News

IT for government and public sector

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  Bournemouth Council considers bringing IT back in-house

  Bournemouth Council could bring IT and other services back in-house to gain more control over its budget and meet tough cost-cutting targets

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  Met Police appoints Angus McCallum as CIO

  BG Group’s Angus McCallum is the Metropolitan Police’s CIO, heading up its Digital Policing arm and serving on the management board

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  NHS 24 admits ‘systematic failure’ of £117m IT project

  NHS 24 has admitted that a “systematic failure around project governance” was the cause of its major IT transformation project disaster

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  Government drafts in civilians to fight cyber crime

  The government plans to bolster police capacity to fight cyber crime by approving measures to give powers to volunteers with specialist knowledge

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  PwC acquires Polish cloud consultancy for European operation

  PwC is buying Poland-based IT services firm Outbox to build its cloud skills and resources across Europe

• January 20, 2016 20 Jan'16

  Microsoft to donate $1bn worth of cloud computing resources

  Microsoft's $1bn cloud computing donation is aimed at helping NGOs, academic research and developing countries

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Digital Single Market must be adopted without delay, says EU parliament

  MEPs pass resolution urging the EU to adopt Digital Single Market proposals and enact new protections for consumers as soon as possible

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Staffordshire Police picks Boeing as its strategic IT partner

  The police and crime commissioner for Staffordshire plans to sign a strategic IT partnership contract with Boeing, worth more than £100m over the next 10 years

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  UK IT and business process outsourcing plummeted in 2015, show ISG figures

  The amount of money UK organisations spent on IT and business process outsourcing fell sharply in 2015, compared to the previous year

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Cornwall Council transfers 270 staff back in-house as BT deal ends

  Cornwall Council’s £160m outsourcing deal with BT has officially come to an end as the council transfers 270 staff back in-house

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Government should exploit blockchain technology, says chief scientist Mark Walport

  Distributed ledgers – the technology behind systems such as bitcoin – could transform public services, says government chief scientist Mark Walport

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Migration recommendations could hike the cost of Indian IT services

  Government recommendations to tighten up the rules around overseas workers in the UK could increase IT costs for businesses

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Sigfox brings the internet of things to Antarctica

  Connectivity provider teams up with GPS supplier Sensolus and Belgian government to use the IoT to support climate change researchers

• January 19, 2016 19 Jan'16

  Australian prime minister Malcolm Turnbull calls for free, open and secure internet

  International norms of behaviour should prohibit states from conducting cyber intellectual property theft, says Australian prime minister Malcolm Turnbull

• January 18, 2016 18 Jan'16

  Scotland needs a chief digital officer, says SCDI

  The Scottish Council for Development and Industry, the Royal Society of Edinburgh and BT Scotland have called on the government to create a new role to drive digital transformation

• January 18, 2016 18 Jan'16

  Irish Tax Institute accelerates tax database search with MarkLogic

  The Irish Tax Institute has opted for MarkLogic for its TaxFind database service, with a system that pools a range of data types

• January 18, 2016 18 Jan'16

  Data standards ‘should be led by market, not European Commission’, says UK government

  In its response to the EU consultation on a single digital market, UK government highlights the need for healthy competition and transparency

• January 18, 2016 18 Jan'16

  Chinese university targeted by Islamic State hacktivist

  Beijing’s Tsinghua University is the latest organisation to be attacked by hackers with a social or political agenda

• January 15, 2016 15 Jan'16

  Lords urge government to reconsider national ID card

  The House of Lords debates the use of ID cards to tackle identity assurance, fraud, terrorism and crime – and urges government to review the issue

• January 15, 2016 15 Jan'16

  Government reviews IT contract strategy as ‘opaque’ outsourcing deals are set to expire

  Project dubbed ‘Ocean liner’ looks at how to move away from existing outsourcing contracts, citing poor value for money and supplier criticisms

• January 15, 2016 15 Jan'16

  Countries underestimate risk of cyber attack, says WEF

  Cyber attacks are one of the most serious risks facing global economies, according to the World Economic Forum's 2016 risk report

• January 14, 2016 14 Jan'16

  Southend-on-Sea Council embarks on £1.5m hybrid cloud datacentre refresh

  Local authority says hybrid cloud datacentre plans will pave the way for greater use of services offered via G-Cloud framework

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  IT specialists account for 25% of government spend on temps

  A National Audit Office report into government use of consultants and temporary staff shows that IT and project management staff account for the majority of the government's total spend in a bid to tackle the skills gap

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  NHS Scotland lets clinicians discover patterns in data with Tableau

  The NHS in Scotland is using data visualisation from Tableau to level up health outcomes across the country

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  NHS England launches hunt for ‘CI&TO’ to replace Kelsey

  NHS England seeks chief information and technology officer to take over from director for patients and information Tim Kelsey, who left late last year

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  Prisons and detention centres to get new health IT system

  NHS England will roll out new health and justice information system across prisons, immigration removal centres, youth institutes and secure children’s homes

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  Scottish Power picks Vodafone to manage smart electricity grid

  Four-year contract will see mobile operator manage performance monitoring and fault identification systems as energy supplier transitions to smart grid technologies

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  Watchdog urges US nuclear agency to close cyber security gaps

  An audit report has called on the US nuclear agency to revise its IT contracts to ensure better cyber security

• January 13, 2016 13 Jan'16

  Firms can monitor employees’ online chats, EU court rules

  Human rights court says it is not unreasonable for employers to want to verify that staff are completing their professional tasks during working hours

• January 12, 2016 12 Jan'16

  More endpoints managed is security concern, say IT services firms

  The rising number of devices connected to corporate networks is a security challenge for the IT services firms managing these endpoints

• January 12, 2016 12 Jan'16

  European Commission awards cloud contracts worth €24m to BT

  BT secures deals that will see it provide public and private cloud services to 52 European Commission agencies and bodies

• January 12, 2016 12 Jan'16

  Law should force companies to reveal cyber attacks, says Liam Fox

  Government should introduce legislation forcing firms to inform shareholders when they have been hacked, says Tory backbench MP Liam Fox

• January 11, 2016 11 Jan'16

  EU data protection rules affect everyone, say legal experts

  The EU's new data protection rules will impact every entity that holds or uses European personal data both inside and outside of Europe, according to legal experts

• January 11, 2016 11 Jan'16

  ICO reiterates call for stronger sentences for data theft

  The information commissioner (ICO) reiterates his call for stronger sentences for data theft after a court fined a woman just £1,000 for selling 28,000 customer records

• January 11, 2016 11 Jan'16

  Jeremy Corbyn’s team quickly regains control of hacked Twitter account

  A hacker gained control of Jeremy Corbyn' s Twitter account, but managed to publish only four posts before control was taken back and the posts deleted

• January 11, 2016 11 Jan'16

  Top priorities for Nordic CIOs in 2016

  What are the main priorities for CIOs in the Nordic region this year? Computer Weekly asks some of the region’s experts

• January 08, 2016 08 Jan'16

  IT procurement lead Sarah Hurrell to leave Crown Commercial Service

  Government purchasing agency’s commercial director for technology will depart to take up a job in the private sector

• January 08, 2016 08 Jan'16

  Blackpool becomes third NHS trust to get open-source EPR

  Open-source electronic patient records continue to gain traction in the NHS as Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust signs up

• January 08, 2016 08 Jan'16

  US officials to meet tech firms about countering Islamic State

  Discussions will cover ways of making it more difficult for extremist groups to use online services to further their aims

• January 08, 2016 08 Jan'16

  Tech firms critical of UK draft Investigatory Powers Bill

  Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter and Yahoo say they are particularly concerned about six key aspects of the UK's draft Investigatory Powers Bill

• January 07, 2016 07 Jan'16

  Gov.uk notifications platform to begin sending texts and emails

  Latest project in government-as-a-platform strategy aims to make it easier to keep individuals informed about applications and services

• January 07, 2016 07 Jan'16

  French intelligence ‘could have prevented Paris attacks'

  A former US intelligence director turned whistleblower tells MPs and peers that bulk collection of internet and phone data is putting lives at risk

• January 07, 2016 07 Jan'16

  UK interception powers need regular review, says privacy watchdog

  UK information commissioner Christopher Graham has called for a regular review of interception powers and greater audit powers

• January 06, 2016 06 Jan'16

  Italy wakes up to new IoT opportunities

  Organisations in Italy are investing in internet-connected technologies, with infrastructure providers building the underpinning networks

• January 06, 2016 06 Jan'16

  EU privacy watchdog to set up ethics advisory group

  The EU data protection supervisor plans to encourage a discussion on the ethics of future technologies to prevent individuals being reduced to mere data subjects

• January 06, 2016 06 Jan'16

  Government has poor track record in delivering major projects, says NAO

  Out of 149 major government projects with total lifetime costs of £511bn, including 40 ICT projects, a third is rated red or amber-red, the National Audit Office has found

• January 05, 2016 05 Jan'16

  Security experts support Dutch stance on encryption

  Security experts have come out in support of a Dutch government statement against weakening encryption for the purposes of law enforcement and intelligence agencies

• January 05, 2016 05 Jan'16

  Fears of software skills shortage in Germany and the Netherlands

  Organisations in Germany and the Netherlands are struggling to fill positions for software developers as they digitise

• January 05, 2016 05 Jan'16

  Bristol opens up transport data to app developers

  Bristol City Council offers free access to transport data to encourage the development of mobile technology systems

• January 05, 2016 05 Jan'16

  Free public communications network rolls out in New York City

  Communication hubs will provide free public Wi-Fi, voice and video calls, device charging and tablets for internet browsing, access to city services, maps and directions

• January 05, 2016 05 Jan'16

  Surveillance tribunal refers child privacy claim to information commissioner

  The Investigatory Powers Tribunal has referred a complaint to the UK information commissioner that the US National Security Agency is intercepting children's internet activities

• January 04, 2016 04 Jan'16

  IT security predictions for Australian organisations in 2016

  What IT security challenges should Australian organisations expect in the new year?

• January 04, 2016 04 Jan'16

  GP Extraction Service ‘another Whitehall failure’, says PAC

  Public Accounts Committee slams GP Extraction Service and its supplier, Atos, in a new report on the long-delayed project

• January 04, 2016 04 Jan'16

  Surrey County Council pushes for digital to improve services for residents

  Local authority is pushing open data, linking up different services and installing movement sensors in extra care housing

• December 31, 2015 31 Dec'15

  Top 10 internet of things stories of 2015

  2015 was the year the internet of things began to move from theory to widespread practice, and the fledgling industry shook off the millstone of connected kitchen appliances

• December 30, 2015 30 Dec'15

  Government calls on industry to develop UK digital strategy

  The government turns to the public and industry for ideas on how to push forward the UK’s digital transformation

• December 24, 2015 24 Dec'15

  Top 10 NHS IT stories of 2015

  From the unexpected news that NHS England’s digital chief Tim Kelsey is leaving the NHS to an unsurprising further delay of Care.data and Epic problems at Cambridge University Hospital, NHS technology has had a turbulent year

• December 23, 2015 23 Dec'15

  Top 10 APAC IT stories of 2015

  The top 10 Computer Weekly articles about enterprise IT in the Asean and ANZ regions

• December 23, 2015 23 Dec'15

  Top 10 CIO interviews of 2015

  The IT leaders in the UK and across Europe who shared their strategies and plans with Computer Weekly in 2015

• December 22, 2015 22 Dec'15

  Dorset County Council rejects outsourcing

  Council decides against outsourcing back-office services, including IT, due to a lack of flexibility

• December 22, 2015 22 Dec'15

  Top 10 public sector IT stories of 2015

  In the year the UK public voted for another five years of Tory government and Mike Bracken left the Government Digital Service (GDS), public sector IT had a turbulent ride

• December 21, 2015 21 Dec'15

  Court rules Cornwall Council can terminate BT outsourcing deal

  Cornwall Council gets the green light from the High Court to end its £160m outsourcing deal with BT and plans to give termination notice before Christmas

• December 17, 2015 17 Dec'15

  Australian corporate counsel under cyber attack but no plans to increase security spend

  Australia’s corporate counsel are suffering a high rate of data breaches compared to many regions, but do not plan to spend more on preventative security

• December 17, 2015 17 Dec'15

  DWP IP addresses ended up in hands of Daesh, hackers claim

  A number of social media accounts owned by jihadist militant group have been linked to IP addresses previously owned by the UK government

• December 17, 2015 17 Dec'15

  National security ‘not affected’ by failed e-Borders programme, says Home Office

  Despite the key Warnings Index system suffering an average of two high-priority incidents a week – such as a system component not being available – Home Office officials deny it causes risk to national security

• December 16, 2015 16 Dec'15

  Deal on EU data protection is close

  A deal to standardise data protection rules across the EU could be imminent after compromises were made

• December 15, 2015 15 Dec'15

  Will more business mean more IT adoption in post-election Myanmar?

  Myanmar is set for huge economic, social and cultural changes after the recent general election and IT has a key role to play

• December 14, 2015 14 Dec'15

  HMRC launches digital personal tax accounts

  HM Revenue & Customs has gone live with online personal tax accounts and has published a detailed plan on how to “make tax digital”

• December 14, 2015 14 Dec'15

  Somerset plans early exit from Southwest One deal

  Somerset County Council plans to pursue an early exit from its Southwest One contract and bring services back in-house in 12 months

• December 14, 2015 14 Dec'15

  GP patients in Wales will get access to medical records by 2017

  The Welsh government publishes a five-year digital health and care strategy, which includes a citizens’ portal for patients to access their GP records

• December 11, 2015 11 Dec'15

  UK hosts international cyber attack response test

  The UK has hosted an exercise to test how investigators and prosecutors across Europe and the US would work together in the event of a complex international cyber criminal incident

• December 10, 2015 10 Dec'15

  Experian chooses UK authentication startup for Gov.UK Verify

  To ensure that UK citizens using Gov.UK Verify have secure access to their online accounts, Experian is using distributed cryptography technology from MIRACL

• December 10, 2015 10 Dec'15

  EE and Motorola confirmed as ESN suppliers by Home Office

  EE and Motorola have been formally selected to provide a resilient national 4G network for the UK’s ambulance, fire and police services

• December 10, 2015 10 Dec'15

  100Gbps network powers petabyte research cloud at Australia’s Monash University

  Australian university implements powerful network to support data hungry research cloud.

• December 10, 2015 10 Dec'15

  100Gbps network powers petabyte research cloud at Australia’s Monash University

  Australian university implements powerful network to support data hungry research cloud.

• December 10, 2015 10 Dec'15

  Rural payments digital service like watching a Greek tragedy unfold, say MPs

  Serious culture clash and dysfunctional leadership were at the core of the rural payments digital service problems, the Public Accounts Committee heard

• December 09, 2015 09 Dec'15

  Russian big data in early stages

  The use of big data technologies in Russia is still embryonic and the economic slowdown is stalling developments

• December 09, 2015 09 Dec'15

  100Gbps network powers petabyte research cloud at Australia’s Monash University

  Australian university implements powerful network to support data-hungry research cloud

• December 09, 2015 09 Dec'15

  Exeter and Devon councils launch smart transport project

  Exeter and Devon councils have launched a project to use real-time traffic and weather sensor data to understand what affects people’s travel behaviour

• December 09, 2015 09 Dec'15

  CCGs collaborate to submit digital plans to NHS England

  A large number of clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) have decided to work together on their digital roadmaps for a paper-free NHS

• December 09, 2015 09 Dec'15

  Nordic startups take on the enterprise mobile app market

  Nordic startups are targeting the mobile market with software to help customers create apps as demand from businesses in their home region and beyond grows

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Australian university launches cyber security master's degree

  The University of New South Wales in Canberra has launched a master's course in cyber security, strategy and diplomacy

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Experts give evidence on draft Investigatory Powers Bill

  The Joint Committee on the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill and the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee hear testimony from experts

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Scottish Government gets electronic voting system for local elections

  The contract to design the electronic vote counting system for the 2017 local elections in Scotland has been awarded to CGI

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  Martha Lane Fox calls on NHS to offer free Wi-Fi and build digital skills

  Martha Lane Fox wants the NHS to offer free Wi-Fi across the NHS estate, build digital skills and increase the number of patients using online services

• December 08, 2015 08 Dec'15

  National roll-out of Universal Credit digital service to begin in May 2016

  The Universal Credit digital service will be rolled out to five job centres a month from May 2016, says the Department for Work and Pensions

• December 07, 2015 07 Dec'15

  Airwave makes U-turn on emergency network injunction

  The UK emergency network operator decides to drop an injunction preventing the Home Office from finding a cheaper operator

• December 07, 2015 07 Dec'15

  Government digital skills gap concerning, says NAO

  Funding and pay is one of the biggest challenges to getting the right capabilities in place, an NAO survey has found

• December 07, 2015 07 Dec'15

  Cyber attacks an increasing concern for Asean countries

  Organisations in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations are increasingly the targets for cyber criminals, according to a report focused on the region

• December 07, 2015 07 Dec'15

  Obama hints at tougher stance on encryption

  The White House has begun raising concerns with tech firms over terrorists' use of encryption and social media as president Obama signals he plans to urge tech firms to help

• December 07, 2015 07 Dec'15

  Australia launches plan to reduce reliance on natural resources

  The Australian government has announced plans to reduce its dependency on industries that rely on natural resources and increase its activities in areas such as IT

• December 04, 2015 04 Dec'15

  Mike Bracken sets up consultancy with ex-GDS colleagues

  Ex-GDS head Mike Bracken, along with three former GDS staff, has launched a consultancy to help foreign governments do digital transformation

• December 04, 2015 04 Dec'15

  Internet of things will be one of the Asean IT highlights in 2016

  IoT investments will be one of the major trends in Asean economies throughout 2016, according to predictions from Frost & Sullivan.

• December 04, 2015 04 Dec'15

  India’s HCL opens Estonian operation to support Nordic customers

  HCL Technologies opens an Estonian delivery centre which will support customers across Europe, including those in the Nordic region

• December 04, 2015 04 Dec'15

  Europe's CIOs must raise their game in testing software quality

  CIOs across Europe have more work to do to ensure the structural quality of software is sound as IT becomes more important to organisations across different sectors

• December 04, 2015 04 Dec'15

  UK citizen challenges police and ICO over Prism

  A UK citizen challenging two police forces and the ICO hopes to achieve a landmark ruling similar to that obtained by Austrian privacy campaigner Max Schrems, who scuttled the Safe Harbour agreement

• December 03, 2015 03 Dec'15

  CGI to provide electronic health records to MoD

  The MoD has extended an outsourcing agreement with CGI to build on existing work the IT services firm does with its global medical operations

• December 03, 2015 03 Dec'15

  The capital needs more diverse tech talent, says London Assembly report

  The London Assembly Economy Committee urges mayor of London Boris Johnson to further champion women in IT, re-design apprenticeships to improve skills and diversity, and lobby for superfast broadband in the capital

• December 03, 2015 03 Dec'15

  Manchester bags £10m smart city prize in government contest

  Manchester’s CityVerve project scoops the £10m jackpot in the government’s smart city and internet of things competition

• December 03, 2015 03 Dec'15

  Home Office e-Borders programme costs to reach £1.1bn by 2019, says NAO report

  The failed e-Borders programme has cost £830m to date, with a further £275m projected costs before the Home Office produces new systems in-house, due to go live in 2019