of
Estates, e-sewa in CPWD, e-dharti in Land and Development office and Project
Management Information System
(PMIS) for Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM). MoUD is
also ensuring implementation of e-Governance across the country through its
mandatory e-Governance reforms to be achieved for claiming funds for
urban infrastructure projects
under JnNURM. Under e-Governance reform, urban local bodies are ensuring
online birth and death registration, property tax, accounting, water supply
and utilities, citizens grievance redressal, personnel management system,
building plan approval as well as procurement and monitoring of projects.
This leads to transparency, better information management, improved service
delivery and overall improvement in urban governance across departments at
all levels. Implementation of PMIS by the Ministry has resulted in providing
online and up-to-date information by the States and the Ministry, for
management and monitoring of projects approved under JnNURM. Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal The Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JnNURM)
was launched by the Government of India on 3rd December 2005, envisaging an
investment of more than `1,00,000 crore during a period of seven years from
2005-06 to 2011-12 with a committed Central Government share of `66,000
crore. JnNURM is a reform driven, fast track programme to ensure planned
development of identified cities with focus on efficiency in urban
infrastructure/ service delivery mechanisms, and through community
participation and enhanced accountability of ULBs/parastatal agencies towards
citizens. The programme has resulted in facilitating large scale investments
in the urban sector and ushered, policy and institutional reforms, leading to
sustainable socio-economic growth in the cities. The programme focuses,
higher level of resources and management attention to 65 select cities across
the country. 35 cities with million plus population, other State capitals and
cities of heritage and tourism importance comprise the 65 551 projects at a total cost of `61,905 crore have been
sanctioned under the UIG for 65 Process flow of PMIS The PMIS Website ensures step by step process flow right from
detailed project report (DPR) submission, State Level Nodal Agency (SLNA)
appraisal, project approval by SLSC and approval by the Ministry. SLNAs are
submitting utilisation certificates as well as Quarterly Progress Reports
(QPRs) on-line for Ministry to take appropriate action for release of
subsequent instalment to the States. SLNA are uploading the completion
certificate on the PMIS website once the project is completed. In the process
of PMIS development, the responsibility of State/ ULB includes registration
of ULB, submission of Detailed Projects Report (DPRs), appraisal of DPRs,
submission of Utilisation Certificate and QPRs and completion certificates.
The Ministry of Urban Development is responsible for further appraisal of
SLSC approved DPR through its technical wings, disbursement of Additional
Central Assistance (ACA) and incentives. On release of instalment, MoUD
updates the States on PMIS along with scanned copy of release order issued by
Ministry of Finance (MoF), Department of Expenditure so that SLNA may utilise
the funds for implementation of projects. Special features in PMIS PMIS allows the users i.e. officials from MoUD, TCPO,
officials of SLNA to easily access and use the website. Online user guide is
available on the home page of the website so that the users may understand
the process flow and smooth navigation of the website. The homepage has the
facility for user to register on-line by creating his user id and password
for further access to the PMIS website. The facilities of forgotten password,
transaction history as well as helpdesk are also available on the home page
for user friendly application of the website. A special feature has been
created on the home page so that the summary of No. of projects sanctioned
under the sector, No. of projects
completed, approved cost, ACA committed and ACA released is displayed in a
box once the mouse is brought on that
particular sector. The overall summary of UIDSSMT is automatically
displayed once the mouse is brought on the circle in the centre. Conclusion PMIS has brought transparency and speed in the urban
infrastructure project management and monitoring at the State and Central
level. The availability of the documents on funds releases by MoF and
completion certificate by the States could be ensured to the fullest extent. Information could be
extracted from the MIS for smooth handling of Parliament Questions/ VIP
references, etc. Data
analysis on funds releases, project completion and for the purpose of
future line of action relating to approval of new projects, optimum
utilisation of funds, etc., is possible with the help of PMIS. Comparison of
States based on completion of projects as well as utilisation of funds can
also be done with the help of PMIS. This IT enabled tool is thus facilitating
smoother and more efficient implementation and monitoring of JnNURM. Project ID Nomenclature. For the ease of understanding, the
facility of online generation of alpha-numeric project ID has been created
and project ID is generated once the project is approved online by the Ministry.
Project ID contains first two digits for the State code, next two digits for
the District code, next two digits represent ULB code of the District, next
is the Urban Sector code, next three digits represent running Sl.No. under
the particular Urban Sector. For example, project ID UP/10/01/ SWM/018 is for
a project in the State of Uploading of Documents on PMIS On utilisation of 70 percent funds and completion of urban
sector reforms, the utilisation certificate submitted online by the SLNA is
processed for release of subsequent installment and sanction letter is sent
to the Ministry of Finance. On
release of the installment by the MoF release order is uploaded on the PMIS
website for information of the SLNA, which can then withdraw funds from the
State exchequer for further implementation of the project. Management Information System (MIS) MIS link provided on PMIS website has further links – (i)
Project at a Glance (ii) Details of ACA Released and (iii) Registered States
and Users. On navigation of project at a glance link, information can be
retrieved on State-wise and Sector-wise Status of projects showing number of
projects, number of projects completed, approved cost, total ACA and ACA
released as well asproject status – completed / in progress. On further
drilling down on this page, Summary Sheet of individual project and ULB is
retrieved. The facility of retrieving release order of the MoF and completion
certificate on clicking on the links instalment date and completion
respectively exits. Under the link – Details of ACA Released, financial
information for a particular State, particular sector for particular
financial year is available. Multiple options for choosing financial year(s),
State, Sector, Project Status, etc., can be exercised to have desired
information required for dealing with matters relating to Parliament
Questions, VIP references, etc. Online Generation of UC & QPR QPRs are generated online by the SLNA that shows the extent of
funds utilised, Stage-wise project implementation including percentage of
progress by end of every quarter. The QPR also provides information on
progress of all 23 reforms at ULB level, State level as well as optional
level reforms. The reform achievement determines further release of
instalment to the State by the Centre. Project Management Information System (PMIS), The PMIS system
has been implemented to achieve the following objectives:- • To provide online and up-to-date information for management
and monitoring of projects by the JnNURM Directorate, MoUD • To allow JnNURM Directorate and TCPO: • To update status of the projects with respect to appraisal
and approval. • To update data in respect of funds sanctioned and released. • To upload Sanction Orders and Release Orders. • To allow SLNAs to enter data for projects of all ULBs under
their control and monitoring. • To allow SLNAs to submit DPR, UCs and QPRs online for
release of funds and project monitoring From
http://egov.eletsonline.com In line with the state level approach UP has selected Kanpur
Municipal Corporation as their first ULB for preparation of DPR and pilot
implementation of state level software solution. Once the software solution
at state level is available then remaining ULBs in mission cities/state will
be able to roll out this solution, with minimal changes to the main state level
solution. Varanasi Municipal Corporation would be joining the state level
solution being developed by Kanpur Municipal Corporation. The fund for ICT
infrastructure will be released only after the state wide solution is
operational, and an audit report is provided, reporting completeness of all
modules that VMC needs. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Panel
Submits Report on HR Policy for E-Gov Projects It has also recommended an enhanced role of NIC (National
Informatics Centre) as a technology adviser to the government. It has
suggested various policy interventions required to build internal
competencies and growing internal resource pool in the government with
institutionalised training and capacity building mechanisms. ”We need to take
all these recommendation process to the government and then take it at the
highest level for approval of the Cabinet,” the Department of Electronics and
Information Technology (DeitY), Secretary J Satyanarayana said. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Assam’s
E-Gov Module Wins Top Award It confers a legal status to the document and provides a
measure of security to the transaction and minimises scope of disputes.
Process re-engineering through application of Information Technology (IT) has
brought about a remarkable change in the service delivery system and improved
efficiency in the offices by eliminating the need to manually create and then
store physical registers and other records, the award committee said. The
Projects for Transformation of Mineral and Administration through
e-Governance of the government of Karnataka and Online Voting System (OVS) of
the state Election Commission of Gujarat have been selected for the Silver
and Bronze Icons respectively in the category of Excellence in Government
Process Re-engineering. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com NIELIT has been playing a key role in improving the reach and
scope of IT related education in the country. What is your vision for the
organisation? There is going to be a vast increase in the scope of work that
NIELIT has been doing. NIELIT has been set up to carry out Human Resource
Development and related activities in the area of Information, Electronics
& Communication Technology (IECT). The organisation has its headquarters
in The organisation is engaged both in the formal and non formal
education in the area of IECT. It also concentrates on developing industry
oriented quality education and training. It is establishing standards for
becoming the country’s premier institution for examination and certification
in the field of IECT. Today NIELIT is a National Examination Body, which
accredits institutes/organisations for conducting courses particularly in the
non- formal sector of IT Education & Training. Our vision for the
organisation is to make NIELIT an institute of national importance in the
field of IT, electronics, e-Governance and education. NIELIT can become of a
stature that is similar to the IIT or IIM, with the permission and the
blessings of the Hon’ble Parliament. At times students face problems as they are unable to access
course content in their own language. What steps is NIELIT taking to help
such students? NIELIT has developed CCC e-content in all the constitutionally
recognised Indian languages except in Santhali. The e-contents of CCC has
also been devel- oped in Mizo and Kokborok. The e-contents have been made
available on a dedi- cated e-learning portal “http://elearn.doeacc.edu.in”
for free access by students. We are in the process of developing e-content
for other courses and we are also planning to conduct online examinations.
NIELIT is now undertaking projects concerned with capacity building in the
field of e-Governance. Tell us about it. As you might know, NIELIT will be
undertaking projects to conduct e-Governance training for various cadres of
Central and State Government officials with funding support of Department of
Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances. NIELIT has conducted one workshop for the
Cabinet of Bihar. It is also conducting e-Gov Capacity Building for senior
officers in Delhi Government. Capacity building in the area of e-Governance
is of great importance to the nation, and we are keen to contribute our mite
in it. To take this up, our team of senior directors was in NISG (National
Institute for Smart Governance), Tell us about the work that you have been doing for NPR.
NIELIT is the Nodal Implementing Agency on DeitY (Department of Electroncs
and Information Technology) for the data digitisation for the creation of
National Population Register (NPR) project of Registrar General of India
(RGI). Data digitisation work for UT Chandigarh has been completed on pilot
basis in March 2012. In Phase I, the data digitisation work of 25 urban zones
have been completed and data digitisation in respect of 19 rural zones are
expected to be completed shortly. In Phase II, for 48 rural zones, the
contract has been awarded to successful bidders and work is in progress and
is expected to be completed by March, 2013. You have been associated with IT Industry for almost 28 years.
Before taking over as MD, NIELET, you had been serving as Managing Director,
RajCOMP, and Director Technical RajCOMP Info Services Ltd. In that capacity
you had been instrumental in executing many IT and e-Governance Projects for
the Government of Rajasthan. Tell us about the main issues that you have
faced in bringing the benefits of IT to the masses. Every IT project comes
with its own set of unique challenges. And when the project is from the field
of e-Governance, then the challenges become more complicated, as in such
cases we also have to look at governance issues, along with IT. When a
project is being implemented, multiple issues related to Vendor Management,
Technical Management, Finance Management, HR Management, Legal Management and
over and above the Expectation Management come to the fore. It is possible
that the expectation of the end-users, the citizens, could be totally
different from the expectations of the policy makers. It is a difficult task to bridge the gap between the two sets
of expectations. Also there can be mismatch in terms of time, cost and even
the vision of any project due to changes in government or administrative
setup. While conceiving any e-Governance project, we tend to think that
automation will automatically result in e Governance becoming a reality. We
tend to forget that the IT component in any e-Governance project is only 10
to 15 percent. The major component is management and implementation of the
decision and policy of the government, and that is a much tougher task. At
times, the financial considerations make it impossible for us to go for the
best possible technology in e-Governance projects, so this too is a
challenge. We are unable to hire the most talented experts as they require a
higher salary, the government norms restrict the salary that can be paid to
the experts. Moreover, when we are implementing e-Governance projects, we
think of pilots only and pilot hardly get rolled out because of multiple
reasons. “e-Governance projects will not be able to deliver at the
ground level unless there is capacity building in a big way.” During the last
few years Rajasthan has achieved lot of success in e-Governance
implementations. In your opinion what is the most critical factor for the
successful execution of e-Governance Projects? The capability of government
departments to work as a cohesive team is important. A good team leader and
support from the seniors are the key factors for success of e-Governance
project. In Rajasthan, I achieved a degree of success in execution of NeGP
Projects, after joining as the Managing Director of Rajcomp in June 2009. The
projects that I was involved with are the CSC, State Data Centre (SDC), State
Wide Area Network (SWAN), e-District, State Service Delivery Gateway (SSDG),
etc. I have also contributed in the successful launch of the RPSC online.
This all had been possible because of kind support that I have received from
the Secretary (IT), Shri Sanjay Malhotra, Principal Secretary (IT), Shri
Shrimant Pandey. I was also guided by the vision of the leader, Hon’ble Chief
Minister, Shri Ashok Gehlot. In your opinion what is the importance of field experience in
the success of e-Governance projects? Should the government departments focus
on having at least a few people who have the experience of working in the
field? e-Gov Projects face major challenges in terms of shortage of experts
having knowledge of technology with the IT companies. It also faces challenge
in terms of commitment from the top and ownership of the project. It has been
observed that those who have driven motorcycle in the field are different
from those who know how to drive motorcycle on the blackboard. I am pointing
out to the fact that issues being faced in the field are different from those
discussed at policy making forums. At planning stage a project might seem
very a project is very simple but when it is being implemented in the field,
multiple issues related to Vendor Management, Technical Management, Finance
Management, HR Management, Legal Management and over and above the
Expectation Management starts. So field experience is of utmost importance. You have taken over as the Managing Director of NIELET, a
Government of India organisation, engaged in capacity building. What are the
main challenges that you are facing in the new assignment? The new challenge
is a part and parcel of the assignments I have been executing because unless
and until capacity building in the field of IT and e-Governance is undertaken
for government employees and citizens, we will not be able to bring the real
fruits of IT to our citizens. e-Governance projects will not be able to
deliver at the ground level unless there is capacity building in a big way.
In my humble opinion, my new assignment is nothing more than a continuation
of the activities that I have been part of during my earlier years of service.
It provides me with opportunities for using my past experiences of working
with actual projects to design new course content and better ways of delivery
through IT tools. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com Creating
Foundations for Effective e-Governance eGovernance has attained considerable amount of traction
during the last few years. Please provide us with an overview of the work
that NeGD is doing in the area of e-Governance. The National e-Governance
Division (NeGD) has been formed to support the Department of Electronics
& Information Technology (DeitY) in programme management of the National
e-Governance Plan (NeGP). NeGD also performs the role of the Secretariat to
the Apex Committee on NeGP. Specifically, NeGD provides support to DeitY in
the areas of programme management, technology management, capacity building,
citizen engagement, evaluation of projects, etc. As part of the capacity
building for NeGP, we are directly responsible for staffing and training of
the State e-Mission Teams (SeMTs). DeitY has entrusted NeGD with the
implementation of the World Bank assisted e-Bharat project. In recent times,
we have played the role of catalyst and think tank for new and evolving
thoughts around the EDS Bill, HR Policy for e-Governance, Citizen Engagement
and Social Media Frameworks, The State e-Mission Teams (SeMTs) have been set up in many
states and union territories. How effective have the SeMT teams been in
furthering the cause of e-Governance in the country? I believe that SeMTs
have played a path breaking role in furthering the cause of e-Governance at
state level. It is perhaps the best capacity building support that NeGP has
provided to the states. In a recent study of the SeMT initiative, states have
overwhelmingly suggested the continuation of the placement of SeMTs. They
stated that the presence of these highly qualified personnel has provided the
much needed support to the state’s IT department and has enabled the states
to develop a state-wide, comprehensive and cohesive view of e-Governance
projects. SeMTs have been instrumental in extending professional support to
track the implementation as well as provide necessary inter-linkages between
various e-Governance projects. Please provide us with an overview of the capacity building
work that NeGD is doing in different parts of the country. NeGD undertakes
capacity building at several levels. At the state level, through our
implementing agency NISG, we conduct Specialised Training for e-Governance
Programme (STeP: http://step.nisg.org/) that is aimed at building basic
sensitisation and skills at all levels of governance. Next, we undertake
highly specialised programme to develop Chief Information Officers (CIOs).
The CIO programme is focussed on building specific skills required to manage
large e-governance projects. Finally, we conduct Leadership Meets in states
which are directed at the political and bureaucratic leadership to ensure
awareness about and support for e-governance programmes at the highest level.
In addition, we conduct specific training programmes as needed by the states
and the central ministries. In what ways has NeGD contributed through the creation of core
policies and by providing technical assistance, R&D and awareness? As I
stated earlier, NeGD plays a very important role in development of new ideas
and does necessary research to enable informed policy formulation. Some of
our notable contributions include EDS Bill, Citizen Engagement and Social
Media Framework, Mobile Service Delivery Framework, HR Policy for
e-Governance, Integrated Public Service Delivery Framework, RFP Toolkit,
Interoperability Standards, etc. For each one of these, NeGD undertook
necessary research, coordinated stakeholder consultations and held intensive
discussions with states and ministries. All this was done in a time bound
manner and I am happy to say that today our outputs are being implemented as
policy measures by the government. NeGD is also providing technical assistance to Central
Ministries and State Line Departments. Tell us about the work that you are
doing in this vertical. The mandate of NeGD is to support the DeitY in the
implementation of the NeGP. Since NeGP spans across various central
ministries and states, we interact and provide necessary support to them in
the areas of programme management, capacity building, technology management,
etc. We are an integral part of many MMP technical committees such as CCTNS,
eBiz, MCA21, etc. We are also playing an important role in formulation of new
MMPs such as Education and Health. Given our unique mix of skill sets,
ministries and states are increasingly approaching us and we are happy to be
of help to them. e-Governance has seen lot of developments during the last few
years. But the expectations of the people from the e-Governance area are also
growing. So how do organisations like NeGD keep pace with the expectations of
the people? NeGD is not a project implementation agency, and does not come in
direct contact with the public. However, I NeGD is alive to the changing
scenario in the field of public service guarantee and citizen charters.
Electronic service delivery would increasingly become the medium of service
delivery by public authorities and NeGD has a critical role to play in
enabling implementing departments in keeping pace with people’s expectation
through its research, assessment and awareness based activities. Towards this
end, various initiatives on which NeGD has worked – EDS Bill, Citizen
Engagement Framework, Mobile Service Delivery Framework, etc would be
supportive. In addition, we are also working on compiling best initiatives in
electronic service delivery and helping in rapid roll out of such
methodologies across the states to enabling implementing departments meet the
raising expectations of the public in a faster timeframe. We are enhancing
our capacity building initiatives to help build sufficient capacities within
the government to cope with such rising demands. Tasks for NeGD Programme Management of NeGP, inter-alia
including facilitating and supporting DIT in undertaking the following tasks
and responsibilities assigned to DIT under NeGP: •Facilitating implementation of NeGP by various Ministries and
State Governments •Providing technical assistance to Central Ministries and
State Line Departments •Serving as a secretariat to the Apex Committee •Undertaking technical appraisal of all NeGP projects to
examine issues such as overall technology architecture, framework, standards,
security policy, service delivery mechanism, sharing of common infrastructure
etc. •Human Resource Development, Training and •Framing core policies, technical assistance, R&D,
awareness and assessment and creation of organization structure •Acting as a Central Agency for an effective implementation of
Capacity Building Scheme inter-alia involving provisioning of manpower at
various SeMTs across States/ UTs Positioning of a Capacity Building Management Cell for
effective management of manpower at SeMTs together with management of other
Scheme activities including training, setting up HR policies, etc. In your opinion what are the key successes achieved by NeGD during
the last few years. Where would you like to see NeGD in next five years? In
my opinion, NeGD’s success is a result of its unique blend of skill sets and
therefore our successes too have been in areas as diverse as our human
resources. On one hand we helped DeitY draft the EDS Bill and on the other
the HR Policy for e-Governance. While one set of experts worked on the
Integrated Framework for Service Delivery Framework other drafted the Citizen
Engagement and Social Media Frameworks. While one team focussed on looking at
integrating Mobiles in Public Service Delivery, another worked on standards
for inter-operability framework for e-governance. As the expectations of
citizens on public service delivery attain higher standards and as new
technologies emerge, e-governance is striving hard to meet these demands.
With such an evolving domain, I visualise a greater role for NeGD in the
coming years. What are the strategies and the systems that NeGD uses for
conducting the technical appraisal of all NeGP projects? The appraisal of all
projects is done in a holistic manner. Some of the key elements that we look
for are – (1) government process reengineering, (2) leveraging of core
service delivery infrastructure i.e. SWAN, SDC, CSC etc., inter-linkages with
other related MMPs, adherence to e-governance standards, capacity building,
change management, awareness and assessment and, most importantly, citizen
service delivery and service levels. Tell us about your vision for
e-Governance in the country? Provide us with an overview of the role that
NeGD is playing in facilitating the implementation of NeGP objectives by
various Ministries and State Governments. In my view, e-Governance is the future of service delivery to
citizens. Citizen Charters and Public Service Guarantees that are being
notified by governments can be best achieved by e-governance. In a few years,
e-governance would transform the way services are delivered in the country.
This larger goal requires tremendous effort on part of government departments.
NeGD would play an important role as a promoter of electronic service
delivery as well as provide the necessary support. The field of e-Governance
is changing at a fast pace. Tell us about personal views on how you see NeGD
developing over the next few years. Given the wide spectrum in which NeGD
today functions, and the request for kind of support that are being received
by us, I visualise NeGD to evolve into a kind of a Think Tank where the blend
of public and private sector professionals will help us define and refine our
country’s vision of e-Governance. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com 0206/2013 E-Governance
Is Reaching the Citizens Directly The tagline for the NeGP is “Public Service Closer to Home.”
Is the agenda of bringing public services closer to the citizens being fully
implemented through National e-Governance Plan (NeGP)? Please provide us with
your view on status of e-Governance in the country. If you see the e-Governance
domain at a macro level, then you reach the conclusion that as a country we
have done quite well during the last decade. We have been able to reach out
to the citizens directly and in a more systematic manner through electronic
mode. Now many more departments are able to offer their services to the
citizens through electronic means. The processing times for various services
sought by the citizens have reduced drastically and there is more
transparency as well as accountability. However, despite all the successes
that we have had, we also realise that e-Governance continues to be a work in
progress. We are currently working to develop new e-Governance systems that
will get launched in the near future and we are also engineering further
improvements in the systems that have already been rolled out. I believe that
e-Governance can enable disintermediation of governance, the idea is to
enable people to access the services directly, and on this count, the
e-Governance systems launched in the country have been a success story. Most of the projects that were initially conceived under the
NeGP have by now been largely implemented. The SDCs and SWAN infrastructure
is in place. So now there is the talk of NeGP 2.0. What kind of initiatives
can we expect under NeGP 2.0? The NeGP 2.0 is now in the very initial stages
of conceptualisation. The next phase of e-Governance in the country should
focus on ensuring the speedy availability of electronic services through
devices like mobile phones and tablets that are already popular with
citizens. The penetration of mobile phones in the country is much higher as
compared to the penetration of computers and Internet. We have close to one
billion mobile phones in the country, so if we can bring e-Governance
services on the mobile platform, we will enable a very large section of the
population to access these services. We have already launched the Mobile
Service Delivery Gateway (MSDG) and mobile based services under a new
initiative called “Mobile Seva”. The system is already operational and the
details can be seen at our website: http://mgov.gov.in.The SMS gateway and
Mobile App Store are already fully operational. About 150 departments from
both Centre and the States are using the SMS gateway, developed by DeitY
through C-DAC, to reach out to the citizens. Over two lakh SMS messages are
being sent to the citizens every day for actual transactions and this number
is increasing at a rapid pace. During the last one year, from January 2012 to
December 2012, around 2 crore push SMSs have been sent. Our Mobile App Store
already has 26 live and 50 demo applications which can be downloaded by the
citizens for availing a range of government services. The other aspect of the next phase of NeGP focuses on the
development of an integrated information infrastructure. For instance, we are
now focusing on cloud enabled data centres and integrated network
connectivity. We are also aiming at rapid replication, under which the
successful projects of one state can be replicated in other states with the
necessary customisation. For rapid replication, we will be using the cloud
platform in a major way. Once applications are developed and hosted on the
cloud platform, then any other state or department can make use of it with
the necessary customisations. This would save substantial costs and time. Are there plans for a national rollout of the Mobile Service
Delivery Gateway? Yes, that is being done. This will lead to scaling up of
the infrastructure, thus enabling many more departments, from both the centre
and the states, to start using this as a common infrastructure. So the
departments need not invest their own funds in creating their own
infrastructure separately. This will lead to substantial savings in time and
efforts. As I mentioned earlier, we have also developed a mobile App Store on
the Android platform. The apps have been fully integrated with the back-ends
of the government departments. There are apps that allow users to apply for a
copy of duplicate birth certificate, submit a grievance for redressal, check
the status of UID enrolment, etc. All the apps are free. There are many other
requests that can be made through the mobile phone itself using the SMS pull
service. The details can be seen at http://mgov.gov.in. The Android platform
is an open platform; anyone can add apps or make changes in it. So what about
the security aspect of the e-Governance apps that are being created on the Android
platform? What is being done to ensure that these apps are not tampered by
hackers? Actually, the main strength of the Android platform is that it is
Open Source. There exists a large community of developers who are supporting
the Android platform and making improvements in it on a regular basis. These
developments help in making the platform more robust with passage of time. As
it is Open Source, all the latest developments in the source code are
available to our technical team for developing new applications. Our team is
also following the relevant best practices to ensure security of the
applications and the Mobile Seva platform. Many of the e-Governance initiatives can prove to be much more
fruitful if we had a foolproof system of online authentication. What kind of
initiatives are you taking in this area? Electronic authentication is of
crucial importance for success of e-Governance initiatives. At present,there
is no uniform system for online authentication of users of e-governance
services. For accessing most services, people have to physically present
themselves with a paper based identity proof at a government office. As a
consequence, very few government services are truly electronic from end to
end. To address this issue, we are working on a system for introducing online
authentication which will allow government departments to authenticate the
identity of a user electronically. DeitY has recently notified the policy
framework for this initiative, which has been named as “e-Pramaan”. The process
of authentication would be completely electronic and would incorporate the
Aadhaar based authentication mechanisms. Different government departments
will be able to use e-Praman as a service to authenticate the identity of
their users. The details of this initiative can be seen at the website:
http://epramaan.gov.in. “The key objective is to ensure that the projects are rolled
out and services are delivered to the citizens” Many citizens in the country
are unable to access e-Governance services as they are digitally illiterate
or they lack access to computers or Internet. As mobile telephones are
available to most people these days, the SMS services that you have mentioned
can be tools for empowerment. Can you provide us with more details of the SMS
service that you have launched? Our Mobile Seva provides a host of SMS based
services. In case of the departments that are integrated, the citizens can
send an SMS and track the status of any request. For instance, if you have
applied for a new ration card, you can track the status of your application
at the ration card department through SMS. The Mobile Seva portal also
provides a very easy and automated process for government departments to
integrate their services and start offering them to the citizens. The details
can be seen at the portal mentioned above. We are expanding at a rapid rate,
so within a short span of time you are going to witness a large number of new
services being launched under the Mobile Seva platform. So how does the user start using the e-Praman website? Does he
have to present himself at any government office to get a user ID and
password? No, the system is being developed in such a way that the entire
process is online. The user needs to register at the e-Praman website, by
providing his/her identification details like name, address, Aadhaar number,
PAN number, ration card number, etc. In the background, the e-Praman gateway
will do the verification electronically through the respective electronic
databases. Once the verification is done, the user becomes a verified entity.
Even those who are yet to get their Aadhaar numbers or those who don’t have
PAN card, ration card, etc. can also join in and register. They will also get
a user ID and password. Once you are registered, you can do a single sign-on
for accessing various services from different departments that are part of
the e-Praman gateway. This service is not only secure; it also allows the
users to avoid the hassle of logging in separately to each department’s
portal. Under the Capacity Building Scheme, we have In your opinion what are the key challenges that are being faced
in the implementation of e-Governance ideas in the country? The key
challenges, according to me, are to build capacities across central and state
departments and ensure optimal usage of the entire core ICT infrastructure
that we have created under the NeGP. We need to avoid any duplication in
creating the infrastructure. The key objective is to ensure that the projects
are rolled out and services are delivered to the citizens. Recently, we have
also started focusing on outcomes and transactions to judge the success of
any e-Governance project. Transaction approach basically means that the
number of transactions delivered to the citizens must be taken as a key
indicator of the success of any e-governance project. The challenge is to
ensure that the projects are delivering actual services to the citizens. The
CSCs in the country are expected to curb the incidences of digital divide,
but now questions are being raised about the financial viability of these
centres. How do we tackle the problem of financial viability? With rising
popularity of e-Governance services, and also due to the fact that CSCs are
also offering B From
http://egov.eletsonline.com New
Technologies for e-Governance Provide us with an overview of the role that EMC is playing in
What kind of response are your cloud based solutions seeing
from the government departments in “Big Data era has arrived in full force, bringing with it an
unprecedented opportunity to transform governance and the wa we work and
live.” Security related concerns are always associated with data that is
being handled by the government. These days there is some insecurity about
the safety of the data that is being stored in the cloud. What kind security
systems does EMC have to provide an extra layer of security to its clients?
As the businesses are focusing on transforming their digital strategies and
the way IT will sup- port them, the security risk landscape is also
enhancing. Stance on security must change from preventing breaches to
assuming you will be breached and to protecting your most critical assets.
Government organisations must have a zero-tolerance approach to data leakage,
insider threats, and zero-day and targeted malware. RSA, The Security
Division of EMC, is the premier provider of security, risk, and compliance
solutions, helping the government sector and leading organizations succeed by
solving their most complex and sensitive security challenges. RSA NetWitness
views these issues as inter- related and can help your organization address
them with a single enterprise security platform. Is Big Data a buzz word or is it really necessary for
government departments and private organizations to find ways of managing it
more efficiently? The Big Data era has arrived in full force, bringing with
it an unprecedented opportunity to transform governance and the way we work
and live. Through the convergence of massive scale-out storage,
next-generation analytics and visualisation capability, the technology is in
place. What’s needed to fully realise its value is a vibrant, interconnected,
highly-skilled and empowered data science community to reveal relevant trend patterns and
uncover new insights hidden within. As per the latest EMC-IDC Digital
Universe study, proliferation of devices such as PCs and smartphones
worldwide, increased Internet access within emerging markets and the boost in
data from machines such as surveillance cameras or smart meters has
contributed to the doubling of the digital universe within the past two years
alone, to a mammoth 2.8 ZB. The study further reveals that the digital
universe will reach 40 ZB by 2020. Can Big Data be used to bring more effectiveness in delivering
citizen services through e-Governance? Tell us about EMC solutions for Data Centre automation. EMC is
helping transform the data centres. The first step to transform the data
centre is virtualisation. More importantly, to exploit all the benefits of
virtualisation, CIOs need complete infrastructure visibility and streamlined
management, along with new levels of productivity and efficiency. This is
where EMC storage, EMC de duplication backup software and system offer the
ideal solution to virtualized infrastructure challenges. Automation of
various feature within storage like fully automated storage Tiering helps
deliver sustained performance under unpredictable load scenarios at optimized
cost levels. In what ways is the cloud technology evolving over a period of
time? What kind of developments can be seen in 2013? Today, Cloud is
revolutionizing the IT process by making it possible to run IT As-a-Service
to drive maximum efficiency. By deploying a pool of elastic resources, IT is
dramatically reducing hard- ware costs and making it simple to provision and
help rapid application deployment to unleash the benefit of application to
target audience. As users bring new devices to the workplace, they expect to operate them using both
personal and enterprise resources. IT must provide a new end user computing
model so they can maintain control over information and access, while
allowing users to choose their own devices. EMC thinks of this as the new
layering of IT which requires end-to-end security and management across
layers. As IT transforms its operations to run IT- As-A-Service, its role
will also transform – from an exclusive provider of IT services to a broker
of IT services – some of which IT creates and delivers itself, some of which
are delivered by service providers. This new role for IT combined with new
cloud technology will drive maximum business efficiency. From
http://egov.eletsonline.com |
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The Azerbaijani Ministry of Taxes is creating a special
organisation to deal with an electronic audit, Azerbaijani Deputy Minister
Sahib Alakbarov told Trend on Monday. "In the coming days we intend to
make changes to the structure of the Ministry," he said. "This will
be a very strong organisation consisting of IT specialists and tax employees.
This organisation will begin its activity in early 2013 enabling us to
conduct an e-audit." He said that the project of introducing e-audit is
under completion. "Specialists at the Ministry underwent special training,"
he said. "The project consisting of six components (establishing a legal
framework, the information base and staff training), is under
completion." Head of Tax Policy and Strategic Studies Department of the
Ministry Akif Musayev told Trend earlier that the regulatory framework for
the electronic audit will be created within the bill on amendments and
additions to the Tax Code. This bill is being developed. The electronic audit
is intended to protect the rights of taxpayers. An automated information system
is required for its application. The Ministry of Taxes has the system,
including all the possibilities for an e-audit the ministry said. Using an
electronic audit will reduce the number of on-site inspections by 90 per
cent. From
http://en.trend.az/ E-Service
Application for Licensure in the ICT Field Integrated into “E-Government”
Portal The Ministry of Communications and Information Technologies of
Azerbaijan added e-applications for various licensures into its
"e-government" portal (ehdis.az), a report published by the portal
said on Wednesday. Currently, the ministry offers 25 e-services. Also,
services provided by the State Committee for Family, Women and Child Affairs
are also integrated in the portal. Currently, an online application for
international adoption is also available. "E-government" contains
36 state agencies and integrates over 168 online services. A number of state
institutions also appealed to the agency in hopes of joining the portal; this
process will be carried out in stages depending on the readiness of their
individual IT-infrastructures. The "e-government" portal is a key
tool in supporting interaction with citizens as well as with the public and
private sectors. The portal is intended to reduce the number of documents
requested by citizens, given that different agencies will communicate with
each other electronically. Access to the portal is through the use of
electronic digital signatures (EDS), the identification data of private
businesses and citizens, as well as through the use of verification data
(username and password), that may be obtained upon registration with the
portal. From
http://en.trend.az/ Azerbaijani
Communications Ministry Introduces The Information Computer Centre of the Azerbaijani
Communications and Information Technologies Ministry has introduced an
authentication system for access to the portal of electronic government
through mobile devices (mobile phones and tablet computers). The centre
presented an application that will provide access to the e-government portal
through mobile devices. The new system empowers users to create digital
certificates by using a two-factor authentication system and receive access
to the portal of e-government by scanning the QR code. In future, application
functionality will be supplemented by modules providing assurance of legally
significant documents by electronic signature and its address to relevant
departments. From
http://en.trend.az/ Newly
Established Commission to Consider Online Media Complaints in A commission has been established under the Press Council. It
will consider complaints and other issues relating to online media, head of
the Press Council Aflatun Amashov said at a briefing today. He said that the
commission will consider complaints relating to online media, hacker attacks
on websites and other issues in this area. The general concept of the
commission's activity will be established, Amashov said. From
http://en.trend.az/ The Uzbek government has adopted a decree on measures aimed at
improving the work of the online state portal with consideration of delivering
public services via the Internet. According to the document, the State
Committee for communications, information and communication technology of the
country has developed and will launch a single portal of interactive public
services which will operate as part of the state portal and in the single
window mode as well. A single portal providing online public services will be
aimed at ensuring access of individuals and entities to information on
services and functions provided by the state and economic management bodies
as well as public authorities in the field. Alongside, users will be given an
opportunity of exchanging data online, making requests through a single point
of access to integrated, interactive public services by public and economic administration
and public authorities in the field and on a paid basis as well.
Consideration of requests and appeals of individuals and entities concerning
the functioning of a single portal, including the monitoring of the quality
of online public services provided by public and economic administration
bodies and public authorities in the field will become available. This
measure is taken to ensure full exchange of data in electronic form, to
expedite the procedures for the request and improve the interaction of
entrepreneurs and the public with public authorities on the basis of use of
information and communication technologies. From
http://en.trend.az/ Creation
of "Electronic Government" to Be Accelerated in Uzbek Cabinet of Ministers instructed State Committee for
Communication, Informatization and Telecommunication Technologies to
accelerate the development of the concept and comprehensive program for the
creation of "electronic government" to introduce electronic
delivery of interactive public services to businesses and individuals. This
was stated in a decree signed by President Karimov at the meeting of Cabinet
of Ministers which reviewed the results of socio-economic development of the
country in 2012 and priorities of economic program for 2013. The document was
published in the mass media on Tuesday. As previously reported, the Uzbek
government adopted a decree on measures aimed at improving the work of the online
state portal with consideration of delivering public services via the
Internet. It is planned that a single portal of interactive public services
will operate as part of the state portal and in the single window mode as
well. A single portal providing online public services will be aimed at
ensuring the access of individuals and entities to information on services
and functions provided by the state and economic management bodies as well as
public authorities in the field. Also, users will be given an opportunity to
exchange data online, making requests through a single point of access. The
portal will also consider the requests and appeals of individuals and
entities and conduct monitoring of the quality of online public services
provided by public and economic administration bodies and public authorities
in the field. The Asian Development Bank (ADB) provided technical assistance
to From
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The TPB
registers and regulates Australian tax practitioners. The cloud project marks
the start of a physical and logical separation of systems and services from
those of the Australian Taxation Office (ATO). Currently, the board does not
have its own independent IT system; this is shared with the ATO. Once up and
running, cloud-hosted services will be available in From http://www.futuregov.asia Australian Govt
Fights Against Internet Governance Changes Communications
Minister Stephen Conroy is in Others
have warned that the changes would make internet "blackouts", such
as those seen in Conroy
said that he would be meeting with the delegations from other nations to seek
support for From http://www.zdnet.com Aust Gov Drives
High-Tech Transport Reforms Facing a
high rate of road fatality, the National Transport Commission (NTC) is
driving the adoption of intelligent transport management systems – while supporting
regulatory reforms to cut the national toll. The NTC is weighing in behind
introducing nationwide Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) –
noting this technology will cut Notifications
are also relayed about changed traffic conditions such as a train approaching
a railway crossing. Among its features, C-ITS technology enables different
elements of a transport network, including vehicles and infrastructure, to
exchange information using dedicated short range communication. This
technology is supported by warning systems that are activated, alerting road
users about potential collisions. In Active
trials are also under-way in Europe and the From http://www.futuregov.asia Super Fast Broadband
and Government Service Delivery Senator
the Honourable Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the
Digital Economy, The
Australian Government has also released a National Digital Economy Strategy
which has the overarching vision to make ·
Online participation by Australian
households ·
Online engagement by Australian businesses
and not for profit organisations ·
Smart management of our environment and
infrastructure ·
Improved health and aged care ·
Expanded online education |
