The Scottish Government is extending its digital identity programme, ScotAccount, to new services across the public sector, including exploring the potential for interoperability with GOV.UK One Login, to support users of both Scottish and UK public services.
In a blog post, the programme’s director, Trudy Nicolson, said scaling ScotAccount will “make it easy for people to access other public services saving time, money, and effort for both the user and the public service.”
Working initially with Disclosure Scotland, ScotAccount has enabled people to access their disclosure results online. More recently, it has assisted the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service (COPFS) to introduce their new Witness Gateway, giving victims and witnesses the option to access their case information online for the first time.
It also recently introduced of a save capability, which gives people the choice to save their verified personal information into their ScotAccount, for re-use with other services.
Alongside the potential interoperability with GOV.UK One Login, the programme is now extending the range of verified personal information people can choose to save into their ScotAccount. The goal is for it to be easier for people to re-use their information to access other services.
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Nicolson said ScotAccount is also working on offering more inclusive ways for people to verify their identity, “particularly for those who do not have biometric documents, who have a limited digital footprint due to age or personal circumstances, or for those who struggle with accessing digital services.,” she said.
“This involves introducing knowledge-based verification, accepting alternative documents, as well as supporting a CivTech challenge on third party vouching, which looks at how we can use trusted relationships to support people to identify themselves and access those essential public services.”
“Additionally, we’re looking at using ScotAccount as the way people will sign-in to access secure messages from public services. This involves another Civtech challenge to develop a secure two-way channel between public services and people who use them. This aims to reduce the numbers of letters we send by post, release cost savings and give people faster, more secure and convenient services.”
