Australia
The government plans to spend $9.1 million to prepare a business case for creating a digital skills passport that would enable job seekers to share their verified qualifications with employers.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said more workers were re-training and upskilling than ever before and a skills passport would make it easier for them to demonstrate their training to employers.
“Our goal is to make it easier for workers to have their qualifications recognised and easier for employers to find the well-trained, highly qualified workers they need,” Chalmers said.
United Kingdom
More veterans will receive HM Armed Forces Veteran Cards by the end of the year after the UK government expanded the roll-out to veterans who left service before 2018.
The ID card will allow veterans to prove their veteran status where required, granting them simpler access to key support from the NHS, charities and local authorities, it says. They can also be used to apply for Defence Discount Service Cards and the Veterans Railcard.
Global
ID verification solution provider Shufti Pro has partnered with Newton Global to enhance the latter’s online security and KYC compliance.
Shufti Pro will act as a Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) authenticator for Newton Global, ensuring security in the fintech industry sector and providing a safe user onboarding solution.
By integrating Shufti Pro’s solutions, Newton Global’s customers will be guided through a document capture process for tampering authentication, as well as biometric verification for deep-fake and liveness confirmation. Furthermore, the solution will validate the users from several authentic registries, including AML, sanction, media, and PEPs, among others, ensuring KYC/AML compliance and enabling a secure user onboarding experience.
United Kingdom
Next Tuesday, October 10th is the next Think Digital Identity for Government conference in Westminster, London. There is still time to register for the conference and hear from government identity expert speakers from the Government Digital Service (GDS), DWP Digital, Department for Science Innovation and Technology (DSIT), Ministry of Defence, NHS and many industry bodies and experts.
Kenya
Kenya’s Immigration and Citizen Services Principal Secretary Julius Bitok has said a proposed digital identification card will help the private sector minimise risks related to fraud by providing a more reliable authentication of clients.
He told representatives of the private sector that the rollout of a digital identity infrastructure will also support business innovation, especially around e-commerce.
He said the implementation of the digital ID regime will be guided by specific measures to safeguard the safety and integrity of private data.
“We have done a data protection impact assessment, which was not done in previous projects. We have submitted a data protection impact assessment report to the Data Commissioner to ensure the process complies with the law,” he said.
United Kingdom
IDnow has received the accreditation on the levels medium and high for the UK’s Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (DIATF) for its fully automated, AI-based solution IDCheck.io. Valid for two years, IDnow received this badge from government-accredited Digital Identity Systems Certification.
The DIATF is a set of rules and standards designed by the UK government to establish trust in digital identity products coupled with proper governance on how identity service providers (IDSPs) should verify claimed identities via remote methods. Currently, the Framework sets out guidelines and requirements for Right to Work, Right to Rent, and Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Checks.
New Zealand
The not-for-profit, Digital Identity NZ, is calling for any future government to ensure they focus on supporting the uptake of digital identity for the benefit of all New Zealanders.
In its recently released manifesto, the New Zealand digital identity ecosystem seeks to remind government of the importance of digital identity as a way to revolutionise the lives of all New Zealanders by enabling them to fully participate in the digital economy safely and confidently.
The manifesto calls for increased focus on bridging the digital divide to ensure equitable access to digital identity solutions for all New Zealanders – people and organisations – taking into account Māori tikanga and Māori data sovereignty, and social inclusion for the disadvantaged in our society.
India
The Aadhaar digital identity programme poses privacy and security risks, and the use of its biometric technology in humid climate is unreliable, ratings agency Moody’s Investors Service said in a recent report. It added that the unique ID system often leads to “service denial”.
“The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) administers Aadhaar, aiming to integrate marginalised groups and expand welfare benefits access…The system often results in service denials, and the reliability of biometric technologies, especially for manual labourers in hot, humid climates, is questionable,” Moody’s said in its report “Decentralised Finance and Digital Assets,” according to The Hindu.
The report acknowledged that Aadhaar is the world’s largest digital ID programme but added that it “faces hurdles, including the burden of establishing authorisation and concerns about biometric reliability.”
In response, the Indian government said that the investor service has made sweeping assertions against Aadhaar without citing any evidence or basis.
Denmark
Denmark’s digital ID, MitID, could become a valid form of digital ID for people from Denmark who live in other Nordic and Baltic countries.
The decision was made by the Nordic Council of Ministers, the body for inter-governmental co-operation in the Nordic Region, Danish news wire Ritzau reported.
Allowing MitID in these countries outside of Denmark means, for example, that Danes who live in Sweden will be allowed to use their MitID to log on to Swedish digital services that require a digital ID.
The MitID digital ID system is the online ID used in Denmark for access to public service platforms as well as some private services like online banking and payment card verification on Danish webshops. It is not a legal requirement to use MitID.
Argentina
Buenos Aires is making a major move toward integrating its bureaucracy with blockchain technology. Starting in October, the city’s residents can access identity documents via a digital wallet, according to an announcement on September 28.
The first documents available on-chain will include birth and marriage certificates, along with proof of income and academic verification. The announcement notes that health data and payment management will be integrated in the future, and that a roadmap for rolling out the blockchain-based solution across the country will be defined by the end of 2023.
Behind the project infrastructure is QuarkID, a digital identity protocol built by Web3 firm Extrimian. QuarkID wallets are powered by zkSync Era, an Ethereum scaling protocol using zero-knowledge rollups. The technology allows one party to prove to another that a statement is true without revealing any specific information about the statement itself.