Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn’s Digital Democracy Manifesto launch has been praised by IT sector figures. The manifesto proposes a voluntary scheme to provide British citizens with a secure and portable identity for their on-line activities, the Digital Citizen Passport, for use when interacting with public services.
Also promised after public consultation is a digital bill of rights. According to the document: “This constitutional settlement will reaffirm the continued importance of long-held and hard-won individual and collective freedoms within the new information society. The human right of personal privacy should give legal protection for British citizens from not only unwarranted snooping on their on-line activities by the security services, but also unjustified surveillance by CCTV and other hi-tech methods within the workplace.”
Robin Tombs, CEO, Yoti, said that it demonstrated a clear recognition by the Labour Party that the UK requires a digital identity as more and more of our daily tasks are carried out online. “By ensuring people control the sharing of their verified identity and attributes easily from their phone through biometric technology like a selfie, people will be free to prove their identity to a local council, business or even another individual. This is something we’re already working towards at Yoti, as we strongly believe in empowering the public to use, for free, their digital identity securely across public bodies and businesses to prove who they are. Whether we’re buying or selling goods online, online dating, or even renting out holiday homes, we will all benefit from a digital identity.”
Neil Greathead, Vice President, Chief Customer Office, EMEA, BMC Software, said: “The race for digital transformation is no longer just a key consideration for British businesses, it is in fact becoming a crucial component of how our society may grow and flourish in the future.
“Achieving this robust new digital infrastructure is however no mean feat. The public sector can take key learnings from many private sector organisations, and must take measurable steps to try and secure the new generation of ‘digital citizens’. Data security must be at the heart of any digital transformation journey- the digital citizen passport scheme for example, can only thrive with the right level or encryption implemented to maintain citizen trust.
“Finally, continued training and investment into the next generation of STEM talent is vital as the UK economy looks to become digital by default. Digital transformation is not a matter of ‘if’ but ‘when’ and businesses and all areas of society can benefit from this new era of change by acting today.”
For the four-page manifesto visit http://www.jeremyforlabour.com/digital_democracy_manifesto.
Visit http://www.labour.org.uk/people/detail/jeremy-corbyn.
