Three Days Until UK’s Most Useful Digital Identity Event Opens

The countdown’s started for what is emerging as the most useful Identity event of the year – Think Digital Identity for Government 2018.

The conference opens its doors at 8.45am on Friday, with opening remarks from its chair, well-known public sector IT journalist David Bicknell, set for 09.25am, with closing remarks from Institute for Government analyst Daniel Thornton scheduled for 16.15pm. The venue is One Great George St in Westminster (Nearest Tube St James’s Park).

“Identity – from Identity cards, to trust in the handling of data, to the development and adoption of Verify and digital Identity creation – has consistently been one of the thorniest, and yet stimulating, of public sector tech subjects,” says Bicknell, who edits the Government Computing website.

“This conference will shine a strong light on all the key issues around Identity in public services. By the end of the day, we should all be more identity-aware than where we started from.”

Given that confirmed speakers on the day include Nic Harrison, Director of Service Design & Assurance at GDS, who will be delivering a special Keynote outlining current government thinking on Identity as it currently stands at 09.55am, plus Identity expert and his former colleague David Rennie, it sounds like he’s right.

Rennie now works on the vendor side, which is also well represented, with commercial supporters including Diamond Partners Mvine, Identity and access management specialist ForgeRock and UKCloud.

ForgeRock’s comms team sent us this great comment about its plans for Friday: “We believe Think Digital Identity for Government 2018 is a must-attend event for anyone looking to harness the power of Digital Identity to transform their day to day citizen interactions. We look forward to seeing you there.”

The role of the private sector in the next steps in Digital Identity’s evolution has also become of great debate in the community given some very suggestive remarks by GDS’s Harrison at last week’s Sprint 2018 conference in London.

There, the Service’s Service Design and Assurance Director told journalists that his team is “really looking at what do we need to do to reach our 25m target” – and to drive this adoption of ubiquitous Identity forward against that backdrop of “going slower that we wanted to”, GDS needs to “accelerate” what it’s doing with the private sector: “I’ve been meeting with the identity providers (IDPs), having big conversations with them… ultimately, the direction of travel for Verify, in fact for digital identity generally, is that we want it to be a thing that the government is a consumer of, not an owner and curator of”.

So it seems an event that walks us through the ramifications for Digital Identity of that decision at the heart of government would be useful… so it’s a good thing we have Think Digital Identity for Government 2018 to help!

Commenting on the event and how it could contribute to the Identity debate, Matt Stanley, one of the Directors of its organiser, Think Digital Partners, points out that, “Digital Identity is one of the most debated topics across technology departments of both the public and the private sectors. 

“This conference will highlight the many public sector success stories coming through while also exploring the factors influencing how the government moves forward with its Identity plans.”

There are still places left for the event, but not many! So go here to secure your place if you still haven’t – and see you on Friday!