Post Office objection to Capture appeals is ‘inexplicable and unconscionable’

Copyright TechTarget - All rights reserved ComputerWeekly’s best articles of the day https://cyber.law.harvard.edu/rss/rss.html Techtarget Feed Generator en Mon, 18 May 2026 20:32:22 GMT https://www.computerweekly.com editor@computerweekly.com <p>The Post Office’s decision to <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642891/Post-Office-to-contest-Capture-conviction-appeal-despite-chairman-support-for-overturning-en-masse">contest appeals against past convictions by users of the organisation’s Capture software</a> is “inexplicable”, “unconscionable” and causes “fresh harm and insult” to victims, according to the group overseeing the compensation process of the ongoing scandal.</p> <p>As part of a continuing exchange of letters, Christopher Hodges, chair of the influential Horizon Compensation Advisory Board (HCAB), has replied to Post Office chairman Nigel Railton’s justification of his organisation’s decision (<em>see full letter, below</em>).</p> <p>In an excoriating letter, Hodges said that contesting the Capture appeals “completely undermines any trust in statements that the Post Office is sorry, has changed, and can now be trusted” in the ongoing scandal of subpostmasters wrongfully convicted as a result of flawed accounting software.</p> <p>Capture was a PC-based software application that pre-dated the Horizon system, which has been at the heart of the scandal.</p> <p>Three appeals against pre-Horizon convictions have been sent to the Court of Appeal by the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) so far. Two of these are convictions based on the Capture system, and one is regarding a conviction based on a system known as the Automatic Payment Terminal (APT).</p> <p>The CCRC is also reviewing around 30 more cases of prosecutions based on software that pre-dates Horizon.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Post Office needs to apply common sense"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Post Office needs to apply common sense</h2> <p>HCAB had previously written to Railton questioning the decision to contest Capture appeals. <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643102/Post-Office-chair-defends-inappropriate-and-harmful-position-on-Capture-appeals">Railton replied</a> that he understood the advisory board’s concerns, but that the “Post Office must nevertheless act in accordance with the rules and requirements of the independent judicial system and our legal duties as the original prosecutor – which, given past mistakes, Post Office takes very seriously”.</p> <p>In the latest letter, dated 15 May, Hodges dismissed that justification out of hand.</p> <p>“There appears to us to be no reason why the PO could not make a statement to the Court of Appeal that in the current situation, where the PO has caused such harm to the victims, it does not feel right or conscionable that it should object to any appeals brought by victims or having been independently reviewed by the CCRC, and it trusts that the PO will understand the reasons for this,” he wrote.</p> <p>“The decision on this should be taken by the PO Board. The advice of lawyers to the PO Board should be treated as advice rather than a binding decision, and that advice should be subjected to a degree of common sense – which has not, in our view, yet happened.”</p> <p>Hodges referred to Railton’s appearance at the Business and Trade Select Committee in January, when he was asked whether, as with Horizon-related convictions, legislation should be used to overturn Capture convictions en masse – and he agreed.</p> <p>“The Post Office’s public stance, as expressed to the Select Committee, is that these convictions should be overturned. Yet they are arguing to the Court of Appeal that they should not be. That seems to us and to public commentators to be inexplicable and unconscionable,” wrote Hodges.</p> <p>“You and the Post Office have been on record as apologising for horrendous harm to subpostmasters. Yet this stance actually causes fresh harm and insult to them. It completely undermines any trust in statements that the PO is sorry, has changed, and can now be trusted.”</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Post Office actions court controversy"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Post Office actions court controversy</h2> <p>In March 2024, the government <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586358/Over-700-wrongful-subpostmaster-convictions-overturned-by-new-legislation">introduced legislation</a> to overturn around 900 convictions based on evidence from the Horizon system. This came in May 2024, at a time when the UK government faced public outrage after the ITV drama <i>Mr Bates vs The Post Office</i>.</p> <p>The HCAB has already called for further legislation to overturn Capture convictions, and in March, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639931/MP-report-calls-for-legislation-to-overturn-Post-Office-Capture-convictions">MPs demanded “urgent legislation” for this</a> and warned that “unsafe” convictions based on other pre-Horizon systems were yet to be unearthed.</p> <p>Hodges also questioned the role of the lawyers advising the Post Office, given their involvement in many of the past controversies around the way subpostmaster victims were treated.</p> <p>“Your letter seems to shift responsibility for the decision towards your legal advisers. The advisors on which PO rely have been involved for some time and were involved in the post-Hamilton defence of convictions, in ways which properly provoked some controversy during [former Post Office CEO] Nick Read’s tenure,” said Hodges.</p> <p>“Some come from the same chambers as counsel now under the spotlight through the PO Inquiry for matters of significant concern. Without in any way questioning the propriety of their decision-making, we do wonder if they come to these matters with the appearance of sufficient independence when advising on matters with a considerable history where they have played an active role.”</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/AB-letter-to-Post-Office-2-May26-1200px-f.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/AB-letter-to-Post-Office-2-May26-1200px-f_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/AB-letter-to-Post-Office-2-May26-1200px-f_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/AB-letter-to-Post-Office-2-May26-1200px-f.jpg 1280w" alt="HCAB letter to Post Office chair Nigel Railton" height="874" width="560"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>HCAB chair Christopher Hodges' latest letter to Post Office chair Nigel Railton (click image to read full letter) </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>Computer Weekly has asked the Post Office for a response to Hodges’ latest letter, but had not received a reply by the time of publication. The organisation has previously said: “We want all unsafe convictions to be overturned and are doing all we can to ensure appeals are heard as expeditiously as possible and in line with our legal duties as the original prosecutor.</p> <p>“Our response to these appeals is subject to extensive legal advice, and our role is to assist the Court of Appeal’s deliberation of the unique legal and factual issues that prosecutions that may have involved the Capture software require.”</p> <p>Computer Weekly <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240089230/Bankruptcy-prosecution-and-disrupted-livelihoods-Postmasters-tell-their-story">first exposed the scandal in 2009</a>, with the stories of seven subpostmasters who suffered due to faulty accounting software – our full coverage of the scandal since that time is shown in the timeline below.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Timeline: Computer Weekly articles about the scandal since 2009</h3> <ul style="list-style-type: square;" class="default-list"> <li>May 2009: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240089230/Bankruptcy-prosecution-and-disrupted-livelihoods-Postmasters-tell-their-story">Bankruptcy, prosecution and disrupted livelihoods – postmasters tell their story</a>.</li> <li>September 2009: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280090846/Post-masters-form-action-group-after-accounts-shortfall">Post-masters form action group after accounts shortfall</a>.</li> <li>November 2009: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280091449/Post-Office-theft-case-deferred-over-IT-questions">Post Office theft case deferred over IT questions</a>.</li> <li>May 2010: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280092879/Royal-Mail-postpones-Horizon-roll-out-after-outages">A pilot of the new Horizon Online system at Royal Mail has been scaled back after connectivity problems and outages</a>.</li> <li>February 2011: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/1280095088/Post-Office-faces-legal-action-over-alleged-accounting-system-failures">Post Office faces legal action over alleged accounting system failures</a>.</li> <li>October 2011: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240105787/85-sub-postmasters-seek-legal-support-in-claims-against-Post-Office-computer-system">85 subpostmasters seek legal support in claims against Post Office computer system</a>.</li> <li>June 2012: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240158501/Post-Office-launches-external-review-of-system-at-centre-of-legal-disputes">Post Office launches external review of system at centre of legal disputes</a>.</li> <li>January 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240175402/Post-Office-admits-that-Horizon-system-needs-more-investigation">Post Office admits Horizon system needs more investigation</a>.</li> <li>January 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240175994/Post-Office-calls-for-amnesty-for-Horizon-evidence">Post Office announces amnesty for Horizon evidence</a>.</li> <li>January 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240176122/Post-Office-wants-to-get-to-bottom-of-IT-system-allegations">Post Office wants to get to bottom of IT system allegations</a>.</li> <li>June 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240186334/Investigation-into-Post-Office-accounting-system-to-drill-down-on-strongest-cases">Investigation into Post Office accounting system to drill down on strongest cases</a>.</li> <li>July 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240187566/Post-Office-Horizon-system-investigation-reveals-concerns">Post Office Horizon system investigation reveals concerns</a>.</li> <li>October 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240207934/End-in-sight-for-sub-postmaster-claims-against-Post-Offices-Horizon-accounting-system">End in sight for subpostmaster claims against Post Office’s Horizon accounting system</a>.</li> <li>October 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240208118/Former-Lord-Justice-of-Appeal-Anthony-Hooper-joins-Post-Office-Horizon-investigation">Former Lord Justice of Appeal Hooper joins Post Office Horizon investigation</a>.</li> <li>November 2013: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240209819/150-subpostmasters-make-claims-to-Horizon-accounting-system-investigation">150 subpostmasters file claims over “faulty” Horizon accounting system</a>.</li> <li>September 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240230333/Fresh-questions-raised-over-Post-Office-IT-systems-role-in-fraud-cases">Fresh questions raised over Post Office IT system’s role in fraud cases</a>.</li> <li>December 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240236243/MPs-blast-Post-Office-over-IT-system-investigation-and-remove-backing">MPs blast Post Office over IT system investigation and remove backing</a>.</li> <li>December 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240236291/Why-MPs-lost-faith-in-the-Post-Offices-IT-investigation-but-vowed-to-fight-on">Why MPs lost faith in the Post Office’s IT investigation, but vowed to fight on</a>.</li> <li>December 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240236777/Debate-over-Post-Office-IT-system-to-be-held-in-Westminister">MPs to debate subpostmaster IT injustice claims</a>.</li> <li>December 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240236938/MP-accuses-Post-Office-of-acting-duplicitously-in-IT-investigation">MP accuses Post Office of acting ‘duplicitously’ in IT investigation</a>.</li> <li>January 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240238523/MPs-force-inquiry-into-Post-Office-subpostmaster-mediation-scheme">MPs force inquiry into Post Office subpostmaster mediation scheme</a>.</li> <li>January 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240239009/Post-Offices-faces-grilling-by-MPs-over-Horizon-accounting-system">Post Office faces grilling by MPs over Horizon accounting system</a>.</li> <li>February 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240239385/Post-Office-CIO-would-talk-to-any-subpostmaster-about-IT-problems-promises-CEO">Post Office CIO will talk to any subpostmaster about IT problems, promises CEO</a>.</li> <li>March 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/2240242064/Post-Office-ends-IT-system-investigation-day-before-potentially-damning-report">Post Office ends working group for IT system investigation day before potentially damaging report</a>.</li> <li>March 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500242929/MPs-seeks-reassurance-over-Post-Office-mediation-scheme">MPs seek reassurance over Post Office mediation scheme</a>.</li> <li>March 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500243220/Retiring-MP-aims-to-uncover-truth-of-alleged-Post-Office-computer-system-problems">Retiring MP aims to uncover truth of alleged Post Office computer system problems</a>.</li> <li>April 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500244656/Post-Office-failed-to-investigate-account-shortfalls-before-legal-action-report-claims">Post Office failed to investigate account shortfalls before legal action, report claims</a>.</li> <li>April 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500245279/Criminal-Courts-Review-Commission-set-to-review-subpostmasters-claims-of-wrongful-prosecution">Criminal Courts Review Commission set to review subpostmasters’ claims of wrongful prosecution</a>.</li> <li>June 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500249009/Post-Office-looking-to-replace-controversial-Horizon-system-says-MP">Post Office looking to replace controversial Horizon system with IBM, says MP</a>.</li> <li>July 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500249393/Campaigners-call-for-independent-inquiry-into-Post-Office-Horizon-IT-system-dispute">Campaigners call for independent inquiry into Post Office Horizon IT system dispute</a>.</li> <li>October 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500255862/James-Arbuthnot-takes-Post-Office-IT-fight-to-House-of-Lords">James Arbuthnot takes Post Office IT fight to House of Lords</a>.</li> <li>November 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500256860/Communication-Workers-Union-warns-subpostmasters-of-flaw-in-Post-Office-Horizon-accounting-system">The union that represents Post Office subpostmasters has warned of a problem with the Horizon accounting system</a>.</li> <li>November 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500257572/Post-Office-IT-support-email-reveals-known-Horizon-flaw">Post Office IT support email reveals known Horizon flaw</a></li> <li>November 2015: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500257720/Group-litigation-against-Post-Office-being-prepared-in-Horizon-dispute">Group litigation against Post Office being prepared in Horizon dispute</a>.</li> <li>February 2016: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500272635/Post-Office-faces-group-litigation-as-subpostmasters-fund-class-action">Post Office faces group litigation over Horizon IT as subpostmasters fund class action</a>.</li> <li>June 2016: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450297820/Considerable-risk-if-Post-Office-replaced-Horizon-system-says-chairman">Post Office chairman Tim Parker says there would be “considerable risk” associated with changing its Horizon computer system</a>.</li> <li>November 2016: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450403690/Group-litigation-against-Post-Office-in-Horizon-system-dispute-prepares-for-next-stage">The legal team hired by a group of subpostmasters will take their case to the next stage</a>.</li> <li>January 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450411786/Game-on-for-group-litigation-against-Post-Office-after-watershed-decision">The group action against the Post Office that alleges subpostmasters have been wrongly punished for accounting errors gets green light from the High Court of Justice</a>.</li> <li>March 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450415674/1000-sub-postmasters-apply-to-join-IT-related-group-litigation-against-Post-Office">1,000 subpostmasters apply to join IT-related group litigation against Post Office</a>.</li> <li>April 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450417356/Criminal-Courts-Review-Commission-appoints-forensic-accountants-for-Post-Office-IT-system-cases">Investigation into claims of miscarriages of justice in relation to a Post Office accounting system has appointed a forensic accountant firm</a>.</li> <li>May 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450419861/Hundreds-of-sub-postmasters-have-applied-to-join-IT-related-legal-action-since-March">Hundreds of subpostmasters have applied to join IT-related legal action since March</a>.</li> <li>July 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450419861/Hundreds-of-sub-postmasters-have-applied-to-join-IT-related-legal-action-since-March">Post Office defence in computer system legal case due this week</a>.</li> <li>August 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450423858/Subpostmasters-allege-bullying-and-intimidation-by-Post-Office-over-Horizon-IT-system">Campaigners submit initial evidence in group litigation against Post Office over controversial Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>October 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450428525/Post-Office-computer-system-legal-case-reaches-important-procedural-juncture">Subpostmasters’ group action against the Post Office reaches an important milestone</a>.</li> <li>November 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450429076/Court-dates-set-for-Post-Office-accounting-system-trials">An end is in sight for subpostmasters’ campaign against alleged wrongful prosecution, which they blame on a faulty computer system</a>.</li> <li>November 2017: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/450430183/Post-Office-court-case-judge-issues-warning-to-legal-teams">High Court judge in subpostmasters versus Post Office case over an faulty system tells legal teams to cooperate</a>.</li> <li>January 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252433741/Forensic-investigation-into-Post-Office-IT-system-at-centre-of-legal-case-nears-completion">Forensic investigation into Post Office IT system at centre of legal case nears completion</a>.</li> <li>April 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252439796/Criminal-Courts-Review-Commission-findings-in-Post-Office-computer-case-raise-further-enquiries">Criminal Cases Review Commission  examination of Post office IT system has raised further questions</a>.</li> <li>May 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252440879/Connectivity-problem-hits-thousands-of-Post-Office-branches">Post Office branches unable to connect to Horizon computer system for several hours after morning opening time</a>.</li> <li>October 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252451492/Why-subpostmasters-and-Post-Office-are-battling-it-out-in-the-High-Court">After over a decade of controversy, next week marks the beginning of a court battle between subpostmasters and the Post Office</a>.</li> <li>November 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252452254/High-court-Post-Office-trial-puts-subpostmasters-contract-under-microscope">Case against Post Office in relation to allegedly faulty computer system begins in High Court</a>.</li> <li>November 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252452444/Post-Office-trial-throws-up-more-known-computer-problems">High Court case in which subpostmasters are suing the Post Office has revealed a known problem with a computer system</a>.</li> <li>November 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252452694/Post-Office-executives-cross-examined-in-Horizon-IT-system-trial">A High Court trial, where subpostmasters are suing the Post Office for damages caused by an allegedly faulty IT system, ends second week</a>.</li> <li>November 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252452957/Post-Office-held-back-information-about-Horizon-IT-system-errors">Post Office director admits to Horizon errors and not sharing details with subpostmaster network</a>.</li> <li>November 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252453243/High-Court-trial-over-Horizon-computer-system-completes-witness-cross-examinations">The High Court trial in which subpostmasters are suing the Post Office has reached an important stage</a>.</li> <li>December 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252453546/CCRC-may-hold-off-subpostmaster-decision-until-after-Post-Office-Horizon-trial">CCRC may hold off subpostmaster decision until after Post Office Horizon trial</a>.</li> <li>December 2018: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252454055/Complex-Post-Office-Horizon-case-set-to-continue-into-2020">Court case where subpostmasters are suing the Post Office set to span at least four trials and extend into 2020</a>.</li> <li>January 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252455126/Subpostmasters-suing-Post-Office-over-IT-failures-stunned-by-CEOs-honour">Subpostmasters’ campaign group attacks Post Office CEO Paula Vennells’ New Year honour amid ongoing court case</a>.</li> <li>January 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252455877/Thousands-of-known-errors-on-controversial-Post-Office-computer-system-to-be-revealed">Thousands of known errors on controversial Post Office computer system to be revealed</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252458999/Tech-under-spotlight-at-High-Court-in-second-subpostmasters-versus-Post-Office-trial">Tech under spotlight at High Court in second subpostmasters versus Post Office trial</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459274/Post-Office-considered-Horizon-IT-system-as-high-risk-court-told">Post Office considered Horizon IT system “high-risk”, court told</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459857/CCRC-watching-Post-Office-Horizon-trial-closely">CCRC watching Post Office Horizon trial closely</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459564/Subpostmasters-achieve-stunning-victory-against-Post-Office-in-Horizon-case">Judge rules that Post Office showed “oppressive behaviour” in response to claimants accused of accounting errors they blamed on Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459863/Post-Office-lacked-humanity-in-the-treatment-of-subpostmasters-says-peer">Post Office “lacked humanity” in the treatment of subpostmasters, says peer</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459670/Post-Office-director-cross-examination-confirms-lack-of-investigation-into-branch-IT-problems">A High Court judge heard that the Post Office did not investigate a computer system error that could cause losses, despite being offered evidence</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252459996/Horizon-IT-system-trial-suspended-after-Post-Office-accuses-judge-of-bias">The Post Office legal team in the case brought by more than 500 subpostmasters has called for the judge to be recused after questioning his impartiality</a>.</li> <li>March 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252460542/Post-Office-made-to-repay-public-money-it-allocated-to-fund-Horizon-litigation">A senior civil servant asked the Post Office to repay public money it had wrongly allocated to paying legal costs</a>.</li> <li>April 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252460815/Post-Office-could-face-huge-costs-bill-for-first-Horizon-trial">Subpostmaster claimants’ legal team makes application for the Post Office to pay millions of pounds of costs associated with trial</a>.</li> <li>April 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252461096/Post-Office-to-appeal-judgment-from-first-Horizon-trial">Post Office to appeal judgment from first Horizon trial</a>.</li> <li>April 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252461348/Judge-in-Post-Office-trial-rejects-application-to-recuse-himself">The Post Office’s claim that the judge overseeing the case concerning its controversial Horizon IT system was biased has been dismissed</a>.</li> <li>April 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252461728/MP-questions-government-over-Post-Office-Horizon-case">MP questions government over Post Office Horizon case</a>.</li> <li>April 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252461829/Government-says-no-conflict-of-interest-in-Post-Office-trial-due-to-chairmans-dual-role">Government says no conflict of interest in trial despite Post Office chairman’s dual role</a>.</li> <li>May 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252463196/Court-of-Appeal-rejects-a-Post-Office-request-in-Horizon-IT-case">The Court of Appeal has refused the Post Office’s application to appeal a major decision in the Horizon IT trial</a>.</li> <li>May 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252463625/Post-Office-applies-to-appeal-damning-judgment-in-first-Horizon-trial">The Post Office has applied for permission to appeal judgments from the first trial in its IT-related legal battle with subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>May 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252463938/Post-Office-told-to-pay-over-5m-of-its-opponents-costs-for-first-Horizon-trial">The judge in the Post Office Horizon trial has ordered the organisation to pay the legal costs, and refused to give permission to appeal a major judgment</a>.</li> <li>June 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252465193/Post-Office-asks-Court-of-Appeal-for-permission-to-appeal-judgment-in-first-Horizon-trial">Post Office asks Court of Appeal for permission to appeal judgment in first Horizon trial</a>.</li> <li>July 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252466111/Post-Office-back-office-error-leaves-subpostmaster-with-thousands-of-pounds-extra">Post Office back-office error leaves subpostmaster with thousands of pounds extra</a>.</li> <li>July 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252466406/Post-Office-fixes-technical-problem-causing-accounting-errors-in-Horizon">Post Office fixes technical problem causing accounting errors in Horizon</a>.</li> <li>August 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252468199/Hundreds-of-Post-Office-branches-hit-by-new-Horizon-problem">Subpostmasters suffering slow running and frozen terminals while Post Office searches for a fix to issues apparently caused by a software update</a>.</li> <li>August 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252468689/Latest-Post-Office-Horizon-problems-caused-by-software-update">The Post Office has fixed the latest problems with its Horizon system, affecting hundreds of branches</a>. </li> <li>October 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252473026/Post-Office-IT-trial-judgement-within-days">A High Court judgment for a trial that focused on the Post Office’s IT system at the centre of a multimillion-pound litigation will be announced early next month</a>.</li> <li>November 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252474416/Court-of-Appeal-dismisses-Post-Office-application-to-appeal-damning-judgment">The Court of Appeal has rejected a Post Office application to appeal judgments made in its multimillion-pound battle with subpostmasters over IT system failures</a>.</li> <li>November 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252474583/Peer-suggests-clear-out-of-Post-Office-board-after-Court-of-Appeal-confirms-major-defeat-in-court">Peer calls for clear-out of Post Office board after Court of Appeal confirms major court defeat</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475310/Post-Office-settles-legal-dispute-with-subpostmasters-ending-20-year-battle-for-lead-claimant">The Post Office has settled its long-running legal dispute with subpostmasters, and will pay £57.75m in damages</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475442/Subpostmasters-got-the-best-deal-possible-in-legal-battle-with-the-Post%20Office-says-lawyer">Subpostmasters ended their legal battle with the Post Office at the optimal time, according to the lawyer that managed the High Court action</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475611/Subpostmasters-proved-right-on-IT-system-failures-as-calls-for-full-public-inquiry-mount">Subpostmasters proved right on IT system failures as calls for full public inquiry mount</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475773/Criminal-Courts-Review-Commission-to-review-Horizon-judgment-swiftly">Criminal Courts Review Commission to review Horizon judgment “swiftly”</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475841/National-Federation-of-Subpostmasters-cries-foul-after-court-ruling">National Federation of Subpostmasters cries foul after court ruling on controversial computer system</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475989/Former-Post-Office-CEO-apologises-to-subpostmasters-over-Horizon-scandal">Former Post Office CEO apologises to subpostmasters over Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>December 2019: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252476160/Call-for-former-Post-Office-CEO-to-step-down-from-public-roles-after-IT-court-battle-lost">Call for former Post Office CEO to step down from public roles after IT court battle lost</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252476403/Fujitsu-must-face-scrutiny-following-Post-Office-Horizon-trial-judgment">Fujitsu must face scrutiny following Post Office Horizon trial judgment</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252476569/Subpostmaster-group-calls-for-government-to-pay-legal-costs-for-Horizon-trial">Subpostmaster group calls for government to pay legal costs for Horizon trial</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252476622/Why-subpostmasters-are-calling-on-the-government-to-pay-Horizon-trial-costs">Why subpostmasters are calling on the government to pay Horizon trial costs</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252476768/Government-distances-itself-from-Post-Office-decisions-in-Horizon-IT-litigation">Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy says it did not make decisions in the Post Office’s recent court battle</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252477142/Government-should-not-be-allowed-to-dismiss-subpostmasters-claims-over-Horizon-IT-scandal">Government should not be allowed to dismiss subpostmasters’ claims over Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252477368/Police-sent-information-about-potential-Fujitsu-staff-perjury-in-subpostmaster-prosecutions">Police sent information about potential Fujitsu staff perjury in subpostmaster prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252477433/Subpostmaster-prosecutions-move-closer-to-appeal">Prosecutions are a significant step closer to being sent to the Court of Appeal as Criminal Courts Review Commission forms a group of commissioners to review them</a>.</li> <li>January 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Alan-Bates-The-details-man-the-Post-Office-paid-the-price-for-ignoring">Alan Bates: The “details man” the Post Office paid the price for ignoring</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252477786/Government-refuses-request-to-pay-legal-costs-for-subpostmasters-in-Post-Office-case">The government has refused to pay the huge legal costs subpostmasters incurred in their battle with the government-owned Post Office, which they won</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252478402/Pressure-for-public-inquiry-into-Post-Office-IT-system-scandal-begins-with-mountain-to-climb">Members of Parliament seeking a public inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal face huge challenges, but pressure and time could force justice</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252478549/Calls-for-inquiry-into-Post-Office-IT-scandal-increase-in-Parliament-with-cross-party-support">Calls for inquiry into Post Office IT scandal increase in Parliament, with cross-party support</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252478694/Concerns-raised-over-former-Post-Office-CEOs-appointment-at-NHS-trust-under-review">Care Quality Commission to review concerns over Paula Vennells’ appointment after they were raised by a former NHS consultant psychiatrist</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479087/Government-admits-it-was-too-passive-managing-Post-Office-as-parliamentary-pressure-builds">Government admits it was too passive managing Post Office as parliamentary pressure builds</a>.</li> <li>February 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479323/Government-claims-it-was-misled-by-Post-Office-over-IT-scandal">Minister says Post Office IT experts misled the government when it asked questions about subpostmasters’ concerns over Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479176/Boris-Johnson-commits-to-getting-to-the-bottom-of-Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal">Boris Johnson commits to “getting to the bottom of” Post Office Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479401/Boris-Johnsons-commitment-to-inquiry-into-Post-Office-scandal-in-doubt">Boris Johnson’s commitment to inquiry into Post Office scandal in doubt</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479549/MPs-call-on-PM-to-commit-to-full-public-inquiry-into-Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal">MPs call on PM to commit to full public inquiry into Post Office Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479650/Those-who-did-not-play-by-the-rules-in-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-should-face-prosecution">Those who did not play by the rules in Post Office Horizon scandal “should face prosecution”</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252479794/MPs-told-to-hold-to-account-those-responsible-for-Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal">MPs told to hold to account those responsible for Post Office Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480083/Secret-Post-Office-deals-cause-fury-among-Horizon-IT-scandal-campaigners">The Post Office has sparked anger with secret settlements with subpostmasters outside the recent legal action against it</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480365/Labour%20MP%20Karl%20Turner%20tells%20Computer%20Weekly%20that%20the%20Post%20Office%20Horizon%20scandal%20is%20the%20most%20grotesque%20version%20of%20predatory%20capitalism%20he%20has%20ever%20seen">Labour MP Karl Turner tells Computer Weekly that the Post Office Horizon scandal is the most grotesque version of predatory capitalism he has ever seen</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480365/MP-warns-minister-not-to-parrot-civil-servants-lines-on-Post-Office-IT-scandal">MP Kevan Jones has warned a government minister not to repeat the mistakes of predecessors in relation to the Post Office Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480440/Coronavirus-CCRC-uses-Microsoft-Teams-to-consider-subpostmaster-appeals">Criminal Cases Review Commission to use Microsoft Teams to ensure review of subpostmaster prosecutions is held on time</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480463/Coronavirus-Post-Office-postpones-subpostmaster-compensation-scheme-amid-Covid-19-crisis">Post Office postpones subpostmaster compensation scheme amid Covid-19 crisis</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480571/Meeting-reviewing-subpostmaster-applications-to-appeal-criminal-prosecutions-moves-into-second-day">Meeting reviewing subpostmaster applications to appeal criminal prosecutions moves into second day</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480655/Subpostmaster-prosecutions-to-be-considered-by-Court-of-Appeal-for-miscarriages-of-justice">Subpostmaster prosecutions to be considered by Court of Appeal for miscarriages of justice</a>.</li> <li>March 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252480745/How-Subpostmasters-made-legal-history-with-biggest-referral-of-potential-miscarriages-of-justice">How subpostmasters made legal history with biggest referral of potential miscarriages of justice.</a></li> <li>April 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252482260/Met-Police-assess-evidence-of-potential-perjury-in-Post-Office-IT-trials">Met Police examines information about evidence given in court by Fujitsu staff on the Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>May 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252482517/Subpostmasters-receive-their-inadequate-damages-over-Horizon-IT-scandal">Subpostmasters who had their lives ruined by the Post Office’s faulty IT system have received their damages after a High Court victory</a>.</li> <li>May 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252483344/Post-Office-executive-who-tried-to-mislead-judge-in-Horizon-trial-leaves-via-back-door">A senior Post Office executive at the centre of an IT scandal, who tried to mislead a High Court judge in relation to it, has left the organisation without fanfare despite many years of service</a>.</li> <li>May 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252483639/900-more-criminal-prosecutions-of-subpostmasters-could-be-unsafe-because-of-IT-failures">Post Office re-examines hundreds of prosecutions that could have resulted from faults in Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252483733/Subpostmasters-crowdfund-for-justice-in-IT-scandal">A campaign group representing subpostmasters wrongly prosecuted for theft and false accounting by the Post Office is raising money to help clear the names of victims of the scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484026/Subpostmasters-to-force-scrutiny-of-governments-role-in-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Subpostmasters to force scrutiny of government’s role in Post Office IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484100/CCRC-sends-47-subpostmaster-miscarriages-of-justice-for-appeal-asks-for-prosecution-powers-review">The Criminal Cases Review Commission sends 47 more subpostmaster cases to Court of Appeal and asks government to review private prosecution powers</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484163/Government-investigation-into-Horizon-scandal-bares-teeth">Select committee chair writes to former Post Office CEO demanding answers over her role in IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484483/Anger-as-government-launches-pathetic-and-pointless-review-of-Horizon-scandal">The government has been accused of launching a review that fails in getting to the bottom of one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in UK history</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484566/Subpostmasters-will-not-cooperate-with-government-review-into-IT-scandal">Subpostmasters will not cooperate with government review into IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484647/Blow-to-Government-review-of-Post-Office-scandal-as-key-forensic-accountants-refuse-to-support-it">The government’s proposed review of the Post Office IT scandal has received a further setback as forensic accountants join subpostmasters in refusing to back it</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484776/Select-committee-chair-demands-sharper-teeth-for-review-of-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Call for government review of Post Office Horizon scandal to have the power to force individuals to give evidence under oath</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484917/Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-victims-keep-pressure-on-governments-doorstep">Subpostmasters seeking justice in the Post Office Horizon IT scandal are regaining momentum in Parliament</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252484963/Care-Quality-Commission-to-discuss-concerns-over-Paula-Vennells-NHS-role">Healthcare regulator will be discussing concerns about former NHS boss chairing an NHS trust at an upcoming meeting</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252485110/Firm-that-investigated-controversial-Post-Office-IT-system-to-support-criminal-conviction-appeals">Second Sight is working with law firm in appeals by subpostmasters against criminal convictions in Horizon IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252485190/Former-Post-Office-CEO-and-Fujitsu-play-the-blame-game-in-Horizon-IT-scandal">Post Office and Fujitsu blame each other for many of the failings in the Horizon IT scandal that wrecked lives</a>.</li> <li>June 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252485328/MPs-to-examine-fairness-of-private-prosecutions-in-light-of-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Parliamentary Justice Committee to hold short inquiry into the rules and regulations surrounding private organisations’ ability to initiate criminal proceedings</a>.</li> <li>July 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252485826/Post-Office-scandal-victims-have-days-to-raise-thousands-of-pounds-or-perpetrators-go-scot-free">Victims of the Post Office Horizon IT scandal need to raise thousands of pounds in a week or those responsible for their suffering will avoid scrutiny</a>.</li> <li>July 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252486099/Subpostmasters-hit-funding-target-to-prevent-government-burying-IT-scandal">The government is set to face scrutiny over its involvement in the Post Office Horizon IT scandal, described as one of the biggest miscarriages of justice in modern UK history</a>.</li> <li>September 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252488725/Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal-victims-face-long-fight-as-government-digs-heels-in">The government repeats that it won’t pay victims’ legal costs and confirms review into the scandal will not have the power to call witnesses</a>.</li> <li>September 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252489777/Subpostmasters-still-in-the-dark-about-live-Horizon-errors">Subpostmasters still not being told about all the known errors in the controversial Post Office branch accounting and retail system that they use</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252489999/Justice-for-subpostmasters-as-wrongful-criminal-convictions-are-set-to-be-quashed">The Post Office has chosen not to contest 44 out of 47 appeals, meaning most are likely to have their names cleared, but others still face a Court of Appeal battle for justice</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490154/Government-deaf-to-loud-calls-for-statutory-public-inquiry-into-Post-Office-scandal">MPs are demanding the government holds a full statutory public inquiry into the Post Office IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490276/Care-Quality-Commissions-enquiries-into-IT-scandal-CEO-continue">NHS regulator continues enquiries about the appointment of former Post Office CEO at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust as more damning details emerge</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490447/Government-ministers-plea-for-subpostmasters-to-take-part-in-review-of-IT-scandal-rejected">Government minister met with former subpostmaster online in an attempt to get victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal involved in government review</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490580/Post-Office-races-to-solve-IT-error-under-gaze-of-public-and-banks">The Post Office is focusing urgently on fixing an IT error suffered by a subpostmaster amid the ongoing IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490795/Labour-shares-subpostmaster-concerns-over-whitewash-Horizon-IT-inquiry">Labour politicians are calling for the government to give the Post Office Horizon scandal inquiry the power to force witnesses to give evidence if they don’t cooperate</a>.</li> <li>October 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252490996/NHS-trust-takes-another-look-at-its-appointment-of-IT-scandal-CEO">Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust has asked for external review of its process when appointing controversial executive</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252491520/Subpostmasters-complaint-about-government-begins-its-journey-to-Parliamentary-Ombudsman">Government faces scrutiny of its handling of the Post Office IT scandal that destroyed subpostmasters’ lives and livelihoods</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252491681/Post-Office-Horizon-system-crashes-nationally">Post Office branches offline during busy business hours after suffering an IT error that the Post Office said related to IT from supplier Fujitsu</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252491906/Lack-of-openness-on-Horizon-errors-remains-as-Fujitsu-refuses-to-explain-latest-outage">Fujitsu is refusing to explain what caused a national system outage in Post Office branches last week, despite the Post Office confirming the issue was the fault of the supplier</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492031/Police-open-criminal-investigation-into-potential-perjury-by-Fujitsu-staff-in-Post-Office-IT-trial">The Metropolitan Police opens criminal investigation into Fujitsu staff who gave evidence in trials of subpostmasters wrongly prosecuted and even imprisoned for financial crimes</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492118/Post-Office-explanation-of-IT-system-outage-so-vague-it-is-pointless">Post Office criticised over vagueness of its explanation of the cause of a UK-wide IT failure that saw subpostmasters unable to do business</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492186/Botched-software-update-to-blame-for-Horizon-crash">Post Office says planned firmware update caused the problem that left branches unable to do business for 90 minutes</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492350/Fujitsu-staff-under-investigation-for-potential-perjury-in-Post-Office-IT-trial-named">Court documents reveal the names of the Fujitsu employees under investigation for potentially providing misleading information in criminal trials</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492495/Subpostmasters-want-300m-from-a-government-that-allowed-Post-Office-reign-of-terror">The government allowed the Post Office to ‘run amok’ and destroy lives, says complaint to Parliamentary Ombudsman</a>.</li> <li>November 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492572/Post-Office-accused-of-lying-and-potentially-being-in-contempt-of-Parliament-in-IT-scandal">Campaigning politician demands access to documents that could prove that the Post Office lied</a>.</li> <li>December 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252492923/Government-covers-its-ears-as-complaint-by-victims-of-Post-Office-abuse-heads-to-ombudsman">Government denies responsibility for the abuse inflicted on subpostmasters by the Post Office over faulty IT system</a>.</li> <li>December 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252493199/Post-Office-IT-scandal-CEO-Paula-Vennells-jumps-NHS-ship-as-pressure-mounts">CEO at the centre of the scandal that saw innocent people bankrupted and some sent to prison steps down from NHS role as pressure for her resignation grows</a>.</li> <li>December 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252493522/History-made-as-subpostmasters-wrongly-prosecuted-in-Horizon-IT-scandal-have-convictions-quashed">History made as subpostmasters wrongly prosecuted in Horizon IT scandal have convictions quashed</a>.</li> <li>December 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252493521/Appointment-of-disgraced-former-Post-Office-executive-at-Welsh-FA-questioned-by-MP">The appointment of a former Post Office executive, who tried to mislead a judge, in the Football Association of Wales has been questioned by an MP</a>.</li> <li>December 2020: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252493818/Post-Office-suffers-latest-court-defeat-in-Horizon-IT-scandal">Court of Appeal indicates subpostmasters can pursue appeal route that could do more damage to Post Office’s reputation</a>.</li> <li>January 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252494402/NHS-trust-says-appointment-processes-robust-despite-criticism-of-role-for-Post-Office-scandal-CEO">NHS trust defends its director appointment process following an external review of its recruitment of former Post Office CEO Paula Vennells</a>.</li> <li>January 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252495079/IT-scandal-exposes-legal-rule-that-made-it-easy-for-Post-Office-to-prosecute-the-innocent">Lawyers call for changes to digital evidence rule that made it easier for the Post Office to ‘bamboozle courts’ and make subpostmasters pay a heavy price for its IT failings</a>.</li> <li>January 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252495097/More-subpostmasters-prosecutions-sent-to-appeal-for-wrongful-conviction">The Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) has referred four more subpostmasters’ criminal convictions to appeal, as part of the biggest miscarriage of justice in modern UK history</a>.</li> <li>February 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252496560/Fujitsu-bosses-knew-about-Post-Office-Horizon-IT-flaws-says-insider">A former senior developer who worked for Fujitsu on the Post Office IT system that led to subpostmasters being falsely accused of fraud, has claimed bosses knew of fundamental flaws before going live</a>.</li> <li>February 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252496767/Subpostmaster-group-calls-for-prime-minister-to-pause-Horizon-whitewash-inquiry">Subpostmasters call for Boris Johnson to pause and reshape the government’s Horizon inquiry</a>.</li> <li>February 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252496823/Appointment-of-disgraced-former-Post-Office-director-triggers-vote-of-no-confidence-in-Welsh-FA-boss">Vote of no confidence in Football Association of Wales boss triggered by recruitment of former Post Office executive who tried to mislead a judge in IT trial</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252497419/Government-to-change-unfair-private-prosecutions-used-to-prosecute-innocent-subpostmasters">Government agrees to change private prosecution rules that were abused by the Post Office in its pursuit of subpostmasters wrongly accused of financial crimes</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252497511/Prime-Minister-yet-to-respond-to-serious-subpostmaster-concerns-over-Horizon-IT-scandal-inquiry">Subpostmaster victims who have spent millions bringing the Post Office IT scandal to light have received no reply to their concerns from Boris Johnson</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252497573/Governments-refusal-of-freedom-of-information-request-about-Post-office-deeply-concerning">MP condemns department’s ‘bizarre’ rejection of freedom of information request linked to Post Office IT scandal</a>. </li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252497583/Welsh-FA-boss-linked-to-recruitment-of-controversial-former-Post-Office-executive-to-step-down">Football Association Wales boss steps down after losing confidence motion triggered by appointment of an executive involved in the Post Office IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252497665/Potential-miscarriages-of-justice-of-Scottish-subpostmasters-move-to-full-review">The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission (SCCRC) is reviewing five cases of potential miscarriage of justice in relation to subpostmaster prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498067/Subpostmasters-in-Court-of-Appeal-to-end-20-year-torment">Subpostmasters heading to Court of Appeal to clear their names in what is potentially the biggest miscarriage of justice in English legal history</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498087/Government-to-bail-out-Post-Office-which-cant-afford-to-pay-compensation-to-subpostmasters">The Post Office does not have enough money to pay compensation to the subpostmasters it wrongfully prosecuted</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498141/Post-Office-IT-scandal-executive-forced-out-of-job-at-Football-Association-of-Wales">Angela van den Bogerd has left her role at the Football Association of Wales, following criticism of her part in Post Office IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498245/Post-Office-staff-instructed-to-shred-documents-that-undermined-its-claims-Horizon-was-robust">Court of Appeal hearing reveals Post Office instructed employees to destroy documents that undermined an insistence that its Horizon computer system was robust</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498341/Post-Office-was-told-in-2013-that-Fujitsu-witness-was-unreliable-in-subpostmaster-prosecutions">The Post Office was warned that a former Fujitsu employee had misled courts when giving evidence on its behalf</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498358/Prime-Minister-says-people-should-be-held-to-account-for-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Boris Johnson agrees with MP that those responsible for the Post Office Horizon scandal should be brought to book</a>.</li> <li>March 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498388/Ex-Post-Office-CEO-Paula-Vennells-walked-away-from-IT-scandal-with-over-400,000-in-pay-and-bonuses">Former Post Office chief was paid over £400,000 when she left despite the organisation being involved in what would become the biggest miscarriage of justice in UK history</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498409/Government-faces-judicial-review-into-plans-for-Post-Office-Horizon-inquiry">The UK government faces a potential judicial review over its Post Office Horizon IT scandal inquiry, after subpostmasters formally wrote to the government seeking one</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498901/Demands-for-changes-to-barmy-rules-on-digital-evidence-have-governments-ear">The government is listening to calls for changes in how digital evidence is considered in court, as Post Office IT scandal spells out current rule’s inadequacy</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252498971/Post-Office-gives-controversial-Fujitsu-contract-another-year">The Post Office’s controversial contract with Fujitsu has been extended another year to help the organisation manage its exit</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499045/Post-Office-Horizon-contract-extension-is-part-of-project-to-bring-Fujitsu-work-in-house">The Post Office is to move work done by Fujitsu in-house when its outsourcing contract ends, and is already recruiting IT experts</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499238/End-of-the-road-for-Post-Office-IT-system-that-destroyed-lives">The Post Office has revealed the end to its controversial Horizon IT system which, through its errors and the Post Office’s denial of them, caused huge suffering</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499377/Only-Government-standing-in-the-way-of-fair-compensation-for-subpostmasters">The UK government is the only block to fair compensation for subpostmasters who were wrongly punished for accounting shortfalls</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499723/Post-Office-scandal-victims-have-criminal-convictions-overturned-in-Court-of-Appeal">The Court of Appeal has overturned the criminal convictions of 39 subpostmasters who were blamed and punished for accounting shortfalls caused by computer errors</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499778/Post-Office-scandal-CEO-steps-down-from-roles-after-massive-miscarriage-of-justice-is-laid-bare">Former Post Office CEO Paula Vennells has left roles in the church, Morrisons and Dunelm after postmasters’ convictions were overturned in the Court of Appeal</a>.</li> <li>April 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252499806/Another-38-subpostmasters-submit-appeals-against-convictions">The biggest miscarriage of justice in UK history is set to get bigger as more subpostmasters take their cases to the Court of Appeal</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500167/Post-Office-CEO-either-knew-what-was-going-on-in-Horizon-scandal-or-was-asleep-at-the-wheel">Post Office IT scandal CEO has no excuse for her inaction in preventing the biggest miscarriage of justice in UK history, says Criminal Cases Review Commission chairperson</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500232/Post-Office-dishonesty-in-Horizon-scandal-is-reason-enough-for-statutory-public-inquiry">Subpostmasters, MPs and the public call for a full statutory judge-led public inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal, following another damning court judgment</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500395/Minister-promises-fair-and-speedy-compensation-for-555-subpostmasters-who-defeated-Post-Office">Government says it wants to ensure a fair pay-out for the 555 subpostmasters who defeated the Post Office in a legal battle</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500406/Post-Office-contacts-over-500-subpostmasters-potentially-wrongly-prosecuted-for-financial-crimes">The Post Office has contacted hundreds of people it might have wrongly prosecuted for financial crimes</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500460/Miscarriages-of-justice-are-the-potent-tip-of-Post-Office-scandal">The miscarriages of justice involving subpostmasters are the most disturbing element of the Post Office Horizon scandal – but it goes much deeper</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500646/Fujitsu-bags-3bn-in-public-sector-contracts-while-software-errors-wreck-the-lives-of-subpostmasters">The supplier at the centre of the Post Office Horizon scandal has so far escaped the ramifications of its role in the biggest miscarriage of justice in UK history</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252500762/More-former-subpostmasters-have-criminal-convictions-quashed">Another two former subpostmasters have had their convictions for financial crimes overturned, following a hearing in Southwark Crown Court</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501013/Post-Office-Horizon-inquiry-set-to-be-given-statutory-status-with-wider-powers">The government inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal is set to be made statutory with the power to compel witnesses and evidence</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501082/Nothing-off-the-table-in-statutory-Post-Office-scandal-inquiry">The government confirmed that the inquiry into the Post Office Horizon IT scandal will be given statutory status and wider scope</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501128/Subpostmaster-campaign-group-to-meet-Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-chair">The Justice for Subpostmasters Alliance has agreed to meet the former judge heading up the inquiry into the Post Office scandal that ruined the lives of hundreds of subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501399/Its-a-good-day-when-we-refer-a-case-CCRC-tells-MPs-during-review-of-Post-Office-prosecutions">Criminal Cases Review Commission will not allow pressure on its resources to prevent subpostmasters seeking a review of their criminal convictions</a>.</li> <li>May 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501510/BCS-demands-reform-to-rules-on-computer-evidence-following-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-revelations">Professional IT body wants changes to how computer evidence is used in court in the wake of the Post Office case</a>.</li> <li>June 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252501656/Post-Office-scandal-public-inquiry-finally-begins-after-chances-to-address-problems-were-missed">The Post Office Horizon scandal inquiry begins with subpostmaster campaign group waiting for full details before committing its support</a>.</li> <li>June 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252502056/Did-government-allow-Post-Office-to-sack-forensic-accountants-to-cover-up-Horizon-scandal">Whatever the Post Office told government about its decision to sack investigators examining subpostmaster prosecutions for theft could identify if the government was part of a cover-up</a>.</li> <li>June 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252502738/Post-Office-pays-400-subpostmasters-compensation-for-losses-caused-by-computer-errors">The Post Office has so far compensated about 400 subpostmasters who suffered losses as a result of computer errors that they were wrongly blamed for</a>.</li> <li>July 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252503399/Ten-more-former-subpostmasters-set-to-have-wrongful-convictions-overturned">Another 10 subpostmasters are set to have their criminal convictions quashed as part of one of the biggest miscarriage of justice in British history</a>.</li> <li>July 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252503752/Government-commitment-to-Post-Office-Horizon-victims-was-a-false-promise">The government has made no contact with subpostmasters two months after it said it would work with them to ensure they get speedy and fair compensation</a>.</li> <li>July 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252503844/Taxpayers-will-have-to-pay-at-least-300m-to-bail-out-Post-Office-after-scandal">The cost of a scheme set up to compensate subpostmasters who were victims of the Horizon IT scandal will exceed £300m</a>.</li> <li>July 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252504363/Government-to-fund-interim-compensation-of-up-to-100000-for-each-wrongly-convicted-subpostmaster">The government will pay interim compensation within weeks to subpostmasters who were wrongly convicted of crimes due to computer errors</a>.</li> <li>August 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252505156/Four-more-subpostmasters-set-to-have-convictions-overturned">A further four subpostmasters are set to have their wrongful convictions overturned in the latest development in the Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>August 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252505410/Overturned-convictions-of-subpostmasters-mount-up-but-555-victims-no-closer-justice">The government has failed to provide fair compensation to the subpostmasters who exposed the full extent of the Horizon scandal to the world</a>.</li> <li>August 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252506031/Subpostmasters-demand-more-clarity-on-Horizon-public-inquiry-before-committing-their-support">Subpostmasters demand more clarity on Horizon public inquiry before committing their support</a>.</li> <li>September 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252506632/CCRC-refers-six-more-subpostmaster-convictions-for-appeal">Six more subpostmaster convictions referred for appeal in Post Office IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>September 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252506647/Government-Minister-holds-secret-meeting-with-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-victims">Government minister holds secret meeting with Post Office Horizon scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>October 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252508099/Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-inquiry-announces-first-public-hearing">The public inquiry into a scandal that saw subpostmasters imprisoned after being blamed for accounting shortfalls will hold its first public hearing early next month</a>.</li> <li>October 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252508541/Post-Office-board-appalling-short-sighted-and-partisan-said-Minister-researching-Horizon-project">A government minister investigating the controversial Horizon IT project in 2000 described the Post Office board of directors as ‘appalling, short-sighted and partisan’</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509066/Fujitsu-escaped-huge-lawsuit-because-Post-Office-behaved-so-badly-in-Horizon-scandal">The behaviour of Post Office senior management during the Horizon scandal was so egregious that the supplier of the faulty software has escaped a large financial penalty</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509113/Police-interview-former-Fujitsu-staff-for-second-time-in-potential-perjury-investigation">Former Fujitsu staff who gave evidence in subpostmaster trials have been questioned by police for a second time</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509150/Number-of-subpostmasters-appealing-convictions-reaches-137-at-one-legal-firm">Former subpostmasters convicted of crimes based on data from error-prone Post Office computer system continue to embark on appeals</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509242/Government-and-Post-Office-should-stop-discussing-Horizon-victim-compensation-and-pay-it">The first hearing in the Post Office Horizon scandal public inquiry hears why victims should be paid compensation immediately</a>.</li> <li>November 2021:<a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509479/Convictions-of-eight-former-subpostmasters-in-Scotland-under-review">The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission is investigating eight potential miscarriages of justice linked with faulty Post Office IT system</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509618/Post-Office-agrees-to-share-privileged-legal-information-with-Horizon-scandal-inquiry">The Post Office will waive professional legal privilege for documents relating to legal advice it received regarding subpostmaster prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>November 2021 <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509696/Six-more-former-subpostmasters-have-convictions-overturned">A total number of 65 subpostmasters have now had criminal convictions overturned in Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>November 2021 <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509817/Subpostmasters-asked-to-remove-support-for-Post-Office-scandal-inquiry">Subpostmasters asked to withdraw support for Post Office scandal inquiry</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252509860/More-wrongful-convictions-overturned-in-Post-Office-scandal">Seven more subpostmasters have been cleared after the Post Office charged them for crimes caused by its faulty Horizon software</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252510062/Post-Office-supported-1999-law-change-that-eased-prosecutions-using-computer-evidence">The Post Office made clear its support for a change in UK law regarding computer evidence that was making prosecution ‘onerous’ – a change which later helped to wrongfully convict subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>November 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252510083/Post-Office-Inquiry-clears-up-opaque-stance-on-subpostmaster-compensation">The chair of the Post Office scandal public inquiry has confirmed the compensation of a group of subpostmasters will be revisited</a>.</li> <li>December 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252510928/Government-must-go-further-after-agreeing-to-pay-compensation-for-wrongly-convicted-subpostmasters">Government must go further after agreeing to pay compensation for wrongly convicted subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>December 2021: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252511005/Pressure-on-government-to-pay-fair-compensation-to-subpostmasters-left-out-of-current-schemes">Pressure on government to pay fair compensation to subpostmasters left out of current schemes</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252511716/MPs-call-for-fair-compensation-for-excluded-victims-of-Post-Office-scandal">Almost 100 MPs have backed a call for the government to reverse its decision to exclude 555 subpostmasters from fair compensation</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252511844/Post-Office-cant-access-records-of-all-money-paid-to-it-by-victims-of-the-Horizon-scandal">A parliamentary select committee was told that the Post Office is unable to access information to accurately calculate compensation for some Horizon scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512010/Post-Office-received-1bn-taxpayer-subsidy-last-year-as-part-of-IT-scandal-compensation">The Post Office received subsidies worth over £1bn last year, including a £685m payment just last month, in a scheme labelled Post Office Historical Matters Compensation</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512095/Government-widens-subpostmaster-miscarriage-of-justice-compensation">Government widens subpostmaster miscarriage of justice compensation scheme in Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512243/Government-has-nothing-against-paying-555-subpostmasters-fair-compensation">Government officials are open to finding a way to properly compensate victims of the Horizon scandal without setting a dangerous legal precedent</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512410/Subpostmaster-campaign-group-to-meet-government-over-unfair-compensation-settlement">The subpostmaster campaign group responsible for exposing the Post Office Horizon scandal is to meet with the government to discuss fair compensation for their suffering</a>.</li> <li>January 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512465/Demands-on-Fujitsu-to-contribute-to-1bn-Horizon-scandal-compensation-costs">Fujitsu cannot hide away as taxpayers pick up the bill for the Post Office scandal triggered by its IT system, say peers</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252512882/Cack-handed-government-compensation-scheme-prolongs-suffering-of-Horizon-scandal-victims">Victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal are being denied the millions of pounds they are owed as the government delays compensation resolution</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252513159/Post-Office-scandal-victims-to-tell-their-stories-in-public">Victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal are due to tell their devastating stories to the statutory inquiry</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252513492/MPs-demand-urgent-compensation-for-Post-Office-scandal-victim-group">MPs are demanding urgent action by the government to provide full compensation to a group of 555 Post Office Horizon scandal victims who have so far been left out</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252513544/The-British-public-are-waking-up-to-the-scandal-that-happened-under-their-noses">Victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal have been suffering in silence for many years, but the current public inquiry is giving them a voice, and people are listening</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252513687/Horizon-inquiry-questioning-raises-hopes-of-fair-compensation-for-victims-so-far-left-out">Horizon inquiry questioning raises hopes of fair compensation for victims so far left out</a>.</li> <li>February 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252513934/Government-set-to-backtrack-on-untenable-position-on-subpostmaster-compensation">Government set to backtrack on untenable position on subpostmaster compensation</a>.</li> <li>March 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252514110/Post-Office-warned-of-software-flaw-in-2006-but-failed-to-alert-subpostmaster-network">The Post Office and Fujitsu failed to alert subpostmasters to a software error that caused them to be wrongly blamed for accounting shortfalls</a>.</li> <li>March 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252514320/Horizon-scandal-inquiry-hearing-sheds-light-on-Subpostmaster-federations-role-in-hushing-up-IT">Horizon inquiry hearing sheds light on subpostmaster federation’s role in hushing up IT problems</a>.</li> <li>March 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252514929/555-subpostmasters-to-get-fair-compensation-after-government-U-turn">555 subpostmasters to get fair compensation after government U-turn on its stance on High Court settlement</a>.</li> <li>March 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252515319/Compensation-goal-finally-in-sight-for-555-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Compensation goal finally in sight for 555 Post Office scandal victims, after 13 year campaign</a>.</li> <li>April 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252515504/Fujitsu-bags-430m-government-contracts-despite-rising-cost-of-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal">Fujitsu bags £430m government contracts despite rising cost of Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>April 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252516173/More-Scottish-subpostmaster-conviction-reviews-expected-as-part-of-Post-Office-scandal">The Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission expects more subpostmasters with potential wrongful convictions to come forward</a>.</li> <li>April 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252516273/Post-Office-scandal-victims-still-waiting-for-compensation-a-year-after-convictions-overturned">Former subpostmasters who were wrongfully convicted and punished for crimes have not yet received full compensation over a year after their convictions were overturned</a>.</li> <li>April 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252516388/Police-question-former-Fujitsu-worker-again-in-Post-Office-scandal-perjury-investigation">A former Fujitsu worker has been questioned under caution for the third time as police investigate potential perjury in trials of subpostmasters wrongfully convicted of financial crimes</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252516635/Post-Office-scandal-CEO-could-be-stripped-of-CBE">Paula Vennells could be stripped of her CBE as the Honours Forfeiture Committee commits to reconsider its award in the light of the Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252516675/Judicial-intervention-inevitable-as-Post-Office-compensation-valuation-falls-short">Lawyer negotiating compensation for victims of Post Office scandal says the two sides are ‘poles apart’ on valuations</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252517922/Post-Office-scandal-victims-in-Scotland-to-tell-their-stories-raising-questions-of-law">Inquiry into Post Office scandal moves to Scotland, with differences in English and Scottish law raising further serious questions about subpostmaster prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252517997/Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-chair-brings-forward-urgent-compensation-hearings">The chair of the Post Office Horizon scandal inquiry has brought forward hearings about compensation as victims warn that at this rate “people will die” before they get anything</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252518010/CCRC-to-contact-88-more-former-subpostmasters-with-potentially-wrongful-convictions">The Criminal Cases Review Commission is to contact 88 more potentially wrongfully convicted Post Office workers</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252518282/Controversial-Post-Office-IT-system-to-be-replaced-by-2025">The Post Office Horizon IT system at the centre of a national scandal will be replaced by 2025, with a supplier expected to be named in August</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252518299/Post-Office-scandal-victim-calls-for-governments-role-in-silencing-victims-to-be-investigated">Victims of the Post Office Horizon scandal in Scotland raise further questions about Post Office and government conduct</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252520527/Government-has-no-plans-to-review-controversial-court-rules-on-computer-evidence">Government accused of ‘passing the buck’ and ‘not knowing what it is talking about’ after stating it has no plans to review court rules on computer evidence</a>.</li> <li>May 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252520682/The-barristers-that-broke-their-backs-to-break-the-Post-Offices-shield-of-lies">Computer Weekly spoke to the barristers at Henderson Chambers that fought the Post Office in the High Court to expose the widest miscarriage of justice in UK history</a>.</li> <li>June 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252521309/More-wrongful-convictions-quashed-in-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Two more Post Office Horizon scandal victims have had their wrongful convictions overturned</a>.</li> <li>June 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252521718/Minister-says-compensation-offer-to-555-subpostmasters-close">The 555 subpostmasters who exposed the depth of the Post Office Horizon scandal could finally be fairly compensated</a>.</li> <li>June 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252521791/Post-Office-IT-investigator-to-be-released-from-confidentiality-obligations-for-inquiry">Forensic accounting firm that ‘knows where the bodies are buried’ will be released from confidentiality obligations by the Post Office to give evidence to public inquiry</a>.</li> <li>June 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252522193/Independent-scrutiny-brought-into-compensation-negotiations-for-wrongly-prosecuted-subpostmasters">Lawyers negotiating the compensation valuations for former subpostmasters who suffered wrongful convictions have brought in independent judicial scrutiny to break an impasse</a>.</li> <li>June 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252522141/Subpostmaster-campaigning-forces-government-to-set-up-compensation-scheme-and-make-interim-payments">Subpostmaster campaign group is a step closer to achieving what it was originally set up to do as government launches compensation scheme for its members who did not receive fair payouts</a>.</li> <li>July 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252523126/Six-more-subpostmaster-convictions-overturned">More former subpostmasters have their wrongful convictions for theft and fraud overturned in the Court of Appeal</a>.</li> <li>July 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252523143/Post-Office-attacked-subpostmasters-who-questioned-Horizon-say-victims">When the Post Office’s lie about the Horizon system failed to silence subpostmaster critics, it took more extreme measures, say victims of the scandal</a>.</li> <li>September 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252524481/Police-interview-Horizon-scandal-victim-in-investigation-into-potential-perjury-by-Fujitsu-staff">The Met Police have interviewed a former subpostmaster as part of an investigation into potential perjury by former Fujitsu staff</a>.</li> <li>September 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252525291/Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-chair-intervenes-in-slow-compensation-progress">Chair of statutory public inquiry into the Post Office Horizon scandal has aired his disappointment over the slow progress in making interim payments to victims</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252525926/Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-restarts-with-call-for-a-pause-amid-disclosure-controversy?_ga=2.192509992.363987533.1665478652-286388731.1664962548&_gl=1*4vu0dy*_ga*Mjg2Mzg4NzMxLjE2NjQ5NjI1NDg.*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTY2NTc0MDc3NC4zOC4xLjE2NjU3NDU4NDkuMC4wLjA.">The public inquiry into the Post Office scandal has begun phase two with a request for adjournment amid allegations that the Post Office is failing to disclose relevant documents</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526045/Those-responsible-for-subpostmaster-suffering-in-Horizon-scandal-must-face-public-inquiry">Victims demand that the perpetrators of the Post Office Horizon IT scandal face the public inquiry</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526102/Fujitsu-to-finally-face-up-to-blame-for-its-part-in-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal">Fujitsu’s part in causing the extreme suffering of subpostmasters will be made clear as the IT supplier begins giving evidence at a statutory inquiry</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526209/Subpostmaster-federation-failed-its-members-when-they-needed-it-most">A dereliction of duty saw subpostmaster federation ignore its members when IT problems hit and allowed the Post Office destroy their lives</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526537/New-minister-asked-to-pause-Fujitsu-government-contracts">Politicians are keeping up the pressure to block government contracts being awarded to Fujitsu because of its role in the Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526542/Reported-Horizon-errors-should-have-been-show-stopper-public-inquiry-told">Problems reported with the Post Office’s Horizon IT system before its roll-out should have been regarded as a “show-stopper.”</a></li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526586/Horizon-system-EPOSS-code-writers-lacked-basic-programming-skills-public-inquiry-hears">Horizon system code writers lacked basic programming skills, according to the task force set up to investigate reported problems with the controversial software</a>.</li> <li>October 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526661/Post-Office-warned-of-Horizon-software-induced-tragedy-in-1999">T</a><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526661/Post-Office-warned-of-Horizon-software-induced-tragedy-in-1999">rials of the Horizon computer system in Post Office branches in 1999 led to a warning from subpostmasters that software problems meant “a tragedy was not far away”</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526828/Game-of-hardball-in-Horizon-negotiations-left-subpostmasters-exposed-to-tragedy?_ga=2.132243406.1953818817.1667299299-286388731.1664962548&_gl=1*4o99gw*_ga*Mjg2Mzg4NzMxLjE2NjQ5NjI1NDg.*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTY2NzQ4NTg3OS4xMTIuMS4xNjY3NDg1OTg4LjAuMC4w">Game of ‘hardball’ in Horizon negotiations left subpostmasters exposed to tragedy</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252526883/Confirmation-bias-led-Post-Office-to-prosecute-subpostmasters-without-investigation-inquiry-told">Confirmation bias led Post Office to prosecute subpostmasters without investigation, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527040/Six-subpostmaster-convictions-referred-for-appeal-in-Scotland">SCCRC has referred six cases of potential wrongful convictions of subpostmasters to the High Court of Justiciary</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527085/Fujitsu-expert-witness-in-subpostmaster-trial-manoeuvred-into-role-public-inquiry-told">Fujitsu expert witness in subpostmaster trial ‘manoeuvred’ into role, public inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527307/Post-Office-changed-view-of-Horizon-problems-before-roll-out-because-of-a-sunk-cost-fallacy">Post Office changed view of Horizon problems before roll-out, because of a ‘sunk cost fallacy’</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527341/Team-working-on-controversial-Post-Office-Horizon-EPOSS-software-was-the-joke-of-the-building">Team working on controversial Post Office Horizon EPOSS software was the ‘joke of the building’</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527436/Post-Office-scandal-inquirys-expert-IT-witness-troubled-by-his-findings">The Post Office IT scandal inquiry’s appointed expert IT witness was “troubled” by the lack of integrity of data from the Horizon system that was used to send people to prison</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Fujitsu-put-pressure-on-UK-government-to-sign-off-troubled-Horizon-project-public-inquiry-hears">Telegram from British Embassy in Tokyo to UK government reveals pressure on ministers to sign off controversial contract</a>.</li> <li>November 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527837/Subpostmaster-federation-deliberately-kept-public-in-dark-over-computer-problems-secret">Subpostmaster federation deliberately kept public in dark over computer problems</a>.</li> <li>December 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252527952/Post-Office-boosted-its-coffers-as-Horizon-system-threw-up-unexplained-shortfalls-inquiry-told">Post Office boosted its ‘coffers’ as Horizon system threw up unexplained shortfalls, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>December 2022:  <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252528046/Post-Office-scandal-cock-up-or-cook-up">Post Office scandal – “cock-up or cook-up”?</a></li> <li>December 2022: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252528356/Criminal-Cases-Review-Commission-calls-on-more-convicted-subpostmasters-to-come-forward">Criminal Cases Review Commission calls on more convicted subpostmasters to come forward</a>.</li> <li>January 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252528935/Former-subpostmaster-Alan-Bates-turns-down-OBE-offer">Former subpostmaster Alan Bates, who ‘pulled up trees and moved mountains’, turns down OBE offer</a>.</li> <li>January 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252529287/Advisory-board-goal-for-Post-Office-scandal-victims-to-be-returned-to-rightful-financial-position?amp=1">Advisory board goal for Post Office scandal victims to be returned to rightful financial position</a>.</li> <li>January 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365529814/Former-Fujitsu-staff-under-police-investigation-to-face-Post-Office-IT-scandal-inquiry">Former Fujitsu staff under police investigation to face Post Office IT scandal inquiry</a>.</li> <li>February 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365531937/Post-Offices-most-senior-executives-hushed-up-Horizon-errors-public-inquiry-told">Post Office’s most senior executives hushed up Horizon errors, public inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>March 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365532018/Post-Office-ditched-plan-to-replace-Fujitsu-with-IBM-in-2015-due-to-cost-and-project-concerns">Post Office attempted to replace controversial Horizon system 10 years ago, but was put off by project’s scale and cost</a>.</li> <li>March 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365532063/IT-worker-evidence-reveals-a-toxic-Post-Office-IT-helpdesk-that-discriminated-against-subpostmasters">IT worker tells public inquiry that the Post Office Horizon helpdesk was toxic, rudderless and racist</a>.</li> <li>March 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365532477/Subpostmaster-demands-names-of-Post-Office-executives-who-crushed-him-to-suffocate-truth">Subpostmaster demands names of Post Office executives who crushed him to suffocate truth</a>.</li> <li>April 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365534956/CCRC-says-door-open-for-more-reviews-of-subpostmaster-convictions">CCRC says ‘door open’ for more reviews of subpostmaster convictions</a>.</li> <li>April 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365535112/Controversial-Fujitsu-contract-with-Post-Office-extended-after-technical-challenges-moving-to-cloud">The Post Office has extended a contract with Fujitsu after being unable to resolve technical issues related to migrating its IT to the cloud</a>.</li> <li>April 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365535585/Post-Office-paid-IBM-millions-when-it-ended-proposed-contract-to-replace-Horizon">Post Office paid IBM millions when it ended proposed contract to replace Horizon</a>.</li> <li>April 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/365535585/Post-Office-paid-IBM-millions-when-it-ended-proposed-contract-to-replace-Horizon">The Post Office ended a proposed contract with IBM to replace its controversial Horizon system after work had already started</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366535953/More-Post-Office-software-related-convictions-take-total-to-86">More Post Office software-related convictions overturned takes total to 86</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366537376/Fujitsu-staff-had-unrestricted-and-unauditable-remote-access-to-Post-Office-branch-systems">Fujitsu staff had ‘unrestricted and unauditable’ remote access to Post Office branch systems</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366537341/Post-Office-lawyer-bragged-how-team-destroyed-attack-on-the-Horizon-system-and-put-woman-in-prison">Post Office lawyer bragged how team ‘destroyed attack on the Horizon system’ and put woman in prison</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366537461/Post-Office-executive-produced-one-sided-report-giving-Horizon-system-a-false-bill-of-heath">Post Office executive told to report false bill of health on controversial software</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366538153/Campaigning-former-subpostmaster-fears-compensation-for-scandal-victims-will-be-delayed-to-2025">Campaigning former subpostmaster fears compensation for scandal victims will be delayed to 2025</a>.</li> <li>May 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366538096/Post-Office-scandal-cover-up-a-dark-chapter-in-government-corporate-and-legal-history">Post Office scandal – cover-up a ‘dark chapter’ in government, corporate and legal history</a>.</li> <li>June 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366542414/Post-Office-will-not-oppose-potential-Horizon-conviction-appellants">Post Office CEO told MPs that the organisation is telling some subpostmasters it won’t oppose them if they appeal</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366543482/Public-inquiry-hears-how-Post-Office-security-withheld-evidence-from-people-it-suspected-of-theft">Public inquiry hears how Post Office security withheld evidence from people it suspected of theft</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366543715/Former-Fujitsu-IT-chief-evidence-postponed-after-late-Post-Office-disclosure">Former Fujitsu IT chief evidence postponed after late Post Office disclosure</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366544234/Post-Office-inquiry-must-examine-rule-on-IT-evidence-if-miscarriages-of-justice-are-to-be-avoided">Post Office inquiry must examine role of court rules around use of computer evidence that enabled it to prosecute innocent people</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366544394/Peer-calls-for-every-Post-Office-prosecution-to-be-reviewed">Peer calls for every Post Office prosecution to be reviewed</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366544317/Horizon-inquiry-adjourned-as-Post-Office-disclosure-failures-threaten-to-derail-proceedings">Horizon inquiry adjourned as Post Office disclosure failures threaten to ‘derail’ proceedings</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366544506/Horizon-inquiry-chief-threatens-Post-Office-with-criminal-sanctions-over-disclosure-failures">Horizon inquiry chief threatens Post Office with ‘criminal sanctions’ over disclosure failures</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366544874/Subpostmaster-compensation-deadline-will-be-missed-warns-public-inquiry-chair">Subpostmaster compensation deadline will be missed, warns public inquiry chair</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366545596/CCRC-refers-two-more-subpostmaster-conviction-for-appeal">CCRC refers two more subpostmaster convictions for appeal</a>.</li> <li>July 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366546032/Post-Office-tried-to-convince-independent-IT-witness-that-he-was-wrong-about-Horizon">Post Office tried to convince independent IT witness that he was wrong about Horizon</a>.</li> <li>August 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366548772/MP-calls-for-review-of-computer-evidence-rule-which-meant-subpostmasters-were-wrongly-convicted">MP calls for review of computer evidence rule which led to subpostmasters being wrongly convicted</a>.</li> <li>August 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366549452/Six-subpostmaster-appeals-to-be-heard-in-Scottish-court">Six subpostmaster appeals to be heard in Scottish court</a>.</li> <li>September 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366552411/Post-Office-employee-changed-story-for-witness-statement-used-to-destroy-subpostmaster">Post Office employee changed story for witness statement used to destroy subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>September 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366553492/Post-Office-had-no-interest-in-subpostmaster-welfare-when-taking-legal-action-says-Fujitsu-memo">Post Office had no interest in subpostmaster welfare when taking legal action, says Fujitsu memo</a>.</li> <li>September 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366552360/Government-offers-600000-to-subpostmasters-with-overturned-convictions">Government offers £600,000 to subpostmasters with overturned convictions</a>.</li> <li>September 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366553454/Five-more-subpostmasters-have-IT-system-related-convictions-overturned">Five more subpostmasters have IT system-related convictions overturned</a></li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366553642/Government-breached-privacy-of-Horizon-victims-with-compensation-offer-says-lawyer">Government ‘breached privacy’ of Horizon victims with compensation offer</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366553756/First-subpostmaster-Horizon-conviction-overturned-in-Scotland">First subpostmaster Horizon conviction overturned in Scotland</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366554152/Amnesia-hides-names-of-individuals-behind-Post-Offices-head-on-a-spike-strategy">Amnesia hides names of individuals behind Post Office’s ‘head on a spike’ strategy</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366555336/Angry-lawyer-warned-against-Post-Office-computer-investigation-in-2010-email">‘Angry’ lawyer warned against Post Office computer investigation in 2010 email</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366555682/Former-Post-Office-executive-admits-he-wouldnt-sign-unfair-contract-he-pushed-on-subpostmasters">Former Post Office executive admits he wouldn’t sign unfair contract he pushed on subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366556296/Post-Office-auditors-presumed-subpostmasters-were-on-the-fiddle-or-in-a-muddle">Post Office auditors presumed subpostmasters were ‘on the fiddle’ or ‘in a muddle’</a>.</li> <li>October 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366556653/Taxpayers-to-fund-a-further-150m-for-Post-Office-IT-scandal">Bill for the scandal over £1bn, as campaign leader considers private prosecutions of Post Office executives</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366558553/Post-Office-disclosure-failures-delay-Horizon-scandal-inquiry-again">Post Office disclosure failures delay Horizon scandal inquiry again</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366558733/Former-Post-Office-manager-has-no-memory-of-preparing-witness-statement-in-legal-dispute">Former Post Office manager has no memory of preparing witness statement in legal dispute</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366559812/Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-postpones-more-key-witness-hearings">Post Office scandal inquiry postpones more key witness hearings</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366560655/Controversial-Fujitsu-contract-with-Post-Office-extended-again">Controversial Fujitsu contract with Post Office extended again</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366561353/CCRC-refers-two-posthumous-subpostmaster-appeals-to-Crown-Court">CCRC refers posthumous appeals against convictions to Crown Court for first time</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366561493/Paulla-Vennells-email-fuelled-Post-Office-Horizon-cult-inquiry-told">Paula Vennells’ email fuelled Post Office Horizon cult, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>November 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366561572/Slow-government-response-to-Post-Office-scandal-compensation-forces-new-legislation">Slow government response to Post Office scandal compensation forces new legislation</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366561574/Post-Office-lawyer-with-his-fingerprints-are-all-over-IT-scandal-spreads-blame">Post Office lawyer with his fingerprints all over IT scandal spreads blame</a></li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366562072/Undisclosed-document-could-reveal-pressure-on-Fujitsu-expert-witness-in-Post-Office-prosecution">Undisclosed document could reveal pressure on Fujitsu expert witness in Post Office prosecution</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366562217/Money-at-heart-of-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-blame">Post Office prioritised its ‘bottom line’ over justice</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366562653/Former-Post-Office-investigator-called-subpostmaster-campaigners-crooks">Former Post Office investigator called subpostmaster campaigners ‘crooks’</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366563257/Current-Post-Office-executive-in-denial-of-Horizon-cover-up">Current Post Office executive in denial of Horizon cover-up</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366563400/Government-advised-to-overturn-all-Post-Office-scandal-convictions">Government advised to overturn all Post Office scandal convictions</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366563893/Government-reveals-its-own-slow-progress-in-compensating-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Government reveals its own slow progress in compensating Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366564035/No-hiding-place-for-those-responsible-for-Post-Office-Horizon-scandal">‘No hiding place’ for those responsible for Post Office Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>December 2023: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366564173/Post-Office-gets-government-handout-as-Horizon-replacement-costs-increase-significantly">Post Office gets government handout as Horizon replacement costs increase ‘significantly’</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565512/Metropolitan-Police-launches-second-criminal-investigation-in-Post-Office-scandal">Metropolitan Police launches second criminal investigation in Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565613/Post-Office-scandal-furore-is-moment-to-change-digital-evidence-rules">The current rules around digital evidence are partly to blame for the widest miscarriage of justice in UK history</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565715/Fujitsu-gets-stay-of-execution-as-MPs-support-exoneration-of-wrongfully-convicted-subpostmasters">Fujitsu gets stay of execution as MPs support exoneration of wrongfully convicted subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565752/Hero-subpostmaster-accuses-government-of-diversion-tactics-through-weaselly-statistics">‘Hero’ subpostmaster accuses government of diversion tactics through ‘weaselly’ statistics</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565720/How-Fujitsu-became-a-central-part-of-the-Post-Office-scandal">How Fujitsu became a central part of the Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366565784/Hundreds-of-subpostmasters-to-have-convictions-quashed-in-blanket-exoneration">The government has chosen to introduce legislation that will enable it to exonerate hundreds of subpostmasters as a group</a></li> <li>January 2024: <a href="file:///C:/Users/kflinders/Desktop/Working%20on/How%20legal%20disclosure%20failures%20disrupted%20the%20Post%20Office%20Horizon%20inquiry">How legal disclosure failures disrupted the Post Office Horizon inquiry</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566438/Fujitsu-morally-obliged-to-contribute-to-subpostmaster-financial-redress-amid-insane-delays">Fujitsu ‘morally obliged’ to contribute to subpostmaster financial redress amid ‘insane’ delays</a></li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566755/More-than-900-subpostmaster-convictions-wouldnt-have-happened-without-Post-Office-backed-law-change">More than 900 subpostmaster convictions wouldn’t have happened without Post Office-backed law change</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566772/Anger-sparked-by-TV-drama-forces-Fujitsu-to-put-public-sector-contract-bidding-on-hold">Anger sparked by TV drama forces Fujitsu to put public sector contract bidding on hold</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566859/Fujitsu-boss-describes-Post-Office-behaviour-as-shameful%20and%20appalling">Fujitsu boss describes Post Office behaviour as ‘shameful and appalling’</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566896/Fujitsu-boss-admits-to-missed-opportunities-to-prevent-miscarriages-of-justice">Fujitsu boss admits to missed opportunities to prevent miscarriages of justice</a> </li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566896/Fujitsu-boss-admits-to-missed-opportunities-to-prevent-miscarriages-of-justice">Concerns of an expert witness in subpostmaster trials were ignored by Fujitsu</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366567032/Urgent-question-asks-which-ministers-knew-of-Post-Offices-shocking-plan-to-remove-judge">Urgent question asks which ministers knew of Post Office’s shocking plan to remove judge</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366567093/Fujitsu-agrees-to-support-former-subpostmasters-families-beyond-financial-redress">Fujitsu agrees to support former subpostmasters’ families beyond financial redress</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366567433/Committee-chair-asks-minister-to-back-Mr-Bates-clause-in-Post-Office-compensation-legislation">Committee chair asks minister to back ‘Mr Bates clause’ in Post Office compensation legislation</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366567874/Expert-IT-witness-outsmarted-an-aggressive-Post-Office-to-get-to-truth-after-inspection-madness">Expert IT witness outsmarted an ‘aggressive’ Post Office to get to truth after inspection ‘madness’</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366568092/MP-demands-answers-from-government-minister-over-second-faulty-Post-Office-IT-system">MP demands answers from government minister over second faulty Post Office IT system</a>.</li> <li>January 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366568333/Pre-Horizon-users-contacting-lawyers-as-more-Post-Office-IT-horror-stories-emerge">Pre-Horizon users contacting lawyers as more Post Office IT horror stories emerge</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366568552/Government-dragging-it-out-by-refusing-to-share-knowledge-of-Post-Office-trial-delaying-tactic">Government ‘dragging it out’ by refusing to share knowledge of Post Office trial ‘delaying tactic’</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366568812/People-are-now-listening-Post-Office-inquiry-told-as-latest-phase-ends">‘People are now listening’: Post Office inquiry told as latest phase ends</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366568954/Post-Office-scandal-phase-fours-rogues-gallery">Post Office scandal: Phase four’s rogues’ gallery</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366569712/More-than-1000-subpostmasters-could-have-used-second-faulty-Post-Office-system">More than 1,000 subpostmasters could have used second faulty Post Office system</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal-inquiry-Two-years-of-shocking-revelations">Post Office Horizon IT scandal inquiry: Two years of shocking revelations</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366569873/Post-Office-CEO-refused-to-meet-government-minister-without-her-lawyer-after-2015-Horizon-report">Post Office CEO refused to meet government minister without her lawyer after 2015 Horizon report</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366570054/Post-Office-IT-insider-and-the-software-decision-that-lit-the-Horizon-scandal">Post Office IT insider and the software decision that lit the Horizon scandal</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366570413/Controversial-Post-Office-Capture-system-was-developed-in-house">Controversial Post Office Capture system was developed in-house</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571076/Law-to-clear-hundreds-of-wrongfully-convicted-subpostmasters-expected-In-July?_gl=1*d95qqy*_ga*Nzg3MzQ4Njc1LjE3MDc4MTY3Njg.*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTcwODg4MzMxMC41Mi4xLjE3MDg4ODM5NjAuMC4wLjA.">Law to clear hundreds of wrongfully convicted subpostmasters expected in July</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366570712/Unisys-investigating-potential-involvement-in-controversial-Post-Office-system">Unisys investigating potential involvement in controversial Post Office system</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571135/King-Charles-strips-disgraced-Post-Office-CEO-of-her-CBE">King Charles strips disgraced Post Office CEO of her CBE</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571354/Post-Office-scandal-roundup-fourth-estate-in-full-throttle">Post Office scandal roundup: Fourth Estate in full throttle</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571394/Government-wont-rush-to-include-Post-Office-Capture-convictions-in-overturning-legislation">Government won’t rush to include Post Office Capture convictions in overturning legislation</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571363/Government-should-face-legal-deadlines-on-paying-Post-Office-victims">Government should face legal deadlines on paying Post Office victims</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571692/Pathetic-Post-Office-spat-detracts-attention-and-fuels-disdain-for-authority">‘Pathetic’ Post Office spat detracts attention and fuels ‘disdain’ for authority</a>.</li> <li>February 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571653/Post-Office-CEOs-Capture-investigation-claims-questioned">Post Office CEO’s claim to be ‘working hard’ on Capture investigation in doubt</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571913/MPs-demand-Fujitsu-be-nailed-down-on-financial-promise-to-Post-Office-scandal-victims">MPs demand Fujitsu be ‘nailed down’ on financial promise to Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366571992/Post-Office-staff-conspired-to-pervert-the-course-of-justice-says-KC">KC names Post Office staff he believes conspired to pervert the course of justice</a></li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366572232/Perverting-course-of-justice-and-contempt-of-Parliament-a-week-in-post-drama-Post-Office-scandal">Perverting course of justice and contempt of Parliament: a week in post-drama Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366572277/Post-Office-prosecutions-during-Horizon-go-live-phase-are-frightening">Post Office prosecutions during Horizon go-live phase are ‘frightening’</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366572513/Brutal-decisions-required-to-sort-out-Post-Office-mess-says-select-committee-chair">‘Brutal’ decisions required to sort out Post Office mess, says select committee chair</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366572633/MPs-call-for-Post-Office-exclusion-from-compensation-schemes-as-trust-hits-rock-bottom">MPs call for Post Office exclusion from compensation schemes, as trust hits rock bottom</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366572692/Fujitsu-should-pay-half-of-Post-Office-scandal-costs-says-MP">Fujitsu should pay half of Post Office scandal costs, says select committee chair</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366573252/Current-subpostmaster-account-shortfalls-reveal-extent-of-Post-Offices-pre-2019-neglect">Current subpostmaster account shortfalls reveal extent of Post Office’s pre-2019 neglect</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366573392/Unprecedented-bill-to-exonerate-hundreds-of-wrongly-convicted-Post-office-workers-arrives">Unprecedented bill to exonerate hundreds of wrongly convicted Post Office workers arrives</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366573533/Children-of-Post-Office-victims-form-group-to-hold-Fujitsu-boss-to-his-word">Children of Post Office victims to hold Fujitsu boss to his word</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366573602/Controversial-Post-Office-Capture-software-was-completely-rewritten-in-1994">Controversial Post Office Capture software was completely rewritten in 1994</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366574833/Post-Office-scandal-fallout-for-Fujitsu-could-open-UK-public-sector-to-Indian-giants">Post Office scandal fallout for Fujitsu could open UK public sector to Indian giants</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366575033/Post-Office-Capture-users-campaign-gathers-pace">Post Office Capture users’ campaign for justice gathers pace</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366575372/Sums-of-money-Post-Office-stole-from-subpostmasters-may-never-be-known">Sums of money Post Office ‘stole’ from subpostmasters may never be known</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366575495/Leaked-comms-reveal-Fujitsu-eyeing-huge-UK-government-bounty-despite-Post-Office-scandal-promise">Leaked comms reveal Fujitsu eyeing huge UK government bounty</a>.</li> <li>March 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366575754/Remote-access-is-the-Post-Offices-known-unknown">Remote access is the Post Office’s known unknown</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366577734/Fujitsu-staff-instructed-how-to-bid-for-government-contracts-during-self-imposed-ban">Fujitsu staff instructed how to bid for government contracts during self-imposed ban</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366579492/Fujitsu-should-stop-bending-rules-stop-bidding-and-pay-up-says-MP">Fujitsu should stop bending rules, stop bidding and pay up, says MP</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366579713/Environment-Agency-dumps-Fujitsu-in-sign-of-Post-Office-scandal-taking-its-toll">Environment Agency dumps Fujitsu as Post Office scandal takes its toll</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366579994/MPs-will-grill-Cabinet-Office-over-Fujitsu-contract-bidding-pause">MPs will grill Cabinet Office over Fujitsu contract bidding pause</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580055/Some-former-Post-Office-staff-should-be-jailed-over-scandal-says-government-minister">Some former Post Office staff should be jailed over scandal, says government minister</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580033/Further-extension-to-controversial-Post-Office-contract-with-Fujitsu-inevitable">Further extension to controversial Post Office contract with Fujitsu inevitable</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580240/Civil-servants-more-to-blame-for-Post-Office-cover-up-than-ministers-says-Alan-Bates">Civil servants more to blame for Post Office cover-up than ministers, says Alan Bates</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580376/Subpostmasters-stealing-from-branches-didnt-make-sense-former-judge-tells-inquiry">Subpostmasters stealing from branches ‘didn’t make sense,’ former judge tells inquiry</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580532/Fujitsu-public-sector-contracts-dry-up-in-Post-Office-scandal-aftermath">Fujitsu public sector contracts dry up in Post Office scandal aftermath</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580442/Former-Post-Office-executives-neglect-prolonged-Horizon-reliability-myth">Former Post Office executive’s neglect prolonged Horizon reliability myth</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580563/Post-Office-boss-said-subpostmasters-had-hands-in-till-and-blamed-technology-for-missing-cash">Post Office boss said subpostmasters had hands in till and blamed technology</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580983/Alan%20Bates%20and%20JFSA%20won%E2%80%99t%20back%20down%20in%20fight%20with%20government%20and%20Post%20Office">Alan Bates and JFSA won’t back down in fight with government and Post Office</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366580983/Post-Office-boss-signed-off-hush-money-to-cover-up-smoking-gun">Post Office boss signed off hush money to cover up smoking gun</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581297/IT-expert-who-helped-expose-Post-Office-scandal-offers-to-investigate-second-controversial-system">IT expert who helped expose Post Office scandal offers to investigate second controversial system</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581519/Unisys-reveals-no-link-to-development-of-controversial-Post-Office-software">Unisys reveals no link to development of controversial Post Office software</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581672/Post-Office-lawyer-was-a-jack-of-all-trades-but-failed-his-own">Post Office lawyer was a jack of all trades, but failed his own</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581777/Fujitsu-UK-to-cut-UK-jobs-as-Post-Office-scandal-fallout-hits-sales">Fujitsu to cut UK jobs as Post Office scandal fallout hits sales</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581895/Expert-investigating-Capture-system-refuses-to-meet-untrustworthy-Post-Office">Expert investigating Capture system refuses to meet ‘untrustworthy’ Post Office</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366581954/Post-Office-boss-used-husbands-descriptions-in-Orwellian-ploy-to-downplay-Horizon-problems">Post Office boss used husband’s descriptions in ‘Orwellian’ ploy to downplay Horizon problems</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366582013/Lords-debate-amendment-to-law-on-use-of-computer-evidence-in-light-of-Post-Office-scandal">Lords debate amendment to law on use of computer evidence in light of Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366582214/More-evidence-emerges-that-Post-Office-executive-misled-High-Court-judge">More evidence emerges that Post Office executive misled High Court judge</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366582332/Post-Office-lied-to-subpostmasters-when-forced-to-meet-them-says-former-federation-representative">Post Office ‘lied’ to subpostmasters when forced to meet them, says former federation representative</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366582452/Post-Office-scheme-was-a-charade-that-never-intended-for-large-compensation-pay-outs">Post Office scheme was a ‘charade’ that never intended for large compensation pay-outs</a>.</li> <li>April 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366582732/Post-Office-misjudged-campaigner-it-labelled-a-bluffer">Post Office misjudged campaigner it labelled a ‘bluffer’</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366583159/Post-Office-investigators-saw-subpostmasters-as-enemies-and-thats-what-they-became">Post Office investigators saw subpostmasters as ‘enemies’ – and that’s what they became</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366583452/Post-Office-legal-boss-withheld-details-from-statutory-body-reviewing-miscarriages-of-justice">Post Office legal boss withheld details from statutory body reviewing miscarriages of justice</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366583303/Police-told-in-2016-that-Post-Office-prosecutor-withheld-evidence-of-Horizon-errors-from-court">Police told in 2016 that Post Office prosecutor withheld evidence of Horizon errors from court</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366583912/Fujitsus-Post-Office-Horizon-admission-was-bombshell-amid-religious-panic-over-reliability">Fujitsu Post Office system admission was ‘bombshell’ to barrister</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Post-Office-Horizon-scandal-explained-everything-you-need-to-know">Barrister says Post Office lawyers misled him over Horizon cases</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366584740/Scotlands-Post-Office-scandal-victims-to-be-exonerated-en-masse">Scotland’s Post Office scandal victims to be exonerated en masse</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585307/Comms-director-at-centre-of-cover-up-never-thought-Post-Office-were-the-baddies">Comms director at centre of cover-up never thought Post Office were the ‘baddies’</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366584810/Post-Office-IT-boss-failed-to-raise-concern-over-false-Horizon-statements">Post Office IT boss failed to raise concern over false Horizon statements</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585694/Post-Office-considered-asking-Computer-Weekly-to-review-Horizon-IT-system">Post Office considered asking Computer Weekly to review Horizon IT system</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585733/Post-Office-CEO-Paula-Vennells-didnt-believe-there-were-miscarriages-of-justice-inquiry-told">Post Office CEO Paula Vennells ‘didn’t believe there were miscarriages of justice’</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585779/The-fall-from-grace-of-ex-priest-and-Post-Office-boss-Paula-Vennells">The fall from grace of ex-priest and Post Office boss Paula Vennells</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585812/Post-Office-directors-went-crawling-back-to-Fujitsu-when-IBM-project-got-complex">Post Office directors went crawling back to Fujitsu when IBM project got complex, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366585863/You-knew-former-ally-accused-Paula-Vennells-of-knowing-about-Horizon-problems">‘You knew’: former ally accused Paula Vennells of knowing about Horizon problems</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586015/Third-police-probe-into-Post-Office-scandal-under-consideration">Third police probe into Post Office scandal under consideration</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586256/Government-was-aware-of-Post-Office-strategy-to-fight-subpostmasters">Government knew of Post Office plan to remove judge</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586242/Paula-Vennells-boasted-about-removing-Horizon-risk-reference-in-Royal-Mail-flotation-prospectus">Paula Vennells boasted about removing Horizon risk reference in Royal Mail flotation prospectus</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586358/Over-700-wrongful-subpostmaster-convictions-overturned-by-new-legislation">Over 700 subpostmasters exonerated by new legislation</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586398/Post-Office-scandal-Met-Police-investigation-set-to-go-national">Met Police investigation set to go national</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586399/Government-appoints-investigators-to-analyse-Post-Office-Capture-software-used-before-Horizon">Government appoints investigators to analyse Post Office Capture software used before Horizon</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366586814/Post-Office-Horizon-replacement-project-labelled-unachievable-as-taxpayer-bill-reaches-1bn">Post Office Horizon replacement project labelled ‘unachievable’ as taxpayer bill reaches £1bn</a>.</li> <li>May 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587174/Fujitsu-set-for-further-180m-deal-as-Post-Office-Horizon-replacement-delayed">Fujitsu set for further £180m deal as Post Office Horizon replacement delayed</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587652/Post-Office-bosses-misled-subpostmasters-day-before-IT-project-problems-exposed">Post Office bosses misled subpostmasters a day before IT project problems were exposed</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587793/Subpostmasters-consider-legal-action-against-government-in-pursuit-of-financial-redress">Subpostmasters may take legal action against government in pursuit of financial redress</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587816/Post-Office-chair-was-aware-of-Horizon-concerns-from-day-one">Post Office chair was aware of Horizon concerns from day one but failed to act</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587837/Mystery-Post-Office-software-developer-revealed-in-1995-Horizon-project-document">Mystery Post Office software developer revealed in 1995 Horizon project document</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366587935/Fujitsu-had-Post-Office-over-a-barrel-inquiry-told">Fujitsu had Post Office ‘over a barrel’, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366588592/Post-Office-Capture-software-training-deficit-echoes-systemic-Horizon-problems">Post Office Capture software training deficit echoes systemic Horizon problems</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366588662/IT-witness-hidden-away-from-Post-Office-court-battle-supported-it-from-shadows">IT witness was hidden away from Post Office court battle, but supported it from shadows</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366588932/Post-Office-scandal-victims-in-Scotland-have-convictions-quashed">Post Office scandal victims in Scotland have convictions quashed</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366588822/Once-ridiculed-Post-Office-scandal-campaigner-Alan-Bates-receives-knighthood">Once ridiculed Post Office scandal campaigner Alan Bates receives knighthood</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589578/Post-Office-and-Fujitsu-had-tense-relationship-but-were-joined-at-hip-when-protecting-their-brands">Post Office and Fujitsu had tense relationship, but were joined at hip when protecting their brands</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589422/Sir-Alan-Bates-hits-out-at-Post-Office-incompetence-after-data-breach">Sir Alan Bates hits out at Post Office ‘incompetence’ after data breach</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589716/Metropolitan-Police-set-to-investigate-one-of-its-own-staff-in-Post-Office-probe">Metropolitan Police could investigate one of its own staff in Post Office probe</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589563/Post-Office-expert-IT-witness-Gareth-Jenkins-resigns-BCS-membership">Post Office expert IT witness Gareth Jenkins resigns BCS membership</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589775/Numbers-prove-former-subpostmaster-federation-bosss-ignorance-over-Post-Office-scandal">Numbers prove former subpostmaster federation boss’s ignorance over Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366591596/Ignorance-of-legal-niceties-from-Post-Office-expert-IT-witness-saw-innocent-people-jailed">Ignorance of ‘legal niceties’ from Post Office expert IT witness saw innocent people jailed</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366590300/Experts-shocked-by-extraordinary-claim-made-by-Post-Office-IT-expert-witness">Experts shocked by ‘extraordinary’ claim made by Post Office IT expert witness</a>.</li> <li>June 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366592093/Former-Fujitsu-engineer-says-Post-Office-trapped-him-into-giving-incomplete-evidence">Former Fujitsu engineer says Post Office ‘trapped’ him into giving incomplete evidence</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366592443/Former-Post-Office-chair-regrets-keeping-critical-Horizon-report-secret">Former Post Office chair ‘regrets’ keeping critical Horizon report secret</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366592775/Sir-Alan-Bates-welcomes-MPs-elevation-to-House-of-Lords">Sir Alan Bates welcomes MP’s elevation to House of Lords</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366592917/Government-left-monitoring-of-Post-Office-to-luck">Government left monitoring of Post Office to ‘luck’</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366593212/Civil-servant-was-lone-voice-on-Post-Office-board-to-query-legal-plan-that-blew-taxpayers-cash">Civil servant was lone voice on Post Office board to query legal plan that blew taxpayers’ cash</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366593732/Civil-servant-said-subpostmasters-threat-of-legal-action-was-sabre-rattling">Civil servant said subpostmasters’ threat of legal action was ‘sabre-rattling’</a></li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366593992/Fujitsu-analyst-gave-witness-statements-when-more-qualified-colleagues-refused">Fujitsu analyst gave witness statements when more qualified colleagues refused</a></li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366596078/Government-trusted-abuser-over-the-abused-on-Post-Office-scandal">Government trusted ‘abuser’ over the abused on Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366596372/Ed-Davey-and-Jo-Swinson-handled-by-civil-servants-in-Post-Office-cover-up-says-Sir-Alan-Bates">Ed Davey and Jo Swinson ‘handled’ by civil servants in Post Office cover-up, says Sir Alan Bates</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366596397/Former-minster-felt-she-was-fighting-department-over-Post-Office-controversy">Former minister felt she was fighting department over Post Office controversy</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366596559/Post-Office-acted-the-victim-and-civil-servants-abandoned-their-principles-says-former-minister">Post Office ‘acted the victim’ and civil servants ‘abandoned their principles’, says former minister</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366598430/Vince-Cable-says-the-Post-Office-lied-to-the-government-over-Horizon-issues">Vince Cable says the Post Office ‘lied’ to the government over Horizon issues</a>.</li> <li>July 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366599254/Government-commits-at-least-540m-to-financial-redress-for-wrongfully-convicted-Post-Office-staff">Government commits at least £540m to financial redress for wrongfully convicted Post Office staff</a>.</li> <li>August 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366599673/Post-Office-scandal-Phases-5-and-6-had-islands-of-conscientiousness-in-great-depths-of-neglect">Post Office scandal: Phases 5 and 6 had islands of conscientiousness in great depths of neglect</a>.</li> <li>August 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366603062/Post-Office-brings-in-new-IT-chief-as-it-awaits-funding-for-Horizon-replacement">Post Office brings in new IT chief as it awaits funding for Horizon replacement</a>.</li> <li>August 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366605718/Post-Office-systems-crash-hits-collapsing-Horizon-system">Post Office systems crash hits ‘collapsing’ Horizon system</a>.</li> <li>August 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366608479/Post-Office-apologises-for-IT-problem-text-alert-that-was-never-sent">Post Office apologises for IT problem text alert that was never sent</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366609561/Post-Office-and-Fujitsu-malevolence-and-incompetence-means-huge-final-taxpayers-bill">Post Office and Fujitsu malevolence means huge taxpayers’ bill</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366609960/Post-Office-scandal-victims-given-route-to-appeal-unfair-financial-settlements">Post Office scandal victims given route to appeal unfair financial settlements</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610126/Fujitsu-cuts-annual-staff-pay-rise-as-Post-Office-scandal-bites">Fujitsu UK staff won’t receive annual pay rise as Post Office scandal bites</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366609946/Under-pressure-Post-Office-botches-hardware-procurement-in-project-to-replace-error-prone-system">Under-pressure Post Office botches hardware procurement in project to replace error-prone system</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610515/Government-receives-report-on-second-controversial-Post-Office-IT-system">Government receives report on second controversial Post Office IT system</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610815/Fujitsu-loses-50m-in-sales-after-Post-Office-scandal-furore">Fujitsu loses £50m in sales after Post Office scandal furore</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611132/Post-Office-chief-executive-Nick-Read-quits">Post Office chief executive Nick Read quits</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611257/Post-Office-scandal-victim-becomes-first-to-receive-600000-under-new-redress-scheme">Post Office scandal victim becomes first to receive £600,000 under new redress scheme</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611555/Post-Office-system-still-causing-unexplained-Horizon-shortfalls-for-half-of-subpostmasters">Post Office system still causing unexplained shortfalls for over half of subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611383/Fujitsu-addresses-financial-challenge-doubts-over-commitment-to-righting-Post-Office-wrongs">Fujitsu faces financial challenges, with doubts over its commitment to righting Post Office wrongs</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611619/Post-Office-IT-departments-focus-on-chasing-a-discount-meant-botched-procurement">Post Office IT department’s focus on chasing a discount meant botched procurement</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611835/Post-Office-IT-procurement-mess-saw-35m-spent-on-air-conditioner-says-board-member">Post Office IT procurement mess saw £35m spent on air conditioner, says board member</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612032/Fujitsu-accused-of-paying-lip-service-to-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Fujitsu accused of ‘paying lip service’ to Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612054/Subpostmasters-living-years-with-disputed-but-unresolved-debts-to-the-Post-Office-inquiry-told">Subpostmasters living years with disputed but unresolved debts to the Post Office, inquiry told</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611858/More-parallels-between-Post-Office-Capture-and-Horizon-scandal-revealed">More parallels between Post Office Capture and Horizon scandal revealed</a>.</li> <li>September 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612292/Investigation-finds-reasonable-likelihood-Post-Office-Capture-software-caused-accounting-losses">Investigation finds ‘reasonable likelihood’ Post Office Capture software caused accounting losses</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612692/Post-Office-spending-80000-a-week-on-engineers-who-cant-work-as-IT-project-burns-cash">Post Office spending £80,000+ a week on engineers who can’t work, as IT project burns cash</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612637/Post-Office-and-Fujitsu-from-blood-brothers-to-bad-blood">Post Office and Fujitsu: from blood brothers to bad blood</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612718/Late-evidence-in-Post-Office-Capture-investigation-could-not-be-reviewed">Late evidence in Post Office Capture investigation could not be reviewed</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612738/Post-Office-recruiting-tech-savvy-board-member-amid-unravelling-IT-disaster">Post Office recruiting tech-savvy board member amid unravelling IT disaster</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612666/Post-Office-senior-executive-suspended-over-allegations-of-destroying-evidence">Post Office senior executive suspended over allegations of destroying evidence</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612955/Whistleblowers-call-out-ongoing-cover-up-by-Post-Office-CEO-in-explosive-letter">Whistleblowers call out ongoing cover-up by Post Office CEO in explosive letter</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612789/Post-Office-boss-Nick-Read-Inadequate-greedy-and-self-interested-whistleblowers-tell-inquiry">Post Office boss Nick Read ‘inadequate, greedy and self-interested’, whistleblowers tell inquiry</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612938/Can-the-Post-Office-project-to-replace-Horizon-be-rescued">Can the Post Office project to replace Horizon be rescued?</a></li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366612944/Post-Office-IT-transformation-project-was-set-up-to-fail-chairman-tells-inquiry">Post Office IT transformation project was ‘set up to fail’, chairman tells inquiry</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613118/Under-fire-Nick-Read-was-unprepared-for-Post-Office-challenge">Under-fire Nick Read was unprepared for Post Office challenge</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613372/Post-Office-dragging-its-feet-getting-rid-of-tainted-staff-despite-government-green-light">Post Office dragging its feet getting rid of tainted staff, despite government ‘green light’</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613500/Post-Office-believes-it-took-36m-from-subpostmasters-with-unexplained-losses">Post Office believes it took £36m from subpostmasters with unexplained losses</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613496/Post-Office-set-to-axe-in-house-development-for-NBIT-software">Post Office set to axe in-house-developed New Branch IT software</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613852/Former-police-officer-heading-Post-Office-operations-dd-nothing-to-help-innocent-subpostmasters">Former police officer heading Post Office operations did nothing to help innocent subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>October 2014: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613894/Sir-Alan-Bates-tells-prime-minister-to-guarantee-Post-Office-scandal-victim-redress-by-March-2025">Sir Alan Bates tells Prime Minister to guarantee Post Office scandal victim redress by March 2025</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614033/Met-Police-investigating-senior-Post-Office-worker-over-evidence-destruction-allegation">Met Police investigating senior Post Office worker over evidence destruction allegation</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614193/Late-evidence-review-doesnt-change-Post-office-Capture-system-report">Review of late evidence doesn’t change Post Office Capture system report</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613941/Post-Office-worker-who-allegedly-told-staff-to-destroy-evidence-could-return-as-police-investigate">Post Office worker who allegedly told staff to destroy evidence could return to work</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366613750/Former-Post-Office-IT-boss-alleged-to-have-misrepresented-alternative-to-in-house-build">Former Post Office IT boss alleged to have misrepresented alternative to in-house build</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614104/Change-to-rules-on-computer-evidence-will-be-an-outcome-of-Post-Office-scandal">Change to rules on computer evidence will be an ‘outcome’ of Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614435/Federation-requests-government-investigation-into-third-Post-Office-branch-system">Federation requests government investigation into third Post Office branch system</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614572/Warning-shots-fired-as-former-subpostmasters-have-useful-meeting-with-Post-Office-CEO">Warning shots fired as former subpostmasters have ‘useful’ meeting with Post Office CEO</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614227/Government-urged-to-overturn-all-convictions-based-on-Post-Office-Capture">Government ‘urged’ to overturn all convictions based on Post Office Capture</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614717/Who-is-the-subject-of-the-Post-Offices-Project-Tiger-investigation">Who is the subject of the Post Office’s Project Tiger investigation?</a></li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614808/No-simple-replacement-to-digital-evidence-rules-says-Post-Office-Horizon-trial-judge">No simple replacement for digital evidence rules, says Post Office Horizon trial judge</a>.</li> <li>October 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614811/Fujitsu-boss-to-face-tough-reappearance-at-Post-Office-inquiry-following-inaction-and-sidestepping">Fujitsu boss to face tough reappearance at Post Office inquiry, following inaction and sidestepping</a>. </li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614725/Post-Office-scandal-affected-relationships-of-two-thirds-of-victims">Post Office scandal affected relationships of two-thirds of victims</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614908/Governments-600000-offer-to-Horizon-scandal-victims-was-political">Government’s £600,000 offer to Horizon scandal victims was ‘political’</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615136/Botched-Post-Office-website-upgrade-caused-serious-data-breach">Post Office data breach caused by botched website upgrade</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615163/Post-Office-was-reluctant-to-cut-costs-despite-143-central-staff-earning-more-than-100k">Post Office was reluctant to cut costs despite 143 central staff earning more than £100k</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615244/Post-Office-appointing-third-party-reviewer-of-current-Horizon-system">Post Office appointing third-party reviewer of current Horizon system</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615285/Post-Office-wrongly-used-public-funds-to-pay-for-legal-battle">Post Office wrongly used public funds to pay for legal battle</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615381/Government-announces-Green-Paper-on-future-of-scandal-ridden-Post-Office">Government announces Green Paper on future of scandal-ridden Post Office</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615494/Post-Office-scandal-not-caused-by-software-errors-says-combative-Fujitsu-boss">Post Office scandal not caused by software errors, says combative Fujitsu boss</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615655/Post-Office-requested-four-year-Horizon-extension-as-Fujitsu-boss-arrived-at-public-inquiry">Post Office requested four-year Horizon extension, as Fujitsu boss arrived at public inquiry</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615973/Post-Office-to-decide-on-Horizon-before-April-Fujitsu-board-considers-final-contract-extension">Post Office to decide on Horizon before April, Fujitsu board considers final contract extension</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615957/Post-Office-IT-boss-calls-for-subpostmasters-to-judge-him-on-his-actions">Post Office IT boss calls for subpostmasters to judge him on his actions</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615956/Post-Office-scandal-Inquirys-final-phase-exposes-dysfunction-past-and-present">Post Office scandal: Inquiry’s final phase exposes dysfunction past and present</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615867/Post-Office-is-paying-lawyers-too-much-admits-minister">Post Office is paying lawyers too much, admits minister</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616054/Subpostmasters-hit-by-Post-Office-scandal-plan-to-meet-over-nuclear-option">Subpostmasters hit by Post Office scandal plan to meet over ‘nuclear option’</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616132/Post-Office-project-taking-control-of-Horizon-data-from-Fujitsu-as-part-of-messy-split">Post Office project taking control of Horizon data from Fujitsu as part of messy split</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616292/Fujitsu-snubbed-on-private-sector-deal-with-Centrica-due-to-Post-Office-scandal-backlash">Fujitsu snubbed on private sector deal with Centrica due to Post Office scandal backlash</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Post-Office-Horizon-IT-scandal-inquiry-Two-years-of-shocking-revelations">Post Office Horizon IT scandal inquiry: Three years of shocking revelations</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616319/Government-looking-into-third-faulty-Post-Office-IT-system">Government looking into third faulty Post Office IT system</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616259/Convictions-of-Post-Office-Capture-system-users-to-be-reviewed-by-statutory-body">Convictions of Post Office Capture system users to be reviewed by statutory body</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616303/Post-Office-scandal-How-much-deeper-and-wider-can-it-get">Post Office scandal: How much deeper and wider can it get?</a></li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616357/Post-Office-scandal-redress-echoes-Windrush-compensation-problems">Post Office scandal redress echoes Windrush compensation problems</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616230/Post-Office-Capture-users-invited-to-pivotal-meeting-with-government">Post Office Capture users invited to pivotal meeting with government</a>.</li> <li>November 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616467/Fujitsus-charity-boss-made-redundant-while-Post-Office-scandal-victims-await-support">Fujitsu’s charity boss made redundant while Post Office scandal victims await support</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616872/Post-Office-Fujitsu-contract-extended-by-a-year-as-decision-time-looms">Post Office Fujitsu contract extended by a year as decision time looms</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616977/Post-Office-senior-leadership-warned-of-IT-project-data-safeguarding-risk">Post Office senior leadership warned of IT project data safeguarding risk</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616881/Controversial-Horizon-system-to-remain-in-Post-Office-branches-as-part-of-tech-fusion-says-source">Controversial Horizon system to remain in Post Office branches as part of tech ‘fusion’, says source</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617072/Police-not-ruling-any-person-or-crime-out-of-Post-Office-scandal-investigation">Police not ruling any person or crime out of Post Office scandal investigation</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617123/Post-Office-weaponised-IT-system-in-most-extensive-and-prolonged-miscarriage">Post Office ‘weaponised’ IT system in most ‘extensive and prolonged’ miscarriage</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617280/Government-promises-redress-and-justice-to-Post-Office-Capture-system-users">Government promises redress and justice to Post Office Capture system users</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617366/Post-Office-creates-CTO-role-to-support-extensive-and-complex-plans">Post Office creates CTO role to support ‘extensive and complex’ plans</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617210/Post-Office-IT-department-fired-and-rehired-friends-at-exorbitant-rates-says-former-HR-chief">Post Office IT department fired and rehired ‘friends’ at ‘exorbitant’ rates, says former HR chief</a>.</li> <li>December 2024: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617418/Post-Office-scandal-campaigners-awarded-OBEs-in-New-Year-Honours-List">Post Office scandal campaigners awarded OBEs in New Year Honours List</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617566/Sir-Alan-Bates-has-serious-concerns-over-Post-Office-scandal-compensation-budget">Sir Alan Bates has ‘serious concerns’ over Post Office scandal compensation budget</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617586/Post-Office-staff-list-14-scandal-stained-individuals-who-should-have-honours-stripped">Post Office staff list 14 scandal-stained individuals who should have honours stripped</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617800/Former-subpostmasters-invited-to-take-part-in-Post-Office-Capture-compensation-scheme-development">Former subpostmasters invited to take part in Post Office Capture compensation scheme development</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366617852/Post-Office-scandal-stained-Fujitsu-orders-staff-to-cut-costs-amid-widening-UK-losses">Post Office scandal-stained Fujitsu orders staff to cut costs amid widening UK losses</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618072/Subpostmasters-wont-get-financial-redress-until-mid-2027-at-current-rate-of-progress">Subpostmasters won’t get financial redress until mid-2027 at current rate of progress</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618206/Government-calls-for-expert-views-on-computer-evidence-to-learn-lesson-from-Post-Office-scandal">Government calls for expert views on computer evidence to learn lesson from Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>January 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618322/Review-of-legal-rule-on-computer-evidence-long-overdue-say-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Review of legal rule on computer evidence long overdue, say Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>February 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618678/Government-failed-to-provide-accurate-cost-of-Post-Office-scandal-compensation">Government failed to provide accurate cost of Post Office scandal compensation</a>.</li> <li>February 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619235/CCRC-reviewing-17-Post-Office-convictions-with-potential-Capture-software-involvement">CCRC reviewing 17 Post Office convictions with potential Capture software involvement</a>.</li> <li>February 2025:<a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619651/Positive-steps-in-redress-for-Post-Office-Capture-victims">’Positive steps’ in redress for Post Office Capture victims</a>.</li> <li>February 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619440/Fujitsus-600m-plus-prize-with-His-Majestys-cash-cow-in-2025">Fujitsu’s £600m-plus prize with His Majesty’s ‘cash cow’ in 2025</a>.</li> <li>February 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619680/Peer-demands-Fujitsu-cough-up-300m-interim-payment-towards-Post-Office-scandal-bill">Peer demands Fujitsu cough up £300m interim payment towards Post Office scandal bill</a>.</li> <li>February 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619806/Post-Office-makes-first-official-apology-to-Capture-users">Post Office makes first official apology to Capture users</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366619960/Metropolitan-Police-concern-puts-brakes-on-Post-Office-Horizon-data-migration">Metropolitan Police concern puts brakes on Post Office Horizon data migration</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620536/Government-announcement-on-Fujitsu-talks-add-vague-words-and-no-interim-payment">Government announcement on Fujitsu talks add ‘vague words’ and no interim payment</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620384/Post-Office-scandal-data-leak-interim-compensation-offers-made">Post Office scandal data leak interim compensation offers made</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620854/Minister-asks-for-evidence-of-Post-Office-ECCO-system-problems">Minister asks for evidence of Post Office ECCO+ system problems</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620988/Former-subpostmaster-to-sue-Post-Office-and-Fujitsu-for-judgment-obtained-by-fraud">Former subpostmaster to sue Post Office and Fujitsu for judgment ‘obtained by fraud’</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620910/Government-considering-redress-scheme-for-families-of-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Government considering redress scheme for families of Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621213/MPs-demand-government-reconsider-response-to-Post-Office-compensation-report">MPs demand government reconsider response to Post Office compensation report</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621280/Kroll-reviewing-Post-Office-Horizons-current-integrity-and-discrepancy-identification?_gl=1*2lgjm8*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTc0MzAwMjQ2Ny4xMy4xLjE3NDMwMDYxMzMuMC4wLjA.">Kroll reviewing Post Office Horizon’s current integrity and discrepancy identification</a>.</li> <li>March 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621762/Experts%20question%20court%E2%80%99s%20rejection%20of%20former%20Post%20Office%20manager%E2%80%99s%20Horizon%20appeal">Experts question court’s rejection of former Post Office manager’s Horizon appeal</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621786/Scottish-support-group-for-Post-Office-scandal-victims-launched">Scottish support group for Post Office scandal victims launched</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621800/Post-Office-Capture-and-ECCO-users-asked-to-make-contact-with-Scottish-statutory-body">Post Office Capture and Ecco+ users asked to make contact with Scottish statutory body</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366622017/Post-Office-cant-find-evidence-for-over-1000-Horizon-scandal-redress-claimants">Post Office can’t find evidence for over 1,000 Horizon scandal redress claimants</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366622179/Post-Office-gets-extra-136m-towards-tech-transformation-as-clock-ticks-on-Horizon?_gl=1*pgbh5m*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*MTc0NDM2MTEwNy43MS4xLjE3NDQzNjU0NzkuMC4wLjA.">Post Office gets extra £136m towards tech transformation as clock ticks on Horizon</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366622421/More-than-100-Horizon-victims-are-challenging-Post-Office-offers-on-complex-claims">More than 100 Horizon victims are challenging Post Office offers on complex claims</a>.</li> <li>April 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366623124/Fujitsu-UK-staff-will-get-bonus-despite-Post-Office-scandal-fallout">Fujitsu UK staff will get bonus despite Post Office scandal fallout</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366623342/Progress-made-on-governments-Post-Office-Capture-redress-but-concerns-remain">Progress made on government’s Post Office Capture redress, but concerns remain</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366623751/Evidence-reveals-Post-Office-scandal-victims-short-changed-in-compensation-payouts">Evidence reveals Post Office scandal victims short-changed in compensation payouts</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="http://preview.pg.techtarget.com:8080/techtarget-ecm/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=41368aed229c6910VgnVCM1000003f80a50aRCRD&vgnextchannel=006c165cad300310VgnVCM1000000d01c80aRCRD&vgnextfmt=default&appInstanceName=default&_dc=1747403318234&vgnextrefresh=1">Controversial Post Office Horizon system could stay until 2033</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366623902/Post-Office-scandal-inquiry-to-publish-first-findings-this-summer">Post Office scandal inquiry to publish first findings this summer</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366624021/Post-Office-performs-costly-30-year-U-turn-on-Horizon">Post Office performs costly 30-year U-turn on Horizon</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366624005/Botched-Post-Office-IT-projects-continue-to-drain-public-purse">Botched Post Office IT projects continue to drain public purse</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366624141/Fujitsu-raked-in-80m-from-HMRC-in-March-alone-despite-Post-Office-scandal">Fujitsu raked in £80m from HMRC in March alone, despite Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>May 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366624967/Post-Office-slammed-after-deleting-social-media-comments-on-IT-scandal">Post Office slammed after deleting social media comments on IT scandal</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366625541/Compensation-to-Post-Office-scandal-victims-reaches-1bn-milestone">Compensation to Post Office scandal victims reaches £1bn milestone</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366625793/HMRC-paid-Fujitsu-315m-last-year-but-Post-Office-scandal-suppliers-UK-business-faces-gradual-de">HMRC paid Fujitsu £310m last year, but Post Office supplier’s UK business faces gradual decline</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366626068/Government-announces-details-of-Post-Office-Capture-redress-scheme">Government announces details of Post Office Capture redress scheme</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366626318/Report-on-integrity-of-the-current-Post-Office-Horizon-system-due-in-Autumn">Report on integrity of current Post Office Horizon system due in autumn</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366626532/Wrongly-convicted-subpostmasters-may-have-to-wait-another-year-for-redress">MPs say the government has not done enough to contact all those who qualify for Post Office scandal compensation schemes</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366626756/Seven-main-suspects-under-police-investigation-in-national-Post-Office-probe">Seven main suspects under police investigation in national Post Office probe</a>.</li> <li>June 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366626737/Fujitsus-grip-on-HMRC-loosening-but-bags-of-taxpayer-cash-still-to-be-made">Fujitsu’s grip on HMRC loosening but bags of taxpayer cash still to be made</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366627174/Post-Office-inquiry-chair-cannot-rule-out-scandal-caused-13-suicides">Post Office inquiry chair ‘cannot rule out’ scandal caused 13 suicides</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366627634/Former-Post-Office-staff-in-Horizon-replacement-bid-team">Former Post Office staff in Horizon replacement bid team</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366627641/Home-Office-dumps-Fujitsu-from-IT-services-contract">Home Office dumps Fujitsu from IT services contract</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366627820/Fujitsu-outage-crashes-Post-Office-Horizon-system">Fujitsu outage crashes Post Office Horizon system</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366627933/Peer-warns-IT-suppliers-against-partnering-Fujitsu-in-government-contracts">Peer warns suppliers against partnering Fujitsu in contracts</a>.</li> <li>July 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366628045/Post-Office-will-not-compensate-subpostmasters-for-IT-outage">Post Office will not compensate subpostmasters for IT outage</a>.</li> <li>August 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366629119/Fujitsu-orders-staff-to-retain-Post-Office-related-documentation-as-it-braces-for-legal-action">Fujitsu tells all UK staff to preserve documents related to its work with the Post Office</a>.</li> <li>August 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366629672/Metropolitan-Police-contract-with-Fujitsu-is-potential-conflict-of-interest-amid-Post-Office-probe">Metropolitan Police contract with Fujitsu is ‘potential conflict of interest’ amid Post Office probe</a>.</li> <li>August 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366629917/Subpostmaster-federation-accepted-money-from-Fujitsu-in-run-up-to-High-Court-Post-Office-trial">Subpostmaster federation accepted money from Fujitsu in run-up to High Court Post Office trial</a>.</li> <li>August 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366629933/Police-investigation-into-Post-Office-scandal-to-cost-more-than-50m">Police investigation into Post Office scandal to cost more than £50m</a>.</li> <li>August 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630000/Home-Office-Fujitsu-contract-is-de-facto-conflict-of-interest-in-Post-Office-police-probe">Home Office Fujitsu contract is ‘de facto’ conflict of interest in Post Office police probe</a>.</li> <li>September 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630253/Fujitsus-roots-in-government-go-too-deep">Post Office scandal supplier’s roots in government go too deep</a>.</li> <li>September 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630262/Depression-anxiety-PTSD-and-suicidal-thoughts-Post-Office-victims-speak-out">Depression, anxiety, PTSD and suicidal thoughts: Post Office victims speak out</a>.</li> <li>September 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630443/Fujitsu-braced-for-double-digit-decline-triggered-by-foolish-display-of-legal-machismo">Internally, Fujitsu UK is braced for major revenue decline as Post Office scandal takes its toll</a>.</li> <li>September 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630772/Post-Office-Horizon-accounts-are-still-a-mess-and-replacement-system-is-years-away">Post Office Horizon accounts are still a mess and replacement system is years away</a></li> <li>September 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366631595/Post-Office-Capture-appeals-slowed-by-poor-records">Post Office Capture appeals slowed by poor records</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632434/Peer-demands-Fujitsu-pay-700m-in-interim-as-it-prepares-response-to-Post-Office-scandal-inquiry">Peer demands Fujitsu pay £700m in interim as it prepares response to Post Office scandal inquiry</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632424/Fujitsu-boss-said-Post-Office-inquiry-report-wasnt-that-bad-despite-link-to-suicides">Fujitsu boss said Post Office inquiry report wasn’t ‘that bad’, despite link to suicides</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632706/Shameless-Fujitsu-boss-confident-firm-will-be-back-in-good-books-in-18-months">Shameless Fujitsu boss confident firm will be back in ‘good books’ in 18 months</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632837/CCRC-formally-sends-Post-Office-Capture-referral-to-Court-of-Appeal">CCRC formally sends Post Office Capture referral to Court of Appeal</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633555/Government-awards-Post-Office-2m-contract-to-search-for-its-own-Capture-records">Government awards Post Office £2m contract to search for its own Capture records</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633678/Post-Office-Capture-redress-scheme-went-down-like-lead-balloon-and-is-discriminatory">Post Office Capture redress scheme ‘went down like lead balloon’ and is ‘discriminatory’</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633625/Peer-angry-as-sales-figures-suggest-Fujitsu-has-weathered-Post-Office-scandal-storm">Peer angry as sales figures suggest Fujitsu has weathered Post Office scandal storm</a>.</li> <li>October 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633589/Investigator-warns-Post-Office-inquiry-about-Horizon-defect-at-large-for-years">Post Office scandal investigator warns public inquiry about Horizon defect at large for years</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634214/Unearthed-report-reveals-source-of-Post-Offices-tenuous-Capture-sales-pitch">Unearthed report reveals source of Post Office’s tenuous Capture sales pitch</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634300/Post-Office-extends-controversial-Fujitsu-contract-in-41m-deal">Post Office extends controversial Fujitsu contract in £41m deal</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634434/Post-Office-contract-with-Fujitsu-has-option-to-extend-into-2028">Post Office contract with Fujitsu has option to extend into 2028</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634551/Fujitsu-milks-110m-from-HMRC-in-six-months-with-hardly-a-public-stir">Fujitsu milks £110m from HMRC in six months with hardly a public stir</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634756/Subpostmaster-was-told-no-jury-would-believe-Post-Office-had-dodgy-computer">Research says wrongful prosecution of subpostmasters casts doubt on ‘golden thread’ of British justice</a>.</li> <li>November 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635237/CCRC-refers-case-based-on-third-faulty-Post-Office-system">CCRC refers case based on third faulty Post Office system</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635600/Former-Post-Office-legal-boss-wont-escape-police-reach">Former Post Office legal boss won’t escape police reach</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635602/Post-Office-scandal-could-widen-to-thousands-more-branches-after-third-system-appeal">Post Office scandal could widen to thousands more branches after third system appeal</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635620/Post-Office-finally-investigates-Horizon-defect-but-investigator-slams-comms-strategy">Subpostmaster and investigator met the Post Office over Horizon defect raised six years earlier</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635582/Post-Office-avoids-1m-fine-over-botched-website-upgrade-data-breach">Post Office avoids £1m fine over botched website upgrade data breach</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366635668/Fujitsu-police-contract-complicates-Post-Office-investigation">Fujitsu police contract ‘complicates’ Post Office investigation</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636272/Fujitsu-underestimated-Post-Office-scandal-backlash">Fujitsu underestimated Post Office scandal backlash</a>.</li> <li>December 2025: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636563/Post-Office-six-years-late-to-warn-subpostmasters-about-Horizon-defect?_gl=1*49p5gt*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*czE3Njc2MDc5NjMkbzU2JGcxJHQxNzY3NjA4MDU1JGozNCRsMCRoMA..">Post Office six years late to warn subpostmasters about Horizon defect</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636802/Fujitsu-boss-has-been-a-Post-Office-scandal-bystander-for-over-a-decade">Fujitsu boss has been a Post Office scandal bystander for over a decade</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636770/Former-Fujitsu-IT-support-team-were-legalised-hackers">Fujitsu Post Office IT support team were ‘legalised hackers’</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636911/CCRC-says-multiple-Post-Office-software-systems-potentially-implicated-in-miscarriages-of-justice?_gl=1*fusf1s*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*czE3NjgyOTcxNTUkbzg2JGcxJHQxNzY4Mjk4OTE4JGo0NyRsMCRoMA..">CCRC says multiple Post Office software systems potentially implicated in miscarriages of justice</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366637292/Post-Office-scandals-oldest-victim-calls-for-total-ban-on-Fujitsu">Post Office scandal’s oldest victim calls for total ban on Fujitsu</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366637471/DWP-review-of-Post-Office-worker-prosecutions-yet-to-start-months-after-announcement">The DWP said in August that it would carry out an independent review of prosecutions of subpostmasters, but it has yet to appoint a reviewer</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366637646/Peer-demands-independent-investigation-into-DWPs-prosecution-of-subpostmasters">Peer demands independent investigation into DWP’s prosecution of subpostmasters</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366637835/Fujitsu-boss-falls-on-his-sword-before-settling-with-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Fujitsu boss ‘falls on his sword’ before settling with Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638192/Sir-Alan-Bates-slams-nonsense-reported-about-his-financial-redress-settlement">Sir Alan Bates slams ‘nonsense’ reported about his financial redress settlement</a>.</li> <li>January 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638232/History-repeats-itself-in-Post-Office-Capture-redress-scheme-with-low-ball-offers-made">History repeats itself in Post Office Capture redress scheme with low-ball offers made</a>.</li> <li>February 2026 <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638847/Minister-responds-to-criticism-of-Post-Office-Capture-redress-scheme">Minister responds to criticism of Post Office Capture redress scheme</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638999/Fujitsu-will-be-out-by-summer-2027-says-Post-Office-CTO">Fujitsu will be out by next summer, says Post Office CTO</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639018/Peer-disappointed-that-DWP-review-of-subpostmaster-prosecutions-is-still-months-away">Peer ‘disappointed’ that DWP review of subpostmaster prosecutions is still months away</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639155/UK-government-risks-perpetuating-Post-Office-injustice-through-response-to-Capture-appeals">UK government risks ‘perpetuating’ Post Office injustice through response to Capture appeals</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639049/Eradicating-Fujitsu-and-Horizon-from-the-Post-Office-step-by-step">Eradicating Fujitsu and Horizon from the Post Office, step by step</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639272/Minister-wants-logical-conclusion-to-review-of-digital-evidence-in-light-of-Post-office-scandal">Minister wants ‘logical conclusion’ to review of digital evidence in light of Post Office scandal</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638929/Email-from-1999-reveals-Post-Office-ECCO-system-crash-problems">Email from 1999 reveals Post Office ECCO+ system crash problems</a>.</li> <li>February 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639388/Government-commits-483m-to-Post-Office-for-IT-transformation">UK government commits £483m to Post Office for IT transformation</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639757/Scandal-victim-gets-leave-to-appeal-decision-to-split-case-against-Post-Office-and-Fujitsu">Scandal victim gets leave to appeal decision to split case against Post Office and Fujitsu</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639859/IBM-takes-a-second-shot-at-Post-Office-contract-to-replace-Horizon">IBM takes a second shot at Post Office contract to replace Horizon</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639931/MP-report-calls-for-legislation-to-overturn-Post-Office-Capture-convictions?_gl=1*nijjqa*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*czE3NzM5MTk2MTMkbzI5MyRnMSR0MTc3MzkyMDk0MSRqMiRsMCRoMA..">MP report calls for legislation to overturn Post Office Capture convictions</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640326/Government-announces-redress-scheme-for-families-of-Post-Office-scandal-victims">Government announces redress scheme for families of Post Office scandal victims</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640615/DWP-finally-seeks-reviewer-of-its-subpostmaster-prosecutions?_gl=1*rbhnnc*_ga*MTEwNzM2MTI5My4xNzQyODE4ODQ3*_ga_TQKE4GS5P9*czE3NzQ1MTkwMTkkbzMxNiRnMSR0MTc3NDUyMjMyNCRqNjAkbDAkaDA.">DWP finally seeks reviewer of its subpostmaster prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640853/Post-Office-still-cant-find-evidence-for-1400-scandal-redress-claimants-while-people-die-waiting">Post Office still can’t find evidence for 1,400 scandal redress claimants, while people die waiting</a>.</li> <li>March 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Second%20Post%20Office%20Capture%20System%20Conviction%20Referred%20to%20Court%20of%20Appeal.%20Steve%20Marston%E2%80%99s%20reaction%20this%20morning%20:%22It%20feels%20like%20a%20massive%20weight%20has%20been%20lifted.%20Obviously%20this%20is%20a%20massive%20step%20forward,%20but%20there's%20still%20a%20hell%20of%20a%20long%20way%20to%20go%20yet.%22%20https:/www.computerweekly.com/news/366640609/Second-Post-Office-Capture-conviction-referred-to-appeal-court">Second Post Office Capture conviction referred to appeal court</a>.</li> <li>April 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641092/Post-Office-scandal-supplier-Fujitsu-to-cut-nearly-10-of-UK-workforce">Post Office scandal supplier Fujitsu to cut nearly 10% of UK workforce</a>.</li> <li>April 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641017/Fujitsu-injects-another-80m-into-UK-arm-amid-Post-Office-Scandal-fallout">Fujitsu injects another £80m into UK arm amid Post Office scandal fallout</a>.</li> <li>April 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641051/Keir-Starmer-was-warned-about-Post-Office-prosecution-practices-as-director-of-public-prosecutions">Keir Starmer was warned about Post Office prosecution practices as director of public prosecutions</a>.</li> <li>April 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641747/Platitudes-hide-struggle-as-Post-Office-scandal-redress-scheme-closing-date-announced">‘Platitudes’ hide struggle as Post Office scandal redress scheme closing date announced</a>.</li> <li>April 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642366/Court-of-Appeal-rejects-Post-Office-Capture-case-delay-request">Court of Appeal rejects Post Office Capture case delay request</a>.</li> <li>May 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642657/Post-Office-acknowledges-ECCO-users-calls-for-help-three-decades-ago">Post Office acknowledges ECCO+ user’s calls for help three decades ago</a>.</li> <li>May 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642879/Fujitsu-UK-pays-staff-bonuses-as-it-sits-on-Post-Office-scandal-contribution">Fujitsu UK pays staff bonuses as it sits on Post Office scandal contribution</a>.</li> <li>May 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642986/Accenture-joins-IBM-in-battle-for-323m-Post-Office-Horizon-deal">Accenture joins IBM in battle for £323m Post Office Horizon deal</a>.</li> <li>May 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642891/Post-Office-to-contest-Capture-conviction-appeal-despite-chairman-support-for-overturning-en-masse">Post Office to contest Capture conviction appeal despite chairman support for overturning en masse</a>.</li> <li>May 2026: <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643102/Post-Office-chair-defends-inappropriate-and-harmful-position-on-Capture-appeals">Post Office chair defends ‘inappropriate and harmful’ position on Capture appeals</a>.</li> </ul> <ul type="square" class="default-list"></ul> </div> </div> </section> In an ongoing exchange of letters, compensation advisory board attacks controversial decision to contest appeals against pre-Horizon convictions https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/Post-Office-sign-on-post-box-Sinan-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642931/Post-Office-objection-to-Capture-appeals-is-inexplicable-and-unconscionable Mon, 18 May 2026 09:32:00 GMT Post Office objection to Capture appeals is ‘inexplicable and unconscionable’ <p>A flagship project that promises to revolutionise the way the public interacts with UK government services is now available. It can only be accessed via the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614730/Government-to-roll-out-Govuk-Forms-across-its-websites">Gov.uk app</a>, however, which means people will need to use a relatively modern iPhone, iPad or Android device. There are also known compatibility issues that may affect users who rely on assistive technology.</p> <p>The artificial intelligence (AI) tool, called Gov.uk Chat, aims to tackle government inefficiency by offering people a chatbot through a dedicated smartphone app, rather than waiting to speak to a call handler. In January, the <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/state-of-digital-government-review/state-of-digital-government-review"><em>State of digital government review</em></a> reported that HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) handles approximately 100,000 calls each day, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) processes around 45,000 letters daily, and the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) still manages more than 500 paper form-based services.</p> <p>The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) said Gov.uk Chat draws on tens of thousands of pages of guidance from UK government public websites and has been designed to help people find answers to questions often buried in government websites. DSIT said early trials have shown demand is strongest around tax, driving and transport, and benefits.</p> <p>It can also be used in business. For instance, it can help sole traders understand their tax obligations, guide entrepreneurs in setting up a new company, or point small business owners to relevant grants and support. DSIT said Gov.uk Chat provides fast, reliable answers drawn from across UK government websites, thereby helping businesses to spend less time navigating government and more time focused on growth.</p> <p>Commenting on the launch, technology secretary Liz Kendall said: “Modernising our digital services is central to building a government that works for everyone. For too long, navigating government has felt like a full-time job.</p> <p>“Whether you’re a parent trying to find out what childcare you’re entitled to, a first-time buyer working out which schemes you can access, or someone approaching retirement, you shouldn’t have to spend time trawling through hundreds of web pages to get a straight answer. Gov.uk Chat changes that – putting clear, reliable information in people’s hands in seconds, at any time of day.”</p> <p>Gov.uk Chat is built into the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/blog/Computer-Weekly-Editors-Blog/Why-the-Govuk-App-could-maybe-possibly-be-a-turning-point-for-digital-government">Gov.uk app</a>, which was launched last year. This can be installed on iPhones with iOS 16 or above, which means people need an iOS device from 2022 onwards – the oldest supported iOS devices are the iPhone 8 and the 5th-generation iPad. For Android users, the Gov.uk app requires Android 10 or later, which means smartphones from 2019 are supported. However, version 10 of the Android operating system reached end of life in March 2023, which is when Google stopped releasing official security updates.</p> <p>The <a href="https://www.gov.uk/guidance/accessibility-statement-for-the-govuk-app">March 2026 accessibility statement</a> from the government regarding the Gov.uk app recognises limitations in usability. For iOS users, it is not possible to use Assistive Touch and iOS Reachability mode at the same time in the Gov.uk app. There are also parts of the app that cannot be easily navigated with an external keyboard, preventing some users from accessing all content or selecting links.</p> <p>For Android, along with some difficulties relating to screen navigation, in Gov.uk Chat conversations, users cannot select individual links within Chat’s responses when navigating with an external keyboard. Another issue is that when Gov.uk Chat gives very long responses, the screen does not automatically scroll to show the specific content currently being read or highlighted.</p> <p>The government said it has been been working closely with an accessibility agency which has completed an independent Web Content Accessibility Guidelines audit and disabled user testing on the app, including Chat. “We have made improvements to usability and accessibility and will be updating the app accessibility statement in line with that continuing work,” a spokesperson said. The government said the current accessibility issues relating to VoiceOver on iOS and the automatic scrolling of long conversations on Android devices, have now been resolved.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about Gov.uk</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632768/Govuk-One-Login-live-with-digital-Veterans-Cards">Gov.uk One Login</a> live with digital Veteran Card: The digital version of the Veteran Card is the first government-issued document available in the Gov.uk One Login app, allowing veterans to use their smartphone to access discounts and services.</li> <li>Security tests reveal serious vulnerability in government’s <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366623991/Security-tests-reveal-serious-vulnerability-in-governments-One-Login-digital-ID-system">One Login digital ID system</a>: A ‘red teaming’ exercise to simulate cyber attacks on the government’s flagship digital identity system has found that One Login can be compromised without detection.</li> </ul> </div> </div> Chatbot functionality in the Gov.uk app now provides citizens and businesses with a natural language interface across government online services in the UK https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/London-Westminster-Houses-of-Parliament-exflow-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643041/Govuk-chatbot-makes-government-services-faster-to-access Thu, 14 May 2026 17:30:00 GMT Gov.uk chatbot makes government services faster to access <p>Bradford is to be the site of one of the UK’s first projects to reuse waste heat from a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Data-Centre">datacentre</a>, after operator <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366566397/Octopus-Energy-invests-200m-in-datacentre-heat-reuse-startup-Deep-Green">Deep Green</a> this week gained planning consent for a 5.6MW facility. The datacentre will be built next to and integrate with heat generation at the under-construction Bradford Energy Centre.</p> <p>The site – near the junction of Listerhills Road and Thornton Road – aims to provide <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639995/Enormous-AI-growth-zone-datacentre-gets-planning-approval">artificial intelligence (AI)-capable datacentre resources</a>, which are estimated to come on stream around the end of 2028, after a 24-month construction period.</p> <p>Instead of venting heat drawn away from computer equipment into the atmosphere, the Deep Green datacentre will transfer excess heat into the Bradford Energy Network and make it available to buildings in the area. </p> <p>The datacentre will use a closed-loop cooling system, which practically eliminates water wastage, and will enable the transfer of heat for further use. </p> <p>Deep Green hopes the Bradford site will provide high-density colocation capacity for universities, public sector bodies and businesses that want to run AI inference and data-intensive workloads.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> The UK needs more datacentres. But it does not need more waste. Our model is simple – use the electrons twice. First to power AI and high-performance computing. Then to heat homes and buildings </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Mark Lee, Deep Green</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>Reuse of heat from datacentres has made little progress in the UK. Elsewhere, Deep Green has a datacentre project in Greater Manchester that will provide heat for a nearby swimming pool. Meanwhile, in London, Vantage Data Centres has a project underway where datacentre heat could be used to warm up to 25,000 homes.</p> <p>Mark Lee, chief executive of Deep Green, said: “The UK needs more datacentres. But it does not need more waste. Our model is simple – use the electrons twice. First to power AI and high-performance computing. Then to heat homes and buildings.”</p> <p>Datacentres produce heat to practically the same level as they consume electricity for compute. So, for every megawatt expended on compute, that amount of heat is produced. In the not-too-distant future, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639658/Huge-grid-and-heat-challenges-ahead-as-Nvidia-set-for-1MW-rack">AI racks of 1MW each</a> – achievable by 2028, according to Nvidia’s roadmap – will produce the equivalent heat of 200 electric ovens. </p> <p>But there are challenges to using that heat. A major one is that the temperature of cooling water coming out of datacentre racks is not very hot in the power generation scheme of things. For that reason, it is not possible to generate electricity from it, so it can only really be used for a local heating scheme.</p> <p>There are almost none of these in the UK, so there is nothing for a datacentre that wants to reuse heat to link up to. </p> <p>The Bradford Energy Scheme is an exception. It is a large-scale heat pump with underground pipes that transport heat across the city, which were laid ahead of the recent pedestrianisation of Bradford city centre. They link to university and college buildings and Bradford City Hall, with the option for others in the city centre to connect in the coming years. </p> <p>Tracy Brabin, mayor of West Yorkshire, said: “Deep Green’s pioneering approach will power our businesses, heat our communities, support the creation of good jobs and help us meet our net-zero ambitions. As the UK’s youngest city and its leading producer of applied AI postgraduates, Bradford is perfectly placed to harness this opportunity and help us innovate to build a stronger, better off West Yorkshire.”</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about datacentres</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640447/Hit-the-north-UK-datacentre-focus-shifts-to-M62-and-points-north">UK datacentre focus shifts to M62 and points north</a>: Barbour ABI data shows 8GW of total datacentre pipeline with most big projects in the north and Scotland, while London and the M4 corridor are about 25% of projected capacity.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640935/Data-dive-Government-2030-datacentre-capacity-targets-look-shaky">Data dive – UK government’s 2030 datacentre capacity targets look shaky</a>. We look at UK datacentre capacity – current and projected – and find DSIT’s 2030 target for 6GW of AI-capable capacity is currently out of reach, unless operators get a move on.</li> </ul> </div> </div> Deep Green’s 5.6MW AI datacentre will take 24 months to build and will link up to an energy centre to heat buildings across Bradford city centre via pre-laid pipes https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/Bradford-Energy-Centre-CREDIT-LDRS-Norr-hero.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643098/Bradford-datacentre-with-heat-reuse-gains-planning-consent Thu, 14 May 2026 09:31:00 GMT Bradford datacentre with heat reuse gains planning consent <p><i>Inside FDP is an exclusive series of articles written by the former deputy director of data engineering at NHS England, Tom Bartlett, who led the 150-person team that built the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">Federated Data Platform</a> (FDP), the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">controversial Palantir-supplied system</a> linking data across the health and care service. </i></p> <p><i>This is the third in a five-part series on what FDP is for. Parts 1 and 2 defined <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-1-Understanding-the-problems-facing-NHS-data">the eight problems</a>, the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-2-Delivering-on-the-NHS-vision-for-data">seven Frontline-First dimensions</a>, and how FDP delivers them. This article describes the specific features of Palantir's Foundry, the commercial software platform on which FDP is built, that make those dimensions technically possible.</i></p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What the best NHS data platforms have in common"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What the best NHS data platforms have in common</h2> <p>The <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">NHS data community</a> includes people who have built genuinely sophisticated platforms: linked datasets spanning acute, primary, mental health, and community care; population-level risk stratification; near-real-time dashboards used 24 hours a day in system control centres; embedded analytics inside clinical systems; write-back capabilities pushing data into GP records.</p> <p>These are not trivial achievements. They represent years of work by some of the most capable data professionals in the country.</p> <p>But even the best of these platforms share a common architecture - the data lives in a warehouse, the descriptions live somewhere else (in a catalogue, a wiki, or a developer's head), and the applications that capture or display the data live somewhere else again. Three separate things, connected through extracts, feeds, and bespoke integrations that the team maintains by hand.</p> <p>The analytical tools sit alongside the clinical systems, not inside the operational workflow - the clinician works in one place and the data team works in another. The two are connected, sometimes impressively, but the data, the tools, and the actions still live in separate places. A Frontline-First approach requires them to be in the same place.</p> <p>This article is about an architectural choice that collapses that separation. It is not about whether existing platforms work. Many of them do, within their scope. It is about what becomes possible when the data, the description, the application, and the action all live in the same place.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What Palantir means by 'ontology'"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What Palantir means by 'ontology'</h2> <p>The word "ontology" has become a source of confusion in the FDP conversation because it means different things to different communities.</p> <p>In computer science and knowledge engineering, an ontology is a formal specification of what things exist in a domain, what properties they have, and how they relate to each other. It is a rigorous discipline with its own standards, including OWL (Web Ontology Language) and RDF (Resource Description Framework). It is not what <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366560657/Palantir-awarded-NHS-FDP-data-contract">the supplier of the FDP platform, Palantir</a>, means by the word.</p> <p>In Palantir’s Foundry software the ontology is something different. It is the operational layer of the platform where real-world concepts are represented as digital things that users interact with directly. It holds the data, hosts the applications, enforces access controls, and supports actions that change the state of the things it represents. It is closer to a living operational workspace than to a formal knowledge representation framework.</p> <p>The double usage causes confusion in almost every conversation I have about FDP. Data architects hear "ontology" and think of formal knowledge engineering. Palantir engineers hear "ontology" and think of the operational layer their applications run on. Both are legitimate uses of the word – but they describe fundamentally different things.</p> <p>For the rest of this article I am using the Palantir meaning - the ontology as the operational workspace, not the ontology as a formal logical framework for knowledge representation.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Object types: the building blocks"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Object types: the building blocks</h2> <p>The foundation of Foundry's ontology is the object type. An object type is Foundry's way of representing a real-world concept that the NHS manages - a patient, a referral, a theatre session, a ward bed, a consultant, a waiting list entry, an appointment.</p> <p>Each object type does two things that a traditional database table does not.</p> <p>First, it holds both the data and its description in the same place. A theatre session object type does not just contain a row of values. It contains the definition of what a theatre session is, what its properties mean, how they relate to other concepts, and who is allowed to see or change them. The description travels with the data rather than sitting in a separate catalogue that nobody maintains.</p> <p>Second, object types are connected to each other through link types, which are defined relationships that the platform maintains and resolves automatically.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> 'Actions' are the mechanism by which FDP applications capture new data at the point of care, not just present data that was captured somewhere else </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>In a relational database, the relationship between a theatre session and a patient exists as a foreign key. How that relationship gets resolved depends on what you are trying to do.</p> <p>If you are an analyst running a query across all theatre sessions and all patients, the database engine performs an SQL JOIN, scanning both tables to find the matches. If you are a clinician looking up a single patient's theatre session, the system retrieves the linked record directly.</p> <p>These are fundamentally different workloads, and traditional architectures handle them with fundamentally different systems: an OLTP system, such as an <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Electronic-health-records-are-still-creating-issues-for-patients">electronic patient record (EPR)</a>, for the clinician's individual lookup; and an OLAP system, such as a data warehouse, for the analyst's cross-population query. Data flows from the first to the second through overnight extracts and batch pipelines, and the two never share a live view.</p> <p>Foundry's ontology resolves both queries from the same data. When a clinician views a theatre session, the platform performs what Palantir calls a "search-around" - starting from a single object and navigating its defined links to the patient, the consultant's schedule, the recovery bed status. This is operationally instant, like an OLTP lookup, but it draws on a data estate that spans domains no single operational system covers.</p> <p>When an analyst needs to query across all theatre sessions Trust-wide, they work with what Foundry calls an "Object Set" - a filtered, aggregated view across a population of objects that supports grouping, counting, summing, and segmenting in the same way an analyst would query a warehouse, but running against the same live data the clinician is viewing.</p> <p>The links and the aggregations always reflect the current state, so neither the clinician's individual view nor the analyst's population-level view is stale, and neither required extracting data from one system into another.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Actions: the part that changes everything"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Actions: the part that changes everything</h2> <p>Object types that store data with descriptions and link to each other are valuable. A well-designed data warehouse with a good catalogue and a good data model can approximate the descriptive part - governed definitions, documented relationships, consistent naming.</p> <p>What it cannot approximate is the live, navigable links between objects that users traverse in real time, or the dual-mode querying described above. To get that from a warehouse, you have to build an application layer on top of it, and at that point you are no longer comparing like with like.</p> <p>What a warehouse cannot do at all is host actions.</p> <p>An action in Foundry is a defined operation that a user can perform on an object type – for example: accept a referral; cancel a theatre session; discharge a patient; assign a recovery bed; escalate to a consultant.</p> <p>Actions are not just buttons on a screen. They are transactions defined in the ontology itself, with validation rules, access controls, and audit trails built in. When a user performs an action, the action updates the relevant object types and all the linked relationships update with them.</p> <p>This is the feature that makes FDP an operational platform rather than an analytical one. It is also what makes the Frontline-First approach possible, because actions are the mechanism by which FDP applications capture new data at the point of care, not just present data that was captured somewhere else.</p> <p>Consider what happens when a theatre session needs to be cancelled. In a typical Trust today, the scheduler cancels the session in whatever system the Trust uses for theatre management. That information then has to reach other systems: the waiting list, the bed management view, the operational dashboard. Depending on how those systems are connected, that might take hours, or it might happen overnight through a batch extract. In the meantime, a waiting list manager may reassign the slot or contact a patient based on information that is already wrong, because the cancellation has not reached them yet.</p> <p>In the ontology, the scheduler performs a "cancel theatre session" action. The action updates the theatre session object type, and because the theatre session is linked to the waiting list entry, the patient, the consultant, and the recovery bed, every linked concept reflects the cancellation immediately - the waiting list manager, the analyst, and the COO's dashboard all see the change at the same time. There is no overnight feed, no delay, and no reconciliation.</p> <p>For analysts who need frozen reporting for board papers or national submissions, the platform also supports submission snapshots that lock the state at the end of a reporting period - the live view and the frozen view coexist.</p> <p>Now consider something more important. A discharge coordinator uses an FDP application to manage the discharge pathway. They perform actions such as "confirm transport arranged"; "confirm pharmacy complete"; "confirm social care package in place". Each action creates new data on the platform, data that did not exist in any source system because no source system tracks the discharge pathway at this level of detail. The coordinator's spreadsheet used to hold this information. Now the FDP application holds it, with an audit trail, with access controls, and with live links to the patient, the ward, the bed state and the analytics layer above.</p> <p>Actions can also trigger automated responses: a notification to the community team that the patient is ready; an API call to the transport booking system; an alert to the ward manager that a bed will be free. The platform supports scheduled and event-driven automation, which means actions do not always require a human to trigger them - a rule that fires automatically when a patient meets discharge criteria and initiates the coordination workflow is a different proposition from a coordinator clicking a button.</p> <p>This is the point that most critics of FDP miss. They compare it to warehouses and dashboards because they are thinking about platforms that present existing data. FDP applications capture new data through actions, and that new data sits on the same platform as everything else. The discharge coordinator's "confirm transport arranged" action is as much a part of the patient record as the admission that came from the EPR. The secondary uses - such as, how many discharges were delayed by transport nationally - and the primary use - is this patient ready to go home today - are happening on the same data, on the same platform, in the same session.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The logic layer: an area to watch"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The logic layer: an area to watch</h2> <p>There is a further capability in the ontology that FDP has not yet fully exploited in the NHS context but which has significant potential.</p> <p>Palantir's description of its architecture identifies four components: data, logic, action, and security.</p> <p>The logic layer is the set of business rules, algorithms, forecast models, optimisation models, and clinical pathways that sit between data and action. In a discharge pathway, the logic might determine which actions are prompted at which stage. In theatre scheduling, it might incorporate a capacity model that optimises slot allocation across surgeons and specialties. In population health, it might run segmentation algorithms that identify patients at risk of deterioration.</p> <p>The logic layer allows these rules and models to be connected into the ontology alongside the data and the actions, so that AI agents and human users can draw on the same reasoning when making decisions. This is largely unexplored territory in the current FDP product set, but it is where some of the most significant operational value may sit in the years ahead.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What AIP adds to the platform"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What AIP adds to the platform</h2> <p>The Artificial Intelligence Platform (AIP) adds two capabilities that change what the platform can do.</p> <p>The first is making analytics accessible without the traditional route through an analyst. <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-2-Delivering-on-the-NHS-vision-for-data">Part 2 of this series of articles</a> described the app called Ask FDP and its potential to change the culture of data use in Trusts. The technical reason it works is that the large language model (LLM) is grounded in the Trust's own data through the ontology, with the same access controls and audit trail that apply to every other interaction with the platform.</p> <p>This is not a chatbot bolted onto a database. It is an AI capability that understands the relationships between object types and can traverse the ontology to answer questions that would otherwise require a skilled analyst and an SQL query.</p> <p>The second capability is AI-FDE, or AI Forward Deployed Engineer, which provides an AI-assisted development environment powered by the latest LLMs. For professional engineers, AI-FDE accelerates their work - it can generate React applications, ontology configurations, Python scripts, and any other deliverable an engineer would normally produce by hand. For clinicians and operational staff with no engineering background, it lowers the technical barrier to entry dramatically. A discharge coordinator can describe the workflow they need and AI-FDE translates that into a working application on the platform. AI-FDE also works with Foundry's no-code features, including Workshop for building interactive applications visually, and Pipeline Builder for building data transformations without writing code.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> This is not a chatbot bolted onto a database. It is an AI capability that understands the relationships between object types and can answer questions that would otherwise require a skilled analyst and an SQL query </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>This is the mechanism by which a Frontline-First approach scales beyond what a central development team can deliver. The Build with FDP event described in Part 2 saw clinical and operational staff building working applications in two days. The paramedic, the ward clerk, the discharge coordinator all have knowledge of their workflows that no nationally commissioned product can capture. AI-FDE lets them contribute that knowledge directly rather than waiting for someone else to build it for them.</p> <p>There is also a longer-term opportunity in using AI to convert unstructured data into structured, actionable insight. <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636205/Interview-Erik-Mayer-transformation-chief-clinical-information-officer-Imperial-College">Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust</a> developed a natural language processing tool that analyses free-text patient feedback comments, detecting sentiment and theming responses in minutes rather than days. The tool has since been adopted by nine NHS Trusts. The free text problem <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-1-Understanding-the-problems-facing-NHS-data">described in Part 1</a> – such as, DIALOG scores buried in progress notes, discharge letters sitting as inaccessible PDFs - is the same class of problem, and AIP on the ontology makes this kind of work architecturally simpler because the grounding, access controls, and audit trail are already in place.</p> <p>A team building AI features on a freely engineered stack has to integrate the LLM externally, manage grounding manually, build audit trails separately, and worry about clinical data leaving the platform. The clinical coding AI assistant that came runner-up at Build with FDP is the AIP pattern - a small team built a clinically useful AI tool in two days because the platform already handled the plumbing underneath it.</p> <p>The platform is also evolving toward autonomous agents that can orchestrate workflows across multiple steps, not just answer questions or build applications - an agent that monitors a ward's discharge readiness, identifies patients who meet criteria, and initiates the coordination workflow represents the next generation of what Frontline-First could deliver.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Why the orthodox data stack cannot do this"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Why the orthodox data stack cannot do this</h2> <p>Anyone with a technical background will be asking why the orthodox data stack cannot replicate what the earlier sections described. The short answer is that Foundry collapses architectural separations that the orthodox stack treats as fundamental.</p> <p>The standard enterprise data architecture separates the systems where things happen from the systems where things are measured.</p> <p>The EPR is an example of the first type - an Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) system that records clinical events in real time, optimised for fast writes and looking up individual records.</p> <p>The data warehouse is an example of the second - an Online Analytical Processing (OLAP) system that aggregates historical data, optimised for complex queries across large datasets.</p> <p>In simpler terms, the app the clinician uses and the database the analyst queries are built on different technology for different purposes. Data flows from one to the other through overnight extracts and batch pipelines. This separation exists because the two workloads have different performance characteristics and historically could not be served by the same infrastructure.</p> <p>Foundry's Object Storage V2 challenges this separation. It is built on a different architectural principle - data is indexed into specialised object databases through an orchestration layer (the Object Data Funnel), with indexing and querying decoupled into separate subsystems that scale horizontally.</p> <p>The architecture is closer to an inverted index search engine than to a traditional relational database. It can serve both operational queries - give me this patient's current state, with all linked objects and available actions - and analytical queries - show me all patients across this Trust matching these criteria, aggregated by specialty - from the same data store, without extracting data from one system to another.</p> <p>The difference is structural. A traditional warehouse join scans two full tables to find matches across all rows, but the ontology's search-around navigates from a single object to its linked objects, which is how a clinician thinks – “show me everything connected to this patient” - rather than how an analyst thinks – “show me all patients matching these criteria”.</p> <p>The ontology supports both modes from the same data. This is what allows it to be both an operational workspace and an analytical platform simultaneously - a genuinely new concept for most NHS data professionals, and the reason FDP does not fit neatly into the categories people try to put it in. The ontology also supports media references, which means documents such as discharge letters and clinical images can be attached to objects as properties and accessed alongside the structured data.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about the NHS Federated Data Platform</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">Health workers call for Palantir to be booted from NHS contracts</a> - Health justice charity Medact warns that Palantir’s involvement in NHS data systems is a threat to patients and healthcare organisations.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">NHS chief data officers concerned by FDP roll-out</a> - The Chief Data and Analytical Officers Network has raised concerns over the way the NHS Federated Data Platform is being implemented and NHS England’s approach to its adoption.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616320/NHS-Federated-Data-Platform-celebrates-first-birthday">NHS Federated Data Platform celebrates first birthday</a> - In its first year, more than 100 NHS organisations have signed up to the controversial platform, aiming to bring together data from different IT systems.</li> </ul> </div> </div> <p>Consider what it takes to build an equivalent operational capability on Azure. To create a discharge coordination product that captures new data at the point of care, you would need to wire together Azure Functions for the business logic, Cosmos DB or SQL for the data store, a custom API layer for the front-end application, Azure AD for authentication, a separate audit logging pipeline, and a manually maintained schema that describes what the data means.</p> <p>Each component is mature and well-documented. But the integration is bespoke engineering for every product, and the semantic description of the data - what a referral means, how it relates to a patient, what actions are available on it - lives in your application code and your documentation, not in the data layer.</p> <p>On Foundry, actions are defined in the ontology itself - the validation rules, access controls, audit trail, and linked object updates are handled by the platform. The semantic description travels with the data.</p> <p>This has a direct consequence for AI. When AIP queries the ontology, it already knows what a referral is, how it relates to a patient, what properties it has, and what actions can be performed on it, because the semantics are embedded in the same layer as the data.</p> <p>To achieve something comparable with Azure and Copilot, you would need to build a retrieval augmented generation (RAG) pipeline -extracting the data, writing grounding instructions that explain the schema and its meaning, managing the context window, and maintaining those instructions every time the data model changes. The semantics and the data live in separate places, maintained separately, and they can drift apart. On Foundry, they cannot, because they are the same thing.</p> <p>Azure, Databricks and all the other reporting-first platforms are excellent at what they were designed to do. But they were designed within the orthodox OLTP/OLAP separation. Foundry was designed to collapse it. That is the architectural choice that makes the Frontline-First approach possible, and it is the reason I argue that FDP is not just another data warehouse with better marketing.</p> <p>It is worth noting that the rest of the industry is moving in this direction, which validates the principle even if the implementations differ.</p> <p>Microsoft launched Fabric IQ in late 2025, which introduces an ontology layer with entity types, relationships, and AI grounding through a unified semantic layer. Databricks has extended Unity Catalog with business semantics and AI agents. Both are building semantic layers that bring data and meaning closer together, and Gartner now treats universal semantic layers as critical infrastructure.</p> <p>But neither yet offers what Foundry has in production - defined actions that create new data through transactions in the ontology, with validation rules, access controls, audit trails, and linked object updates handled by the platform. The semantic layer is necessary but not sufficient for Frontline-First - without actions, you have a smarter way to understand data, not a platform that captures it at the point of care. That is the gap the competitors have not yet closed, and Foundry has been in production with it for over a decade.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="How this works across organisational boundaries"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>How this works across organisational boundaries</h2> <p>The architecture described so far operates within a single Trust's FDP instance. But the Frontline-First approach requires data to connect across Trusts and care settings. The mental health patient who attends A&E at the acute Trust needs their community mental health data to be visible and actionable through the same platform.</p> <p>Foundry achieves this through shared spaces.</p> <p>Each Trust has its own private space with its own ontology. When two or more Trusts want to collaborate across organisational boundaries, they create a shared space with a shared ontology. Each organisation controls which data it shares - the shared space provides the common ground where cross-organisational products operate.</p> <p>One NHS Trust Group has already done this in production - they created a shared space across two Trusts, with a single cross-Trust patient tracking list that is live, with no issues of lag or latency. They are in the process of re-platforming all their core products into the shared space so that across both Trusts they run a single theatres product, a single Optica, and a single set of operational products, backed by permissions that control whether users see one organisation's data or both. Additional workflow features handle the practical realities, such as ensuring patients are not booked into the wrong site.</p> <p>This is not a central hub pulling data from the periphery. It is a peer-to-peer collaboration model where each Trust retains control of its own data and the shared space provides the integration layer. The shared ontology ensures that the data model is consistent across both organisations, so a product built in the shared space works for both Trusts without separate configuration. This is the architectural mechanism that makes the cross-setting collaboration dimension from Part 2 possible at scale.</p> <p>None of this removes the practical challenge of integrating Foundry with the existing Trust application estate. Getting data in and out of the platform, connecting to EPRs and the dozens of other systems a Trust runs, is an area the programme is actively working on and one where the experience of early adopters will be critical.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Can EPR implementation solve the same problems?"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Can EPR implementation solve the same problems?</h2> <p>One concern raised by senior digital leaders is that the problems described in Part 1 are not architectural failures requiring a new platform, but implementation failures that better EPR deployment would solve. There is some truth in this.</p> <p>Implementation quality matters enormously, and the same EPR system can be well or badly implemented. But even a perfectly implemented EPR cannot make a tool built in one Trust available to every other Trust without rebuilding it. EPR convergence programmes can link data across organisational boundaries within their footprint, but this is limited to Trusts that have adopted the same system and does not extend nationally. It cannot enforce semantic consistency across 220 Trusts running different EPR systems with different configurations.</p> <p>And while some EPR suppliers are extending into operational territory with their own features for discharge tracking, bed management, and clinical coordination, these capabilities remain local to each Trust's implementation and are not portable across the 220 Trusts running different EPR systems with different configurations.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> FDP does not replace the EPR. What it does is provide a layer alongside it where operational products can capture data that the EPR was never designed to hold </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>There are also entire data domains that will always be out of scope for any EPR, notably workforce and finance, which are critical to operational management but are not clinical data. National portability, semantic consistency across 220 Trusts, and coverage of non-clinical domains like workforce and finance are architectural properties of a platform, not implementation quality issues, and the Frontline-First approach cannot work without them.</p> <p>FDP does not replace the EPR. What it does is provide a layer alongside it where operational products can capture data that the EPR was never designed to hold, in a structured form that is nationally consistent and immediately available to every other product on the platform. Trusts can choose to keep the EPR as the designated clinical record. FDP provides the operational data estate that the EPR was never asked to be.</p> <p>The platform supports multiple writeback methods including API, HL7, and FHIR - the constraint on writing data back into the EPR is not technical but commercial. To date, the programme has not achieved sufficient traction with EPR providers to establish routine writeback into the clinical record. Trusts who are awaiting this functionality should understand that the barrier is supplier engagement, not platform capability.</p> <p>FDP does not introduce divergence from the EPR. It replaces unaudited, ungoverned, invisible divergence with audited, governed, visible divergence. That is a net improvement in every dimension, even if it is not the clean single-record picture that information governance frameworks assume.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What the platform does not do well yet"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What the platform does not do well yet</h2> <p>Foundry is structured in a genuinely novel way and this is what makes it uniquely suited to the Frontline-First approach, but it does not make it a perfect platform. Teams I have worked with who have adopted Foundry have come across limitations that they have found frustrating, and it is likely that others will too.</p> <p>The general frustration is about a tension between two types of analytical work.</p> <p>Foundry prioritises users who are building repeatable, reusable analytical processes, an approach actively encouraged in NHS England under the Reproducible Analytical Pipelines (RAP) framework. For this kind of work, the platform is excellent - governed, auditable, shareable. But a large proportion of what analysts do day-to-day is not RAP. It is exploratory - quickly viewing a dataset, sharing rough cuts with colleagues, testing an approach before committing to it.</p> <p>The platform makes the first type of work excellent and the second type harder than it needs to be. Getting data in takes more effort than analysts expect - getting data out is harder still. Analysts who needed spreadsheet functionality found it lacking, though the platform does support R, Shiny, and more recently SQL Studio, and Trusts can connect external tools like Power BI and Tableau. NHS England restricted some of this on its own instance, but individual Trusts make their own decisions.</p> <p>Beyond the analyst experience, there were engineering challenges. Foundry's branching model allows developers to branch live data the way a software engineer branches code, test changes against real-world data, and merge back.</p> <p>The national FDP team embraced this because it allowed them to move fast. But engineers who were new to the platform, many of whom had spent years managing data flows from Trusts to NHS England, found it deeply uncomfortable. They were accustomed to long-established best practices - test data, separate development, testing, and production environments, careful promotion between them. Branching real-world data on the master branch felt reckless by those standards.</p> <p>Some teams tried to reconcile the two approaches by setting up test data and then branching it, which satisfied neither philosophy - the test data could not guarantee coverage of the edge cases that would break a pipeline in production, and the branching added complexity without the benefit of working against real data.</p> <p>Foundry does support formal environment separation, but Palantir's engineers discouraged it because it added significant overhead to the development process. The result was a period where neither approach was followed cleanly, and teams were caught between two engineering cultures without a settled way of working.</p> <p>None of this invalidates the architectural case, but it does mean that the journey from architectural promise to operational reality is harder and slower than anyone would like.</p> <p>A change of this scale cannot be delivered by a national programme alone, nor Trusts developing FDP in isolation. It requires cooperation across the system - Trusts, integrated care boards (ICBs), and the national team learning together, adapting together, and being willing to change how they work.</p> <p>The pace at which Frontline-First becomes real will be determined by the level of cooperation and willingness to adapt across all of these organisations.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Why "just an expensive data warehouse" misses the point"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Why "just an expensive data warehouse" misses the point</h2> <p>One of the most persistent criticisms of FDP, repeated in parliamentary debate and in media coverage, is that it is "a very overpriced data warehouse".</p> <p>If you assess FDP as a warehouse, this is a defensible view. The dashboarding is limited. The analytical tooling is less mature than a well-configured Power BI or Tableau environment. For analysts whose entire frame of reference is the analytical layer, FDP looks underwhelming and expensive.</p> <p>But the point of this article is that FDP is not primarily a warehouse. It is an operational application platform where the data, the semantics, the applications, and the actions all live in the same place. Calling FDP an expensive data warehouse is like calling a smartphone an expensive calculator. It is technically true that both can do arithmetic, and it completely misses what makes the smartphone worth having.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What comes next"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What comes next</h2> <p>The next article explains why the NHS needs both a shared data model and the consistent products to enforce it, and why their combination is the most important asset in the programme.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about NHS data</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Electronic-health-records-are-still-creating-issues-for-patients">Electronic health records are still creating issues for patients</a> - Almost every NHS trust will have moved onto a digital system by this spring. Experts have cautioned many patients are still struggling to access their own health data.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639993/Child-rapist-could-have-profiled-victims-through-unaudited-access-to-NHS-databases">Child rapist could have profiled victims through unaudited access to NHS databases</a> - NHS analyst’s conviction for child sexual abuse offences raises concerns over unaudited access to patient data.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366574914/Women-In-Data-panel-NHS-needs-to-get-data-basics-right-before-rushing-into-AI">NHS needs to get data basics right before rushing into AI</a> - During a panel discussion at a Women in Data event, speakers from across the public healthcare sector outlined the groundwork that has to be laid for artificial intelligence to take the NHS by storm.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620174/NHS-investigating-how-API-flaw-exposed-patient-data">NHS investigating how API flaw exposed patient data</a> - NHS patient data was left vulnerable by a flaw in an application programming interface used at online healthcare provider Medefer.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641178/NHS-digital-drive-hit-by-usability-gaps-despite-progress-national-survey-finds">NHS digital drive hit by usability gaps despite progress, national survey finds</a> - The shift from analogue to digital across the NHS is hindered by usability issues in electronic patient record (EPR), but the newly launched frontline productivity programme could be the answer.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> An in-depth look at the specific features of Palantir's Foundry, the commercial software platform on which FDP is built, and how the system makes use of them https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/health-MRI-scan-results-anatoliy-gleb-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-3-The-data-architecture-that-makes-it-work Thu, 14 May 2026 04:00:00 GMT Inside FDP – part 3: The data architecture that makes it work <p>A deal between Europe and the US could lead to unprecedented access by the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – which operates US <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641058/NCSC-warns-high-risk-individuals-of-Signal-and-WhatsApp-social-engineering-attacks">Immigration and Customs Enforcement</a> (ICE) – to the biometric data of European citizens.</p> <p>Europe and the US are holding talks on a framework agreement for an Enhanced Security Border Partnership (EBSP) between the US and the European Union (EU) that will provide the US with access to data on EU citizens.</p> <p>The UK’s Home Office confirmed it has received a request from the US DHS to access fingerprint records in relation to the EBSP programme, but said no negotiations were underway.</p> <p>The agreement between Europe and the US will allow “a reciprocal exchange of information” for security screening, identity verification and visa applications.</p> <p>Critics say that given the sensitivity of the data involved and the widely criticised actions of ICE officers against US citizens, there is a strong public interest in understanding exactly what the European authorities are negotiating.</p> <p>But negotiations are shrouded in secrecy. The author of this article has been trying to obtain the documents for months under Freedom of Information (FOI) laws, but the Council of the European Union has refused to release them, arguing that their disclosure would harm international relations.</p> <p>It said that the council enjoys a “wide discretion” in determining whether disclosure of a document to the public would undermine the public interest.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Continuous systematic transfers of data"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Continuous systematic transfers of data</h2> <p>A <u><a href="https://url.us.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/hFiOCKrY6nH90RwL8FMf4U5XbrF?domain=statewatch.org">draft of the agreement proposed by Europe</a></u> has been leaked to <u><a href="https://url.us.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/Z0faCL9YPoHX5zOLNsqhkUyFPJt?domain=statewatch.org/">Statewatch</a></u>, which reported that the EBSP “would involve mutual continuous and systematic transfers of biometric data”, understood to include fingerprints, photographs and genetic data.</p> <p>Statewatch, a non-profit that monitors human rights in the UK and Europe, warned that data exchanged under the proposal could be used for a wide range of purposes by the US.</p> <p>This includes preventing or arresting people travelling to the US who have expressed opposition to US policies in Europe, or for automated discriminatory profiling of travellers, including EU citizens.</p> <p>The US is also holding separate negotiations with other countries participating in the Visa Waiver Program (VWP), a US government scheme that allows nationals of participating countries to travel to the US for tourism or business for up to 90 days without a visa.</p> <p>US authorities expect EBSP to be in place by 31 December 2026.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="UK is negotiating with US on ESBP"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>UK is negotiating with US on ESBP</h2> <p>The UK Home Office told Computer Weekly, following a FOI request, that it had received a request from the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) regarding an Enhanced Security Border Partnership with the UK, but that “negotiations are not underway”.</p> <p>Asked which UK databases the US is seeking access to, the Home Office said the US was seeking access to UK fingerprint data, but mentioned no other biometrics.</p> <p>“The US has requested the ability to check the fingerprints of UK citizens applying for a US visa against the UK national criminal fingerprint databases as a condition of ongoing membership of the US Visa Waiver Program,” it said.</p> <p><u><a href="https://url.us.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/0qtLCM8E9pH9Gn8jxFJi8U853fw?domain=linkedin.com/">Sophie In’t Veld</a></u>, former Dutch member of the European Parliament and a vocal critic of the post-9/11 EU-US data agreements, told Computer Weekly it was hard to see who would defend the rights of European citizens.</p> <p>“The government leaders are falling all over each other with grand statements about European digital autonomy, but they happily give away our most sensitive data, without any legal protection whatsoever, to an administration that is anti-democratic and hostile to Europe and Europeans,” she said.</p> <p>Journalists in Europe and Australia, another country participating in the VWP, who have tried to access information about the EDPS under Freedom of Information laws have received either denial or heavily redacted documents.</p> <p>This author has requested documents from Italy’s Home Office, which refused to reply, with the Council of the European Union, which denied access.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about border security technology</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366615119/Starmer-announces-tech-enabled-crackdown-on-people-smuggling">Starmer announces tech-enabled crackdown on people smuggling</a>: The UK government has announced a further £75m of funding for its Border Security Command, meaning it will now have £150m over two years to spend on new technologies and staff.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611613/Home-Office-eVisa-scheme-is-broken-says-Open-Rights-Group">Home Office eVisa scheme is ‘broken’, says Open Rights Group</a>: Digital rights campaigners say the Home Office’s plan to make its new electronic Visa scheme a real-time online-only process is part and parcel of the ‘hostile environment’ around immigration status.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610395/Data-sharing-for-immigration-raids-ferments-hostility-to-migrants">Data sharing for immigration raids ferments hostility to migrants</a>: Data sharing between public and private bodies for the purposes of carrying out immigration raids helps to prop up the UK’s hostile environment by instilling an atmosphere of fear and deterring migrants from accessing public services.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> The UK has received a request from the US to share biometric data of citizens, as Europe negotiates a similar deal with US Department of Homeland Security https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/digital-network-biometrics-fingerprint-adobe.jpeg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366643013/Europe-and-US-negotiate-deal-to-share-citizens-biometric-data-UK-also-approached Tue, 12 May 2026 07:15:00 GMT Europe and US negotiate deal to share citizens’ biometric data, UK also approached <p>Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) have called for the expansion of Europol to be paused following disclosures that the police organisation ran a shadow IT system containing vast amounts of data without adequate security or data protection measures in place.</p> <p>An investigation by <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642525/They-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-Inside-Europols-shadow-IT-system">Computer Weekly</a>, <a href="https://correctiv.org/en/europe/2026/05/05/they-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-inside-europols-shadow-it-system/">Correctiv</a> and <a href="https://wearesolomon.com/en/mag/focus-area/accountability/they-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-inside-europols-shadow-it-system/">Solomon</a> revealed that Europol stored petabytes of crime-related data on a network that operated for years without scrutiny from regulators, despite significant privacy and security flaws.</p> <p>Europol’s “shadow” databases were used to analyse vast volumes of sensitive data, such as telephone records, identity documents, banking information or geolocation data and included data relating to individuals not suspected of any crime. They also included a shadow system known as the Pressure Cooker, used for analysing open-source information on the internet, that lacked proper controls.</p> <p>Despite several years of monitoring by the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), some major flaws remained unaddressed in 2026.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Call for Parliamentary oversight"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Call for Parliamentary oversight</h2> <p><a title="Özlem Alev Demirel | Home page" href="https://oezlem-alev-demirel.de/">Özlem Alev Demirel</a>, German MEP for the Left group, issued a <a href="https://oezlem-alev-demirel.de/2026/05/europols-datenmissbrauch-stellt-existenzrecht-der-behoerde-in-frag/">statement</a> calling for plans to expand Europol’s mandate to be put on hold.</p> <p>“This latest data protection scandal violates every legal standard, disregards the fundamental rights of those affected and renders oversight mechanisms absurd,” she wrote.</p> <p>German <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/96932/BIRGIT_SIPPEL/home">MEP Brigit Sippel</a> told this investigation that the fact that the data of innocent people was stored and analysed without any traceable record of who accessed it or altered the entries undermined confidence in the reliability of evidence and the rule of law.</p> <p>“Before we begin discussing a potential expansion of Europol’s mandate, there needs to be genuine Parliamentary oversight, independent supervision with real powers of intervention, and full disclosure and transparency regarding matters that have remained hidden until now,” she added.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Home Office urged to answer questions"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Home Office urged to answer questions</h2> <p>In the UK, conservative MP David Davis called <a href="https://x.com/DavidDavisMP/status/2052387489474568632">in a post on X (<em>formerly Twitter</em>)</a> for the Home Office to answer questions about Europol’s storage of data on British citizens.</p> <p>“The Home Office must now say whether any personal data of entirely innocent British citizens is being stored in Europol’s systems and, if so, why it is being stored and why the UK government is allowing it to be stored,” he added.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Confidence in evidence may be affected"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Confidence in evidence may be affected</h2> <p>Speaking at a meeting of the European Parliament’s committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/committees/en/libe/about">(Libe</a>) on Thursday, <a href="https://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/96932/BIRGIT_SIPPEL/home">MEP Birgit Sippel</a> said that revelations could undermine confidence in Europol.</p> <p>“I think the mere fact that a European agency has operated a parallel data system without any control raises concern, not only regarding data protection, but also on the way of working of agencies, and could affect even the confidence and reliability of agencies and the evidence,” she added.</p> <p>EDPS Wojciech Wiewiórowski told the Libe meeting that this investigation raised new points and accusations that the EDPS would definitely be following. He confirmed that some of the EDPS enforcement decisions – such as its admonishment of Europol in 2020 and a <a href="https://www.edps.europa.eu/press-publications/press-news/press-releases/2022/edps-orders-europol-erase-data-concerning_en">decision requiring Europol to delete data</a> in 2022 – were connected with the use of platforms identified in this investigation.</p> <p>Wiewiórowski said that EDPS needed a wider range of sanctions to oversee European institutions. He added that he has the ability to issue a soft response, in the form of an admonishment, and hard response, in the form of an order to stop processing data, which “might be really dangerous for security in Europe”, but nothing in between.</p> <p>With discussions underway about enlarging the mandate of Europol, he suggested that it would be a mistake for Europol to be enlarged without increasing oversight.</p> <p>Saskia Bricmont, Belgian Green MEP, added in a statement that she would prioritise a discussion with the European Commission and the Libe Committee over the findings of this investigation.</p> <p>“It is urgent that the agency and the European Commission provide detailed explanations,” she said. “Yet, once again, it is thanks to the work of investigative journalists that we are discovering a problem within Europol, which only serves to heighten mistrust.”</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about Europol</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li>The <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634419/Hungry-for-data-Inside-Europols-secretive-AI-programme">EU’s law enforcement agency has been quietly amassing data to feed an ambitious but secretive artificial intelligence development programme</a> that could have far-reaching privacy implications.</li> <li>Europol wants <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618230/Europol-seeks-evidence-of-encryption-on-crime-enforcement-as-it-steps-up-pressure-on-Big-Tech">examples of police investigations hampered by end-to-end encryption</a> as it pressures tech companies to provide law enforcement access to encrypted message.</li> <li>Law enforcement bodies from across the world have revealed how they <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366611232/Europol-provides-detail-on-Ghost-encrypted-comms-platform-takedown">collaborated to bring down encrypted network Ghost</a> and the new ways of working that have been established with Europol at the centre.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> Expansion of Europol’s mandate should be paused while allegations investigated, a number of MEPs say https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/Europol-building-2-PR-hero.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642721/MEPs-call-for-greater-scrutiny-of-Europol-following-concerns-over-Shadow-IT Fri, 08 May 2026 04:57:00 GMT MEPs call for greater scrutiny of Europol following concerns over shadow IT <p>Artificial intelligence (AI) – and in particular agentic AI – can bring considerable increases in productivity to any organisation that uses it, with potential gains of £10 for every £1 spent. But achieving those rewards will require great effort to ensure AI becomes part of organisational culture.</p> <p>That’s the view shared by executives at a Node4 user day event in Nottingham this week, where the mid-market enterprise application, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Software-as-a-Service-SaaS">software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider</a> and Microsoft partner showcased a range of AI-based solutions.</p> <p>According to Derby-based <a href="https://node4.co.uk/">Node4</a>, we are set to move past the era of “clunky” AI experiments and into a period where the technology is being industrialised at a rate that outpaces most corporate governance structures. Also showcased was agentic AI, but here, Node4 thinks it will be a year or so before customers trust it.</p> <p>Meanwhile, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642487/Cloud-and-data-sovereignty-caught-in-a-paradox">data sovereignty</a> is an everyday conversation for the company (<a href="#Sovereignty"><em>see box</em></a>).</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The three rings of AI: From assistance to orchestration"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The three rings of AI: From assistance to orchestration</h2> <p>Core to the thinking on AI are three stages of AI adoption: First, simple assistance, where users ask questions of a large language model (LLM) where once they would have used a web search tool. Second is co-work, where <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639977/Microsoft-Cowork-One-data-store-for-all-your-M365-assets">co-pilot-type tools</a> in an environment help more directly, such as Claude Code. And third, there is orchestration via agentic AI, where agents that are built to carry out specific tasks can be invoked in a variety of settings, often autonomously by preset triggers.</p> <p>But while such capabilities already exist in almost all enterprise application environments, including, for example, in the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central for which Node4 is a specialist, most customers have yet to make use of them. </p> <p>Mark Skelton, chief technology officer (CTO) at Node4 (<em>pictured, above</em>), said: “It’s something we’re struggling with. The challenge with AI at the moment is the consumerisation effect.</p> <p>“We did two roundtables last night, and we had probably 30 customers in those sessions. We asked them, where are you on your AI journey? Almost everyone in the room said, ‘Well, we’re nowhere’.</p> <p>“But when we asked the question, ‘Are you using OpenAI or ChatGPT or cloud?’ Most hands went up. So, what’s happening is business users are using this stuff on their personal accounts.”</p> <p>The concern here, said Skelton, is that if personal accounts are being used, business data is at risk of leaking out.</p> <p>Skelton said the Node4 solution is to help train customers and to showcase what’s possible with simple AI assistance, co-work and agentic AI by means of free-of-charge consulting sessions, “innovation factories” and showing customers how AI can help with real-world workloads.</p> <p>“One thing we do is automate board reports, for example,” said Skelton. “We have to do it every month. And there’s no reason why AI can’t do it. Every organisation will have to do a similar process.</p> <p>“You start with something like that. The customer goes, ‘OK, right, you’re solving a big problem. That’s a bunch of work and five days’ worth of someone’s time that I can now automate and free up their time’.”</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Agentic the future, but trust will take time"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Agentic the future, but trust will take time</h2> <p>Despite recognising the challenges of how to get there, Node4 executives envisage a future of agentic AI. At the event, it showcased pre-built agents and custom agent-building capabilities in Business Central, as well as a set of agents it develops, named “enhanced”, that tackle functions not covered by Microsoft.</p> <p>Currently, Node4 is keen to emphasise that there will be a human-in-the-loop for some time and that AI agents will not be off the leash and able to change or move corporate data.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> We’re probably [six months to a year] away from having [AI agents] committing stuff without human checking. I think that’s sensible because we are still in a phase where this stuff can hallucinate </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Mark Skelton, Node4</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>So, when will Node4 customers be able to trust an AI agent to make changes in a finance ledger or an enterprise resource planning database?</p> <p>“The technology is definitely capable,” said Skelton. “But I think we’re probably in a six-month-to-year window away from actually having these things committing stuff without human checking. I think that’s sensible because we are still in a phase where this stuff can hallucinate.</p> <p>“If it’s not designed right, it can be dangerous. So, I reckon about a year away, but whenever a CTO predicts these days, you can probably halve it because of the rate of innovation.</p> <p>“The human and the guardrails are still very important at this stage,” added Skelton. “Once you’ve built your model and built all the intelligence into the agent, it’s repeatable, and that’s where you get your value. But that starting point – understanding the process you’re trying to automate and execute – is critical, because if you get the input wrong, the output could be catastrophic.”</p> <p>Node4 has around 1,800 customers, of which 800 are users of the Microsoft Dynamics platform. Of those, 63% are on the fully SaaS Business Central, with the remainder on various legacy iterations of Navision.</p> <p>The company also runs its own cloud and datacentres, which can be used for sovereign capability should a customer require it.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Customer base: Different sectors, different speeds"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Customer base: Different sectors, different speeds</h2> <p>About 1,200 customers are private sector, and 600 public sector. Node4 made north of £33m from the UK public sector for 2024-2025, according to Tussell figures, with its biggest UK government customer being the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (£23m).</p> <p>Node4 customers that are not yet SaaS users comprise a fair chunk of the customer base. According to Skelton, it’s not that they don’t want to move. Many simply lack the time and resources to do so.</p> <p>He said: “Traditionally, it’s been very costly to move because the move from Navision to Business Central is not like a Windows upgrade where you click a button and it does it for you.</p> <p>“There are complexities around code conversion and workflow. These are traditionally big projects. They could be 200-day, 300-day projects – so very costly for businesses to do. Where you see this long Navision tail, it tends to be in the smaller organisations that don’t have the big IT departments.</p> <p>“Now, we’re using AI to automate a lot of this process. We’re using AI to do all the code conversion, the workflow remappings, all that kind of stuff. And then we’re going to look at future pipelines about how we automate all the testing.”</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading"><a id="Sovereignty"></a>Data sovereignty ‘an everyday conversation’</h3> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Is-cloud-data-sovereignty-all-just-a-case-of-Trust-me-bro">Data sovereignty is a hot topic</a> in the current <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">geopolitical environment</a>. Meanwhile, Microsoft has said more than once that it can’t guarantee that customer data won’t be moved offshore. And in any case, if a US company were subject to a US court order, it would be compelled to provide access to data that stateside law enforcement asked for.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> The art to [data sovereignty is] working out what is mission-critical data that [customers] really need sovereignty around versus non-critical </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Mark Skelton, Node4</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>So, how does Node4 navigate that conversation? </p> <p>“What’s going on in the world is having a major impact on how customers are thinking and where their data sits. Of course, with Microsoft, we have to be very careful. So, we design models that sit behind all these data platforms to understand where the data can actually go and put some restrictions and controls around it.”</p> <p>Skelton also pointed to the fact that Node4 also has its own datacentres in the UK.</p> <p>“Customers are now going, ‘I don’t feel comfortable with this data sitting in Microsoft or anywhere else. Can it be in a UK-centric datacentre owned by a UK company?’ We’re seeing a bit of an uptick in demand for our datacentre capability for that reason.”</p> <p>Skelton said Node4 can still work with the Microsoft ecosystem, with data or even AI models residing in its datacentres.</p> <p>That’s partly because customers aren’t usually worried about all their data from a sovereignty perspective.</p> <p>“It may be partial sets of data that are critical,” he said. “That’s the art to this; working out what is mission-critical data that they really need sovereignty around versus non-critical. The non-critical would sit in the Microsoft cloud system. The critical stuff sits in ours, and we create the plumbing and the controls between that to make sure all the data is controlled. But it’s a daily conversation.”</p> </div> </div> <p></p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about Microsoft and AI</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639308/Microsoft-CEO-opens-up-London-AI-tour-with-Copilot-push">Microsoft CEO opens London AI Tour with Copilot push</a>: Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella used his event keynote to showcase how the artificial intelligence in M365 is a foundation for agentic AI in the enterprise.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639977/Microsoft-Cowork-One-data-store-for-all-your-M365-assets">Microsoft Cowork – one data store for all your M365 assets</a>: Microsoft has revealed the next stage of its plans to place its software at the heart of enterprise data, which is now powered by agentic AI.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> UK mid-market supplier showcases the three stages of AI – assistance, co-work and orchestration – but faces a reality in which most users have yet to arrive at first base https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/Node4-user-day-Nottingham-hero.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642876/Node4-AI-and-agentic-the-future-but-culture-the-key-to-unlock-it Fri, 08 May 2026 04:55:00 GMT Node4: AI and agentic the future, but culture the key to unlock it <p><em>Inside FDP is an exclusive series of articles written by the former deputy director of data engineering at NHS England, Tom Bartlett, who led the 150-person team that built the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">Federated Data Platform</a> (FDP), the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">controversial Palantir-supplied system</a> linking data across the health and care service. His insights into the challenges facing NHS data, and the solutions available to resolve them, make essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand what’s really happening with FDP in the NHS. This is part 2 of the series - read part 1 here:<a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-1-Understanding-the-problems-facing-NHS-data"> Inside FDP - Understanding the problems facing NHS data.</a></em></p> <p>For decades, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Electronic-health-records-are-still-creating-issues-for-patients">NHS data</a> investment has followed a reporting-first approach. Leaders want visibility into one of the largest organisations in the world, for legitimate reasons, at a time when the pace of technology has been extraordinary. They have poured investment into back-office data teams - expensive engineering and analytical staff, expensive software, expensive consultancies.</p> <p>But they have hardly invested in frontline data capability. Some NHS Trusts have retained a small team to tailor the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252514807/Electronic-Patient-Records-key-to-NHS-digital-transformation">electronic patient record</a> (EPR) and add bolt-on modules for popular use cases, such as ward observations, but that was never going to address the scale of the problems created by retrofitted data plumbing.</p> <p>The result is an estate with thousands of manual cross-organisational data flows. Entire national programmes are dedicated to burden reduction and data flow transformation, programmes that exist solely because the current model creates the burden in the first place.</p> <p>Analytical infrastructure is duplicated at every level of the system. And the cost of shadow IT is absorbed invisibly by clinical staff time that should be spent on patients.</p> <p>None of this was obvious at the time those decisions were made. Technology was moving fast, the demands on the NHS were relentless, and it was genuinely hard to step back and see that the reporting-first approach was creating the very problems it was being asked to solve.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Data vision"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Data vision</h2> <p>The vision that NHS England's leadership wanted to realise, but rarely articulated in public, was to stop treating data as something extracted from the frontline and start treating it as something that serves the frontline - this is what I call a Frontline-First approach.</p> <p>My understanding of that vision can be defined through seven dimensions of value, each with a direct impact on what patients experience: operational tools at the point of care; frontline participation in development; enrichment of data at the point of need; AI-driven analytics at the frontline; live integration through the platform; cross-setting collaboration; and scalable portable products available to every Trust. The first two are the foundation. The rest build on them.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic1a.png"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic1a_mobile.png" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic1a_mobile.png 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic1a.png 1280w" alt="Chart showing the seven key elements of NHS data architecture supported by FDP" data-credit="Bartlett Data" height="336" width="560"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>NHS data architecture - how FDP supports the seven dimensions of data value </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="1. Operational tools at the point of care"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>1. Operational tools at the point of care</h2> <p>Picture the scene. A discharge coordinator in a busy acute Trust is managing 30 patients across four wards. Their tool is an Excel spreadsheet, updated manually after each phone call to the ward, each conversation with the family, each check on community services availability. Nothing is linked to the EPR. Nothing is visible to the bed management team. Nothing feeds the board’s dashboard. The data exists only on that spreadsheet and in the coordinator's head.</p> <p>Now picture the alternative. Instead of the spreadsheet, an FDP application tracks the patient through the discharge pathway, prompts the right actions at the right times, and integrates with bed management. Instead of the theatre scheduler working from a whiteboard, an FDP application holds the session list with live links to the waiting list, the surgeon's availability and the equipment booking.</p> <p>The data captured by these tools enters the formal data estate for the first time, visible to the analyst, the board dashboard and the commissioner, rather than locked in a local file nobody else can see.</p> <p>The cost of leaving these workflows on shadow IT is real. A delayed discharge costs a Trust roughly £400 per day in excess bed days. Every unnecessary day in hospital increases the risk of healthcare-associated infection, deconditioning, falls, and loss of independence, particularly for frail elderly patients. Optica, the FDP discharge application, has delivered a 28% reduction in average delay days across adopting Trusts. The patient impact? They get home sooner, to a more therapeutic environment, with lower risk of hospital-acquired harm.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="2. Frontline participation in development"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>2. Frontline participation in development</h2> <p>These tools do not have to be built centrally by NHS England. The platform allows frontline teams, data engineers working alongside clinicians and operational staff, to build their own applications for their own workflows. The nationally developed products like Optica and the Care Coordination Solutions are the starting point, not the ceiling. A Trust team that knows its discharge pathway better than any national programme ever could, can build an application that fits that pathway precisely, capture data that would otherwise live on a spreadsheet, and then share the application with other Trusts through the Solution Exchange.</p> <p>Foundry – the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252529075/NHS-data-platform-costing-480m-to-supersede-Covid-19-data-store-underway">Palantir software at the heart of FDP</a> - includes no-code tools for building applications and data transformations without engineering skills. On top of this, Palantir's AI capabilities allow clinicians and operational staff to describe what they need in plain language and have the platform generate a working pro-code application. Part 3 of this series explains how this works in more detail.</p> <p>For CIOs managing development backlogs that stretch years into the future, this is a route to clearing demand that traditional software development cannot match.</p> <p>The patient impact? The gap between an operational need being recognised and a working tool being available shrinks from months or years to days or weeks. This capability will need quality assurance and governance as it scales, because frontline-led development without standards risks creating a new form of technical debt - but the answer is to govern it well, not to prevent it from happening.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="3. Data enrichment"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>3. Data enrichment</h2> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> This is enrichment [of data] by reasoning, not just enrichment by visibility, and it represents a step change in what a data platform can do for a clinician at the point of care </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>Once a clinician is working through an FDP application rather than a disconnected EPR, the platform can enrich the data they see with information from elsewhere in the system.</p> <p>This is the logic layer - the platform does not just store data, it connects it and surfaces what is relevant at the moment a decision is being made. The clinician's field of view expands beyond what they personally know and what is in front of them to include what the system knows.</p> <p>A clinician considering an onward referral can see that the receiving service has a six-week wait while an alternative has a two-week wait, and can make a better decision for the patient in the room.</p> <p>A discharge coordinator can see that the community team has already arranged a package of care, rather than duplicating the call.</p> <p>A consultant completing a procedure record gets an immediate comparison - consultants with your case mix at similar Trusts achieve a complication rate of X, yours is Y.</p> <p>A mental health clinician reviewing a patient can see that the same patient attended A&E twice last week, information that sits in a different organisation's data but is now visible through the platform.</p> <p>In every case, the act of recording stops being a bureaucratic overhead and starts being a moment where the clinician learns something useful. Good data becomes a by-product of useful work rather than a chore imposed from above.</p> <p>But enrichment is not just about making more data visible. It is about applying logic to the data in real time.</p> <p>If a patient has a high frailty score and three or more A&E attendances in the last 90 days, surface them for proactive review before the next admission.</p> <p>If a discharge is planned but no community care package is in place, flag it before the patient leaves the ward.</p> <p>If a prescribed medication conflicts with an allergy recorded in another care setting, send an alert.</p> <p>None of this is new to business intelligence (BI) teams. They build these alerts already, in dashboards, in near-real-time reports, in exception lists emailed to service managers. But the clinician still has to work across the BI report, the EPR, and the shadow IT spreadsheet to act on what the alert tells them.</p> <p>What changes with a Frontline-First approach is the level of integration - the alert is inside the operational tool, at the point of the decision, connected to the action the clinician needs to take. The logic and the workflow are in the same place.</p> <p>As the platform matures, large language models (LLMs) will extend this further. Where rule-based logic handles known patterns with defined thresholds, LLMs can reason across unstructured and structured data together, identifying that a combination of symptoms, test results, and medication changes over several months resembles a deterioration pathway that no single data point would flag.</p> <p>This is enrichment by reasoning, not just enrichment by visibility, and it represents a step change in what a data platform can do for a clinician at the point of care.</p> <p>The best existing example of enrichment for clinicians illustrates what changes. The National Consultant Information Programme (NCIP), part of Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT), provides consultant-level benchmarking across 12 surgical specialties. It is clinically led, well designed, and widely used. But it is a reporting-first approach to enrichment.</p> <p>The consultant visits a separate portal, reviews quarterly data drawn from Hospital Episode Statistics, and takes the insight back to their practice. On FDP, the same enrichment would be integrated into the operational tool the consultant already uses, updated in near-real-time rather than quarterly, and extended beyond surgical specialties to mental health, community, primary care and ambulance through the Canonical Data Model (CDM). The difference is not the insight - it is when and where the clinician receives it.</p> <p>The patient impact? Clinicians make better decisions because they see what the system knows, not just what is in front of them. Unnecessary referrals are avoided. Duplicate work is eliminated. Variation in clinical practice is surfaced and addressed in real time rather than discovered years later through audit. Harm is prevented by logic that connects data across settings before the clinician has to ask.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="4. AI-driven analytics at the frontline"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>4. AI-driven analytics at the frontline</h2> <p>Today, when a ward manager wants to know their current caseload, or a service lead wants to understand their team's referral patterns, or a clinical director wants to see how their specialty compares to peers, they send a request to the BI team. The BI team, already stretched, adds it to the queue. The answer comes back days or weeks later as a spreadsheet or a static report. By the time the frontline has the information, the question has moved on.</p> <p>A new tool in development at NHS England called Ask FDP changes this. Using large language models connected to the Trust's data through the ontology, frontline staff can query the data estate in plain English and get straight answers without going through the BI team.</p> <p>What is my caseload? Which patients on my ward have been here longer than seven days? How does our readmission rate compare to the national average? These are not complex analytical questions. They are the everyday operational queries that currently consume a disproportionate amount of BI team capacity.</p> <p>There is a further shift that matters. When a BI team responds to these queries today, they typically produce a set of charts or data tables that require further interpretation. Is that variation genuine or within the range of normal fluctuation? What is driving the trend? The person who asked the question is left looking at 30 graphs wondering what is going on.</p> <p>Ask FDP does not just return the data. It synthesises the analysis, explains what the numbers mean, and flags what requires attention. Analytical skills are in shorter supply than BI dashboards. An AI-powered analyst that can interpret as well as present is a step change in how quickly the frontline can act on what the data is telling them.</p> <p>The consequence is a cultural shift in how data is used.</p> <p>The BI team can pivot away from ad-hoc reporting and toward the higher-value work of building Frontline-First tools, maintaining data quality, and developing the ontology.</p> <p>The frontline gets instant, informed answers from an AI analytical capability that knows the Trust's data.</p> <p>The culture moves from manual analysis of data provided by a busy central team to self-service intelligence at the point of need. The patient impact? Clinical decisions are informed by data in real time rather than waiting for a report that may arrive too late to matter.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="5. Live integration"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>5. Live integration</h2> <p>In the current architecture, data moves between layers through overnight extracts, monthly submissions, and manual uploads. A change in one system is not reflected in another until someone runs a process to move it.</p> <p>Within a Foundry tenant, the ontology changes this. Data on the platform is connected in real time.</p> <p>When a theatre session is cancelled, every linked concept updates immediately - the waiting list entry, the bed allocation, the consultant's schedule, the utilisation dashboard. There is no overnight feed, no reconciliation, no delay. For an average Trust with over 250 different clinical teams, this means all of those teams are working from the same live picture of the organisation for the first time.</p> <p>This matters for the timeliness problem described in Part 1 of this series. When data is live on the platform rather than extracted in batches, the information available to the clinician, the manager and the analyst is the same and it is current. Cross-Trust integration requires additional architectural mechanisms which are described in Part 3, but the direction of travel is clear - from monthly extracts and manual submissions toward a connected, live data estate.</p> <p>The patient impact? Decisions are informed by data that reflects what is happening now, not what happened weeks or months ago.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="6. Cross-setting collaboration"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>6. Cross-setting collaboration</h2> <p>A mental health patient turns up in A&E. In the current model, the A&E clinician has no way of knowing about the community mental health history unless they happen to have access to the shared care record and think to look.</p> <p>On FDP with the national Canonical Data Model, the mental health data and the acute data sit on the same platform with the same definitions. New FDP apps that are bespoke to the intersection of those care settings become possible at a larger scope than point-to-point record sharing. But visibility is only the starting point.</p> <p>In this hypothetical FDP app, the A&E clinician can also see capacity in the receiving mental health service, request an admission informed by the full clinical picture, and have that request received and accepted by the ward team with all the relevant detail attached.</p> <p>The same applies to out-of-area placements, where a receiving Trust currently has no visibility of the placing Trust's clinical intent, risk assessment, or care plan.</p> <p>This is not just data sharing. It is clinical teams collaborating across organisational boundaries through a shared platform, informed by consistent data, in real time. The patient impact? They are treated by clinicians who know their history and can coordinate their care across settings rather than working in the dark.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="7. Scalable, portable products"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>7. Scalable, portable products</h2> <p>Over time, the first six dimensions produce something the NHS has never had - a growing library of operational tools, built by the people closest to the work, available to any Trust on the same platform.</p> <p>The mechanism for this is the Solution Exchange, a commercial and technical framework that allows FDP applications to be packaged, quality-assured, and made available to other Trusts.</p> <p>This is not limited to applications built by NHS teams. Third-party healthtech companies can build products on the platform and distribute them through the Solution Exchange, creating a marketplace for NHS operational tools.</p> <p>NHS England is currently working with invited early adopters this year to establish the framework and the first wave of commercially available products. In 10 years, there could be thousands of these products, all portable across Trusts because they share the same data model. The current handful of nationally built products is like the calculator app on a smartphone. The platform can run anything.</p> <p>The marketplace model introduces something the NHS has rarely had in its data tooling - genuine competition between products on the basis of clinical usefulness.</p> <p>Where multiple products address the same workflow, clinical teams will prefer the one that works best for them. The better product gets adopted more widely. The weaker product either improves or is replaced. This creates incentives for innovation and brings the urgency to improve that is often absent when tools are nationally commissioned and centrally maintained. The NHS remains the commissioner and the governor. The energy to build, iterate, and improve comes from teams and companies who are motivated to make something clinicians actually want to use.</p> <p>The cost of switching from one product to another is also reduced, because every product runs on the same platform with the same data model. A Trust is not locked into a product the way it is locked into a bespoke system that took years to integrate.</p> <p>The patient impact? A tool that works well in one Trust becomes available to every Trust, so improvements in care are shared nationally rather than staying local.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Frontline-First in practice: a real national collection"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Frontline-First in practice: a real national collection</h2> <p>These seven dimensions are abstract until you see them working together. The Mental Health Services Data Set (MHSDS) illustrates what the shift from reporting-first to Frontline-First would look like in practice, because it shows both the scale of the current problem and the potential of a different approach.</p> <p>Today, the MHSDS is a national collection built on the reporting-first culture that has dominated NHS data investment for decades. Someone nationally said, "I want to know what is happening in mental health services," found some money, and built an entire reporting industry that is almost entirely separate from the frontline.</p> <p>Clinicians in mental health trusts are required to record data to the MHSDS specification in their EPR. Much of what they record is not directly useful to their clinical work. It creates friction. The data feeds into a submission process that still relies on Microsoft Access databases as an intermediate stage, is processed centrally, and arrives at the national level months after the clinical event.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> The FDP programme has achieved remarkably fast-paced progress under sustained political and media pressure that would have stalled most national programmes entirely </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>From the clinician's perspective, the MHSDS is a black hole. Data goes in. Nothing useful comes back.</p> <p>There is a further inefficiency. The MHSDS, while quite a comprehensive analytical base, is almost always entirely separate from the analytical base held within the Trust's own data team. The same data is extracted, transformed, and stored twice: once for the national collection and once for local reporting. The local version is almost always more accurate, because it has not had to be translated into a national specification that is in many places distant from the local data structures.</p> <p>This duplication exists because of semantic inconsistencies in the data and the inconsistent platform technology deployed across Trusts and NHS England. It is pure waste. Part 4 of this series explores this semantic gap in more detail.</p> <p>A critic might say the answer is to make the EPR better - configure it to capture the MHSDS data more naturally. But the EPR is a monolithic system that tries to serve every clinical setting with the same application. A crisis team, a rehabilitation ward, a community Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) service, an early intervention in psychosis team - these are vastly different clinical settings with vastly different workflows. Forcing them all through the same EPR interface is part of why clinicians find recording burdensome and why shadow IT emerges to fill the gaps.</p> <p>A Frontline-First approach would look fundamentally different. As well as the monolithic EPR, you would build a fleet of FDP apps, each tailored to the specific workflow of the team using it.</p> <p>The crisis team gets an app designed for rapid assessment and handover. The rehab ward gets an app designed for long-stay progress tracking and outcomes. The CAMHS service gets an app designed for managing referrals and family work.</p> <p>Each app is modular, built close to the clinical team it serves, and captures data in a way that makes sense for that team's work. The sum of the data captured across all of these apps flows to MHSDS automatically, because each app is built on the same platform with the same CDM.</p> <p>The national collection becomes a by-product of useful clinical work rather than an administrative overhead imposed from above. The archaic Access-database submission process disappears because the data is already on the platform in a nationally consistent format.</p> <p>This is what Frontline-First means in concrete terms. The clinician gets a tool they want to use, designed for their workflow rather than a generic compromise. The data quality improves because the recording is clinically meaningful rather than bureaucratically mandated. Modular apps built for specific workflows can also capture data in structured fields that the generic EPR progress note cannot, making data like DIALOG scores accessible to the data estate for the first time rather than buried in free text.</p> <p>The national collection gets better data, faster, with less processing. The duplication between local and national analytical bases disappears because both draw from the same dataset on the same platform, harmonised through the CDM. The patient gets a service that is tracking their outcomes and learning from the comparison with peers. Every layer benefits, and the starting point is a useful tool at the point of care rather than a data extraction requirement.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The production evidence"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The production evidence</h2> <p>Two things need to be evidenced before the Frontline-First argument can stand.</p> <p>The first is that FDP can host operational applications that produce measurable outcomes.</p> <p>The second is that it is feasible for frontline teams to build their own tools on the platform, because if every FDP application has to be nationally commissioned and centrally built, the approach will never cover the breadth of shadow IT that exists across the NHS.</p> <p>On the first, NHS England publishes quarterly figures on FDP uptake and benefits. The Inpatient Care Coordination Solution (IP CCS) reports an average 6.6% increase in booked theatre utilisation across adopting Trusts. Unused theatre time is cancelled elective procedures, longer waiting lists, patients waiting in pain or at risk of deterioration.</p> <p>The Outpatient Care Coordination Solution validates waiting lists and removes unnecessary appointments. Optica reports a 28% reduction in average delay days across adopting Trusts.</p> <p>These figures should be read with caution. The journey is still at an early stage and the production evidence is still building. There will be challenges and limitations, and some are already being publicly stated. An independent three-year evaluation by Imperial College Projects, commissioned by NHS England at a cost of £700,000, began in March 2026 with findings expected in 2029.</p> <p>I would welcome that evaluation going further than measuring the benefits of the current products. It should seek to understand the true comparator costs and relative benefits of a Frontline-First approach versus the reporting-first approach the NHS has followed for decades. Without that comparison, neither the advocates nor the critics of FDP have the evidence they need.</p> <p>The figures I cite in this series are NHS England's published cross-trust numbers. This is the beginning of the journey, and as the platform matures these problems will be addressed if the programme keeps its focus on the Frontline-First vision.</p> <p>On the second, the Build with FDP event in October 2025 offered the most direct evidence that frontline-led development is feasible on the platform. Some 120 NHS staff - a mix of data engineers, developers, clinical and operational staff - spent two days building working operational tools on FDP. The winning team built an Ambulance to Ward handover product. The runner-up built a clinical coding AI assistant. The next event runs in Leeds in May 2026, and the best applications from previous events are being sponsored by NHS England for national rollout.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="How these dimensions address the data problems"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>How these dimensions address the data problems</h2> <p>The following table shows how the seven Frontline-First dimensions address each of the eight problems described in Part 1.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic2a.png"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic2a_mobile.png" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic2a_mobile.png 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/FDP2-Tom-Bartlett-pic2a.png 1280w" alt="Chart showing how the seven dimensions of value address each of the eight key data problems facing the NHS" data-credit="Bartlett Data" height="317" width="559"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>How the seven dimensions of value address each of the eight key data problems facing the NHS </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The financial case"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The financial case</h2> <p>There is also a practical dimension that matters to any Trust finance director or CIO.</p> <p>Trusts that adopt FDP as their core data infrastructure can replace their local data warehouse entirely. The licensing costs for SQL Server, Databricks or similar, the staff costs to maintain bespoke infrastructure, and the analyst time spent manually extracting and uploading national submissions all reduce significantly. National submissions can happen automatically through the platform rather than through the monthly grind of manual extracts.</p> <p>FDP is centrally funded, cloud-hosted, and already in place. For a Trust paying £100,000 or more a year in data platform licensing alone, before staff costs, the financial case for adoption is straightforward.</p> <p>There has been hesitancy among CIOs about what happens to funding arrangements after the current contract ends. This is understandable but should not be a reason to delay adoption. The savings from warehouse replacement, automated submissions, and reduced duplication will over time far outweigh the local implementation costs, and in my view central funding is extremely likely to continue given the strategic significance of the platform.</p> <p>Trusts are expected to invest in ensuring FDP runs well and is developed within their organisation. The implementation costs should not be understated, but they are not new costs unique to FDP. They are the kinds of costs Trusts routinely incur when adopting operational tools: a System Coordination Centre, a data warehouse capability, a job planning system. All of these require staff, training, configuration, and ongoing support.</p> <p>The investment varies significantly depending on approach. Trusts that have embedded FDP adoption into their existing transformation programmes, treating it as a set of tools to deliver improvements the Trust was already planning, rather than running it as a standalone digital programme, have found costs significantly lower than those that stood up dedicated teams.</p> <p>The major investment for most Trusts is the data warehouse migration, which would apply to any platform change regardless of supplier. These costs should be weighed against the costs of maintaining duplicated data infrastructure, manual submission processes, and the shadow IT that a Frontline-First approach is designed to replace.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="What the programme has achieved, and what it costs to transform at this scale"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>What the programme has achieved, and what it costs to transform at this scale</h2> <p>The FDP programme has achieved remarkably fast-paced progress under sustained political and media pressure that would have stalled most national programmes entirely. It has had the ambition to tackle the biggest problem in NHS informatics, one that has sat in the "too difficult" box for decades.</p> <p>The NHS is the seventh largest organisation in the world. A transformation of this scale will inevitably create losers as well as winners, and even despite the pace, some things will not be done fast enough to prevent genuinely avoidable loss. There will not be enough focus, enough shared knowledge, or enough capacity to avoid every mistake that should have been avoided. That is the price of transformation at this scale. The best hope is that as the programme matures it can reduce this cost, and the evidence from the ground suggests it is already doing so.</p> <p>Many Trusts have invested significantly in their own data infrastructure, such as on-premise SQL Server estates, and in some cases cloud-based BI stacks on Azure or AWS. These investments have genuine merit and have delivered real value within their scope.</p> <p>At regional level, Greater Manchester and London have both built excellent data infrastructure, and the people who built them are some of the most capable data leaders in the NHS.</p> <p>Shared care records have gone further, giving clinicians visibility of patient records from other care settings at the point of care.</p> <p>These are genuine achievements. Some regional teams are going further still, linking data across acute, primary, and community care settings, applying population-level risk scores, and beginning to extend into operational use cases with write-back into clinical systems. This work is real, well-governed, and in some cases ahead of what FDP has delivered nationally.</p> <p>But visibility is not the same as integration. Shared care records let a clinician see what happened elsewhere. They do not let the clinician act on it through the same platform, create new data, or collaborate with teams in other organisations through shared operational tools. The Frontline-First approach requires all of these.</p> <p>The regional and local platforms were designed to analyse data, not to host the operational applications that create it. FDP was designed to do both on the same platform, with the same data model, the same access controls, and the same national consistency layer. That is the architectural distinction that makes Frontline-First possible, and the next post explains the architecture in detail.</p> <p>Trusts with strong existing BI estates will benefit from FDP adoption not by discarding what they have built, but by connecting it to a national platform that addresses what their local infrastructure cannot.</p> <p>Local data leaders who invested in infrastructure as NHS England previously directed, and who now feel that investment is being overridden by a national programme they had no role in shaping, have legitimate cause for frustration. That frustration needs to be heard and addressed, not dismissed as resistance to change.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about the NHS Federated Data Platform</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">Health workers call for Palantir to be booted from NHS contracts</a> - Health justice charity Medact warns that Palantir’s involvement in NHS data systems is a threat to patients and healthcare organisations.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">NHS chief data officers concerned by FDP roll-out</a> - The Chief Data and Analytical Officers Network has raised concerns over the way the NHS Federated Data Platform is being implemented and NHS England’s approach to its adoption.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366616320/NHS-Federated-Data-Platform-celebrates-first-birthday">NHS Federated Data Platform celebrates first birthday</a> - In its first year, more than 100 NHS organisations have signed up to the controversial platform, aiming to bring together data from different IT systems.</li> </ul> </div> </div> <p>The frustration is sharpest where mature, operationally proven products already exist. The NHS has System Coordination Centre tools that have been managing urgent and emergency care flows since 2013. Job planning systems embedded in Trust workforce processes. Locally built operational tools with years of frontline refinement behind them, trusted by the staff who use them. In some cases, the national programme has built FDP products that overlap with existing functionality rather than integrating what already works.</p> <p>The Solution Exchange model described above should be the answer to this - bringing mature third-party products onto the platform so that Trusts retain what works while gaining the benefits of a shared data model and national portability.</p> <p>Getting this right matters, because if Trusts feel their existing tools are being displaced rather than integrated, they will resist adoption, and they will have a point. This is an avoidable loss, and it is within the programme's power to fix.</p> <p>There is a practical step that would help. While I have elaborated, named and communicated the Frontline-First concept, I did not create it. Leaders in NHS England did, and so NHS England should publicly name the Frontline-First vision, explain it to the wider data community, and invite collaborative development of the operational application roadmap.</p> <p>The <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">concern about "programme drift" that has been expressed by senior NHS data leaders</a> is essentially a concern that nobody has told them what FDP is for. They signed up for a data federation capability and feel they are being given operational software modules instead.</p> <p>If the programme had clearly stated from the outset that FDP's purpose is to put useful tools at the point of care, with good data as a by-product, the conversation would be about how to make that work locally rather than about whether the programme has drifted from its original brief. The drift is in the communication, not in the architecture.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The investment case"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The investment case</h2> <p>A true Frontline-First approach needs significant investment. Consider the context - even over the last five years.</p> <p>EPR investment alone has come to around £2bn. One single geography will spend £200m on an electronic health record (EHR) upgrade and nobody blinks.</p> <p>In that context, a £330m contract to address the data plumbing looks like what it is - a modest beginning of a much larger endeavour. The cost of FDP is criticised, and the total cost of ownership is genuinely unknown. But the cost of the alternative, continuing with the reporting-first approach, is also unquantified, and it is almost certainly higher.</p> <p>If the NHS data problems described in Part 1 had been properly addressed 10 years ago, instead of investing further in centralised data collection and reporting, the NHS would have a far more effective data estate than it does now. Criticism of FDP's cost is incomplete without the comparator.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Why Foundry?"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Why Foundry?</h2> <p>The next post explains why Palantir's Foundry is the only platform I have seen that is capable of delivering a Frontline-First approach at NHS scale.</p> <p><em>Read <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-1-Understanding-the-problems-facing-NHS-data">part 1 of Inside FDP: Understanding the problems facing NHS data</a></em></p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about NHS data</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Electronic-health-records-are-still-creating-issues-for-patients">Electronic health records are still creating issues for patients</a> - Almost every NHS trust will have moved onto a digital system by this spring. Experts have cautioned many patients are still struggling to access their own health data.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639993/Child-rapist-could-have-profiled-victims-through-unaudited-access-to-NHS-databases">Child rapist could have profiled victims through unaudited access to NHS databases</a> - NHS analyst’s conviction for child sexual abuse offences raises concerns over unaudited access to patient data.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366574914/Women-In-Data-panel-NHS-needs-to-get-data-basics-right-before-rushing-into-AI">NHS needs to get data basics right before rushing into AI</a> - During a panel discussion at a Women in Data event, speakers from across the public healthcare sector outlined the groundwork that has to be laid for artificial intelligence to take the NHS by storm.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620174/NHS-investigating-how-API-flaw-exposed-patient-data">NHS investigating how API flaw exposed patient data</a> - NHS patient data was left vulnerable by a flaw in an application programming interface used at online healthcare provider Medefer.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641178/NHS-digital-drive-hit-by-usability-gaps-despite-progress-national-survey-finds">NHS digital drive hit by usability gaps despite progress, national survey finds</a> - The shift from analogue to digital across the NHS is hindered by usability issues in electronic patient record (EPR), but the newly launched frontline productivity programme could be the answer.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> In the second of an exclusive series of articles by the former deputy director of data engineering at NHS England, we examine the key elements of the data architecture that supports the Federated Data Platform programme https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/healthcare-doctor-tablet-1-adobe.jpeg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-2-Delivering-on-the-NHS-vision-for-data Thu, 07 May 2026 07:00:00 GMT Inside FDP – part 2: Delivering on the NHS vision for data <p>A <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639704/Police-do-not-have-to-explain-to-lawyer-Fahad-Ansari-why-they-seized-his-phone-data-says-court">solicitor, whose mobile phone containing legally privileged material was seized</a> and downloaded by police, was wrongly identified in a police risk assessment as a Hamas member.</p> <p>Fahad Ansari, who specialises in national security cases, argues that police unlawfully stopped and questioned him because they wrongly “equated” him acting as a lawyer for Hamas with being a member of the proscribed organisation.</p> <p>The case is believed to be the first targeted use of Schedule 7 powers against a practising solicitor. Under Schedule 7 legislation, police can stop and question people and seize their electronic devices, without the need for suspicion, to determine whether they appear to be involved in terrorism.</p> <p>The Court of Appeal ordered an immediate stay on Tuesday of a judicial review brought by Ansari while it considers whether <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639704/Police-do-not-have-to-explain-to-lawyer-Fahad-Ansari-why-they-seized-his-phone-data-says-court">police should be required by law to disclose details of their case against him</a>.</p> <p>Ansari, an Irish solicitor who is representing Hamas in a legal appeal to have its proscribed status overturned in the UK, was stopped and questioned by police in August 2025 while travelling home with his family from Ireland to Holyhead.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Police risk assessment stated ‘Hamas’ membership"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Police risk assessment stated ‘Hamas’ membership</h2> <figure class="main-article-image half-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/North-Wales-Police-risk-assessment-Fahad-Ansari-800px.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/North-Wales-Police-risk-assessment-Fahad-Ansari-800px_half_column_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/North-Wales-Police-risk-assessment-Fahad-Ansari-800px_half_column_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/North-Wales-Police-risk-assessment-Fahad-Ansari-800px.jpg 1280w" alt="Image shows police risk review document, with solicitor Fahad Ansari identified as a Hamas member" height="412" width="279"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>Police risk review identified solicitor Fahad Ansari as a Hamas member </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>A police officer who completed a risk assessment made a handwritten note under the heading “membership of a known group” stating “Hamas”.</p> <p>According to a legal submission from Ansari’s barrister for a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630116/Hamas-lawyer-challenges-police-after-they-seized-legal-files-from-phone-in-Schedule-7-stop">judicial review</a> – originally due to be held today (6 May 2026), the police officer was “essentially” equating Ansari, who is not a member of Hamas, with his client.</p> <p>The police officer confirmed in a witness statement that his note was inaccurate. “What I had intended to write was that Mr Ansari worked as a solicitor for Hamas, and not that he was a member of the group,” he said.</p> <p>The officer added that no other officers involved in the stop or the examination of Ansari’s phone saw the note and that it did not affect any of the decisions made by other officers. “Everyone clearly understood the position that Mr Ansari was the solicitor for Hamas,” he wrote.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Ansari not questioned in earlier stop"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Ansari not questioned in earlier stop</h2> <p>It emerged that Ansari had been stopped previously, in 2024, under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, before he represented Hamas, in what appeared to be a random stop.</p> <p>He identified himself as a solicitor and was not asked any questions about Hamas or Palestine. He did not have his mobile phone seized, downloaded or copied on that first occasion, unlike his later Schedule 7 stop, barrister Hugh Southey KC wrote in a skeleton argument.</p> <p>He said the significant difference between the two Schedule 7 stops was that Ansari had made an application on behalf of Hamas before the second stop.</p> <p>The chief constable of North Wales Police has made contradictory statements about the reasons for stopping Ansari in 2025.</p> <p>In January 2026, she stated that “there was an underlying reason or reason for the stop: it was not random”. The chief constable now states that she has “not confirmed” that the stop was a “targeted stop”.</p> <p>It appears that the chief constable has approached litigation heard in open court in a “confused, contradictory and less than candid manner”, Southey wrote.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Legally privileged material"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Legally privileged material</h2> <p>The phone seized by North Wales Police contained legally privileged material, including communications with clients, their families, witnesses and experts, along with documents, financial information and internet research related to clients.</p> <figure class="main-article-image half-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Fahad-Ansari-solicitor-800px-h.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Fahad-Ansari-solicitor-800px-h_half_column_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Fahad-Ansari-solicitor-800px-h_half_column_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Fahad-Ansari-solicitor-800px-h.jpg 1280w" alt="Photo shows solicitor Fahad Ansari, who was stopped under Schedule 7 powers" height="302" width="279"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>Solicitor Fahad Ansari is seeking a judicial review against North Wales Police </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>A police officer subsequently prepared a list of keywords, including names of UK proscribed organisations and words based on research the officer had conducted into Ansari, to allow an independent counsel to “sift and review” data on the solicitor’s phone.</p> <p>Ansari argues that the safeguards, including using an independent counsel to assess the contents of the phone, were inadequate to protect legally privileged material, and that he has no way of knowing whether such material was accessed by investigators.</p> <p>The chief constable wrote to Ansari in March this year, stating that the police had completed their examination of his work phone. Ansari has sought confirmation of whether police officers had inadvertently seen privileged material from the phone.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Lack of rights"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Lack of rights</h2> <p>The consequence of the approach taken by the chief constable of North Wales Police is that Ansari would be entitled to greater safeguards if he were investigated for having committed an offence, and where there had already been a judicial warrant, Southey wrote in the skeleton argument.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> This is not Belfast in the 1980s when such messages were delivered by bullets, but the intention feels uncomfortably similar: represent clients and face consequences </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Fahad Ansari, solicitor</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>Ansari said that the Court of Appeal had recognised that his argument for greater disclosure from the police had merit.</p> <p>“Previously, the High Court allowed the police to rely on secret evidence. In situations like this, it’s normally expected that at least a summary of the allegations is shared to allow a semblance of a fair hearing,” he wrote in a post on LinkedIn.</p> <p>The police’s apparent lack of distinction between being a member of Hamas and being a legal representative of Hamas raises “serious concerns” and would deter lawyers from representing proscribed groups, he added.</p> <p>“This is not Belfast in the 1980s when such messages were delivered by bullets, but the intention feels uncomfortably similar: represent clients and face consequences,” he said.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Phantom Parrot"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Phantom Parrot</h2> <p>A document leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 raised concerns that information collected from phones during Schedule 7 searches was being covertly collected at UK borders under GCHQ’s “Phantom Parrot” programme.</p> <p>Ansari said North Wales Police had declined to say whether information from his phone had been shared with any other organisations.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about the case</h3> <ul type="square" class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639704/Police-do-not-have-to-explain-to-lawyer-Fahad-Ansari-why-they-seized-his-phone-data-says-court">Police do not have to explain to lawyer Fahad Ansari why they seized his phone data</a>, says court: A High Court judge has ruled that police do not have to give reasons to lawyer, who acts for Hamas, why they seized his mobile phone data             </li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633407/Hamas-lawyer-seeks-appeal-following-polices-seizure-of-his-phone-at-Welsh-port">Hamas lawyer seeks appeal following police’s seizure of his phone at Welsh port</a>: Police ordered to give reasons in closed court for seizing phone of UK Hamas lawyer.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639704/Police-do-not-have-to-explain-to-lawyer-Fahad-Ansari-why-they-seized-his-phone-data-says-court">Police say that solicitors cannot have a ‘cast iron defence’ to protect their electronic devices from ever being searched</a>: London court orders police to disclose reasons for seizing and copying the contents of a phone belonging to a UK lawyer who represented Hamas, but refuses an injunction to prevent police from reviewing the phone until after judicial review</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630116/Hamas-lawyer-challenges-police-after-they-seized-legal-files-from-phone-in-Schedule-7-stop">Hamas lawyer challenges police after they seized legal files from phone in Schedule 7 stop</a>: A UK solicitor hired by Hamas to challenge its proscription in the UK as a terrorist organisation argues police acted unlawfully by seizing a phone containing confidential legally privileged material about his clients.</li> </ul> </div> </div> <ul type="square" class="default-list"></ul> </section> A police officer wrongly described a solicitor acting for Hamas in an appeal against its proscribed status in the UK as a Hamas member during Schedule 7 phone seizure https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/UK-border-control-passport-travel-getty.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642804/Police-wrongly-identified-solicitor-Fahad-Ansari-as-Hamas-member-during-Schedule-7-phone-seizure Wed, 06 May 2026 12:54:00 GMT Police wrongly identified solicitor Fahad Ansari as Hamas member during Schedule 7 phone seizure <p>In the high-stakes environment of the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Healthcare-and-NHS-IT">operating theatre</a>, the surgeon’s steady hand (or the robotic scalpel) is literally the sharp end of the process. But in their train lies the invisible grind of hospital logistics, where incredibly valuable surgery resources are often deployed less than optimally as humans try to apply subjective estimation to theatre scheduling and planning.</p> <p>For years, the promise of digital health has been synonymous with telepresence, often in the form of a “Zoom for surgeons” that allowed remote observation during procedures in the operating room (OR). </p> <p>But as healthcare moves into 2026, the focus is shifting to “intelligence-first” surgery. By treating the operating theatre as <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Work-is-broken-Can-agentic-AI-fix-it">an “unbounded” problem</a> that can be reasoned through at scale, technologists are solving the logistical challenges that have limited optimal working.</p> <p>By utilising computer vision as an instrument of measure, and generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) as a tool for predictive scheduling, AWS customer Proximie is transforming the operating theatre from a black box into a data-rich environment. </p> <p>We spoke to Proximie at AWS’s recent London Summit, and found out how the company manages 120TB of unstructured video data across a hybrid edge-to-cloud architecture, the technical guardrails they have built to <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">protect patient data sovereignty</a>, and why the future of surgery relies on AI becoming an invisible “texture” <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632366/How-the-UAE-is-using-AI-to-transform-healthcare">in the hospital environment</a>.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The ‘hanging around’ problem"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The ‘hanging around’ problem</h2> <p>The starting point for Proximie isn’t surgery itself, but the five billion people worldwide who lack access to safe procedures. </p> <p>Richard Carter, CTO at Proximie, argues that because building new hospitals and training staff takes decades, the key thing is to get more out of existing resources. “Healthcare is largely a logistics and communications challenge,” Carter says. “The time is not in getting surgeons to work faster; the time is to minimise the hanging around time.”</p> <p>To solve this, Proximie uses ceiling-mounted sensors to create a statement of fact around OR workflows. Unlike human recall, which Carter describes as fragile and subjective, computer vision provides an objective record of exactly when a patient enters the anaesthetic room and when they depart the procedure room. By removing sentiment from the discussion, hospitals can identify exactly where the “dead time” exists.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The predictive scheduler"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The predictive scheduler</h2> <p>This data collection allows Proximie to tackle one of the most difficult variables in hospital management – elective list scheduling. If a scheduler underestimates a procedure, the entire day’s list falls behind, putting immense pressure on staff. If they overestimate, valuable capacity is wasted.</p> <p>By analysing three years of Electronic Health Record (EHR) data, Proximie’s AI can now outperform human schedulers. It correlates variables that are often too complex for manual calculation, such as the statistical link between a patient’s BMI, age  and the specific surgeon-anaesthetist combination. </p> <p>The real-world impact is significant. Thoracic surgeons at St Thomas’ in London have successfully added one extra major case per day simply by using this real-time data to tighten their schedules.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="From ‘Zoom for surgeons’ to unbounded AI"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>From ‘Zoom for surgeons’ to unbounded AI</h2> <p>During the pandemic, Proximie was often described as “Zoom for surgeons”. While telepresence was a vital off-ramp that normalised digital entry into the OR, Carter explains that video access has now become a feature, not the product. The real challenge is the “unstructured” nature of video and audio data, which historically was impossible to process at scale.</p> <p>“If you’re playing a game of chess, although it is very large, there is a finite number of chess positions,” Carter says. “With healthcare, it is absolutely infinite, because we are all unique as individuals.” </p> <p>He defines healthcare as an unbounded problem, but that 2026-era AI can finally reason around these infinite variables. The goal is for AI to become a texture within the hospital – an invisible layer that removes the “grunt work and grind” rather than acting as a standalone gadget.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Technical architecture – edge vs cloud"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Technical architecture – edge vs cloud</h2> <p>Managing 120TB of unstructured data globally requires a sophisticated hybrid model to navigate latency and data privacy.</p> <p>Edge devices, mounted on the OR ceilings, handle privacy at the source. They obfuscate and redact sensitive information on the device before any data ever leaves the room. Carter is adamant that no unobscured data ever leaves the OR. Once redacted, the data is sent to the AWS cloud for massive, asynchronous processing. Carter argues that on-premise solutions are economically unviable because they lack the upgrade path and cross-system visibility that a cloud provider such as AWS offers.</p> <p>Meanwhile, in real time frame-by-frame analysis, certain procedures, such as laparoscopy – which is entirely hypothetical, says Carter – the system will only have 18 milliseconds to analyse a frame at 60fps. This makes edge computing necessary for tasks where latency would have a practical impact.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The encryption moat"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The encryption moat</h2> <p>When operating across different jurisdictions, data sovereignty is a non-negotiable requirement. Proximie utilises AWS Global Accelerator to ensure data is routed and stored strictly within a user’s jurisdiction. “The user doesn’t have to decide where to put data,” Carter says. “The workflow obligates it.”</p> <p>Addressing concerns regarding the US Cloud Act – which potentially allows US courts to demand data from US-headquartered companies – Carter offers a pragmatic technical defence.</p> <p>While Proximie would comply with legal obligations, their encryption standards serve as a “shield”. He suggests that the data would be “inaccessible in the form in which it would be provided”, effectively rendering any legal surrender moot because raw, readable data remains technically impenetrable to outside parties.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Safeguarding against hallucinations"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Safeguarding against hallucinations</h2> <p>In a flesh and blood environment, the risk of AI hallucinations must be zero. Proximie manages this through a human-in-the-loop governance model. The AI provides recommendations, such as a “win of the day” or highlighting the greatest opportunity for efficiency, but it is never allowed to be executive.</p> <p>Crucially, the system requires the AI to state its reasoning. It cannot just give a recommendation, but must show the specific data points used to reach that conclusion. This traceability allows theatre managers and clinicians – whom Carter notes are not shy about challenging colleagues – to maintain final control over the workflow.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The future of surgical logistics"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The future of surgical logistics</h2> <p>As Proximie scales, the roadmap is focused on making AI even more of a background utility. By solving the core infrastructure and logistics questions that even the most skilled humans struggle with, the company aims to move closer to its mission of providing safe surgery for the five billion people currently without it.</p> <p>The transition from a telepresence tool to an intelligence-first operating system is, in Carter’s view, the only way to meet the infinite demands of global healthcare. By leveraging the scale of the cloud and the privacy of the edge, the OR is finally moving beyond the limitations of human recall and into an era of objective, data-driven efficiency.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about use of AI</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642040/Digital-twin-of-athletes-heart-to-demonstrate-future-of-healthcare">Digital twin of athlete’s heart to demonstrate future of healthcare</a>. IT services firm opens a window to the future of healthcare and physical training as tech advancements converge.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633420/NHS-could-save-millions-of-hours-a-year-using-AI-pilot-shows">NHS could save millions of hours a year using AI, pilot shows</a>. A Microsoft Copilot AI trial in 90 NHS organisations found that a national roll-out could save up to 400,000 hours per month.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> AWS customer Proximie delivers AI-driven operating theatre logistics and tele-surgery. We spoke to its engineering vice-president about the challenges of cloud in a life or death environment https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/healthcare-doctor-tablet-1-adobe.jpeg https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Beyond-telesurgery-How-Proximie-uses-AI-to-optimise-surgery-logistics Wed, 06 May 2026 08:36:00 GMT Beyond telesurgery: How Proximie uses AI to optimise surgery logistics <p>Hyperscaler cloud is incompatible with <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/data-sovereignty">data sovereignty</a>. That’s because, as US companies, the hyperscalers are potentially subject to US court orders that can compel them to exfiltrate overseas citizen data.</p> <p>The paradoxical situation for <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Software-as-a-Service-SaaS">hyperscaler clouds</a> is that they are inherently global and connected because that’s how they gain their economies of scale. </p> <p>Those conclusions result from a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Is-cloud-data-sovereignty-all-just-a-case-of-Trust-me-bro">Computer Weekly investigation into data sovereignty</a> that asked the hyperscalers a set of questions aimed at discovering their ability – in technical terms – to withstand US court orders that compel eavesdropping on foreign citizens.</p> <p>We asked Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud, Microsoft, IBM and Oracle the following:</p> <ul class="default-list"> <li>How they would technically prevent a US court order that compelled them to access customer data.</li> <li>How they perform data-in-use functions on in-the-clear data if they say they don’t possess the keys to do so.</li> <li>Whether US-authored updates that contain US court-ordered “technical assistance” updates could bypass data controls and air gaps.</li> <li>Whether they could demonstrate they have a distinct UK region capable of operating all core services in total isolation from global infrastructure.</li> <li>Whether standard terms of service allow them to move customer data and metadata to other geographies.</li> </ul> <p>The context of the investigation is the heightened sense of risk in terms of <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Go-big-or-go-home-Should-UK-IT-buyers-favour-US-clouds-or-homegrown-providers">data sovereignty in the current geopolitical situation</a>. In particular, it is focused on the powers of US courts to order US-headquartered companies to provide data held on their systems, wherever those systems are.</p> <p>Instruments for achieving this include the <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/252437526/CLOUD-Act-stirs-tension-between-privacy-advocates-and-big-tech">US Cloud Act</a>, which compels US companies to provide to US law enforcement data in their “possession, custody, or control” even if that data is held overseas. US courts can also enact non-disclosure orders that prohibit a company from telling the data subject that their information has been requested or handed over.</p> <p>In addition, the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252433611/New-controversies-upset-plans-for-US-Foreign-Intelligence-Surveillance-Act">Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)</a> Section 702 – due for renewal soon – can compel a service provider to provide “technical assistance” to facilitate a search, with no protection for foreign citizens targeted therewith.</p> <p>Hyperscaler responses to our questions seemed largely to avoid core issues. When we asked about cloud services in general, they responded as though we’d asked about air-gapped and on-premise offers. When we asked about the potential use of backdoor access via updates ordered by US courts, they talked about the use of local staff (or air-gapping again). And when we asked about the possibility of harvesting data, they pointed to encryption and customer-held keys, but did not address that, for the most part, data is processed unencrypted. </p> <p>There are several difficulties with these responses, which you can <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Is-cloud-data-sovereignty-all-just-a-case-of-Trust-me-bro">read for yourself here</a>.</p> <p>One of these difficulties is that, ultimately, a US court can compel “technical assistance” to gain foreign citizen data held in its systems, and that can occur via a compiled software update that would be unreadable by humans and would not contain obvious clues about its function.</p> <p>Another is that even in the rare cases where expensive and resource-intensive data-in-use encryption is used, it is still possible to scrape data from memory.</p> <p>A further difficulty is that in standard terms of service, hyperscalers routinely transit data to other geographies as part of <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366589152/Microsoft-admits-no-guarantee-of-sovereignty-for-UK-policing-data">follow-the-sun support</a>.</p> <p>The reality is that to achieve anything approaching data sovereignty, customers must opt out of standard cloud terms of service, or use air-gapped services, though none of these is technically 100% proofed against intrusion. </p> <p>All this is a key issue for the UK, given that in the public sector alone, US hyperscale cloud providers have near-universal penetration and account for the bulk of technology spending. </p> <p>In the 2023-2024 financial year, 95% of central and local public sector organisations in the UK spent budget on hyperscale cloud services across more than 1,100 public sector bodies, according to <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">data from analyst firm Tussell</a>.</p> <p>Notable examples include <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630792/Ministry-of-Defence-signs-400m-sovereign-cloud-deal-with-Google">Google’s £400m contract signed last year to supply the Ministry of Defence with “sovereign cloud” capability</a> based on its Google Distributed Cloud air-gapped offer. But that’s just one example. </p> <p>The UK public sector is densely connected to US hyperscaler infrastructure, and the UK’s Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">lacks a definition of data sovereignty</a>.  </p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about data sovereignty</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">Breaking the stranglehold – responses to data sovereignty risk</a>: We look at the political and government responses to risks around data sovereignty and massive dependence on the three US hyperscalers – AWS, Azure and GCP – in the UK and Europe.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">The rise of the splinternet? Data sovereignty risks and responses</a>: We look at the political, legal and economic risks around data sovereignty, the fears for digital dependency and massive hyperscaler penetration in the UK public sector. </li> </ul> </div> </div> We asked the hyperscalers how they would respond to US court-ordered eavesdropping on foreign citizen data – and got responses that highlight a paradoxical situation https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/searchITChannel/systems_channel/itchannel_article_020.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642487/Cloud-and-data-sovereignty-caught-in-a-paradox Wed, 06 May 2026 06:19:00 GMT Cloud and data sovereignty caught in a paradox <p>In the UK, giant cloud providers – Amazon Web Services (AWS), Google Cloud and Microsoft – run the systems we depend on for vital functionality in the public and private sectors. </p> <p>In the public sector alone, US hyperscale cloud providers have near-universal penetration and account for the bulk of technology spending. </p> <p>In the financial year 2023/2024, 95% of central and local public sector organisations in the UK spent budget on hyperscale cloud services across more than 1,100 public sector bodies, including government departments, councils, police forces and NHS organisations, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">according to data that comes from analyst Tussell</a>.</p> <p>This begs the question, if the UK’s key national infrastructure is run by foreign-owned companies, is the data of UK citizens secure should a court in the US compel a hyperscaler to provide it? Here lies <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Software-as-a-Service-SaaS">the nub of data sovereignty</a>. </p> <p>In this article, we provide a definition of data sovereignty, the ways it may be undermined from overseas – particularly by the US Cloud Act and FISA Section 702 – drill down into the detail of differing states of encryption and what they mean for security and sovereignty, and look at the inherently cross-border nature of cloud services and its impact on data sovereignty. </p> <p>Core to the article are questions we asked the hyperscalers that aimed to get at exactly how their services could be described as providing data sovereignty. </p> <p>These included how they could technically prevent US court-compelled snooping, the protection afforded by encryption, especially during processing, and how <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632561/Court-dismisses-Apples-appeal-against-Home-Office-backdoor">court-compelled backdoors</a> might be injected into infrastructure updates. We also asked to what extent it is possible to offer a sovereign UK cloud region and whether standard cloud terms conflict with <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Data-is-a-sovereignty-issue-And-broader-than-just-the-hyperscalers">data sovereignty</a>.</p> <p>The results illustrate the paradox that lies at the heart of cloud services and data sovereignty.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Defining data sovereignty"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Defining data sovereignty</h2> <p>We live in a land where the government can’t define data sovereignty. <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">We asked</a> the UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) in February about its progress towards a <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/whatis/definition/data-sovereignty">definition of data sovereignty</a>, but it couldn’t give one or say when it would have one. </p> <p>But we can work out a definition.</p> <p>The idea of sovereignty as applied to states means the solely held power to govern or control a country.</p> <p>For example, if country A invades country B and establishes control over a swathe of land, where country B’s armed forces, police, and so on, no longer have any authority, then it can be said that country B no longer has sovereignty in the portion of its territory so affected. </p> <p>We can form a definition of data sovereignty based on the same principle. </p> <p>So, if a company headquartered in country A provides technology services in country B, and can effect access to data of citizens of that country, then country B cannot say the data of its citizens is sovereign.</p> <p>Country B may have laws that protect the data of its citizens. But if the country in which the tech company is headquartered has the ability to compel it to provide data held in its systems in another country, then those two sets of laws conflict. Or more to the point, the laws of country B are undermined, and are not sovereign. </p> <p>It’s a parallel to where a country has laws that govern its citizens, but the presence of foreign armed forces and the rules they impose nullify its writ. </p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about data sovereignty</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">Breaking the stranglehold – responses to data sovereignty risk</a>: We look at the political and government responses to risks around data sovereignty and massive dependence on the three US hyperscalers – AWS, Azure and GCP – in the UK and Europe.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">The rise of the splinternet? Data sovereignty risks and responses</a>: We look at the political, legal and economic risks around data sovereignty, the fears for digital dependency and massive hyperscaler penetration in the UK public sector. </li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The Cloud Act and FISA Section 702"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The Cloud Act and FISA Section 702</h2> <p>A good example of a law that compels companies headquartered within its jurisdiction to hand over data they possess is the <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/252437526/CLOUD-Act-stirs-tension-between-privacy-advocates-and-big-tech">US Cloud Act</a>, passed into law during US President Donald Trump’s first term.</p> <p>Cloud here stands for Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data. It was enacted in 2018 after Microsoft refused to hand over customer data held in a datacentre in Ireland, and it was determined that the US Department of Justice could not use domestic warrants to seize data held overseas. </p> <p>The Cloud Act compels US companies to provide to US law enforcement data in their “possession, custody, or control” even if overseas. </p> <p>At the same time, a US court can issue a non-disclosure order alongside any order under the Cloud Act. That’s basically a gag order that prohibits a company from telling the data subject that their information has been requested or handed over.</p> <p>There are ways a company subject to a Cloud Act order can challenge the court. These include a challenge on grounds of “comity”, in which the user in question is not a US person and that disclosure would violate the laws of a “qualifying foreign country”, namely one that has a bilateral agreement with the US, like the UK or Australia.</p> <p>Also, the Cloud Act is considered to be “encryption neutral”, so companies can be compelled to hand over what they have, but it does not compel them to break their own encryption if they do not already have the keys.</p> <p>Having said all that, US government agencies have other laws in their toolbox. </p> <p>Namely, the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252433611/New-controversies-upset-plans-for-US-Foreign-Intelligence-Surveillance-Act">Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA)</a> Section 702, which is up for an imminent vote to re-authorise it. Using this, the US government can compel a service provider to provide “technical assistance” to facilitate a search, with no protection for foreign citizens who are targeted by provisions under the act.</p> <p>The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has twice struck down data-sharing agreements between the US and EU (<a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Max-Schrems-The-man-who-broke-Safe-Harbour">Schrems I</a> and <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/How-Schrems-II-will-impact-data-sharing-between-the-UK-and-the-US">Schrems II</a>) because FISA Section 702 does not provide equivalent protection to EU citizens.</p> <p>Such “technical assistance” could take the form of compiled code in a software update that enabled the exfiltration of data. </p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Does encryption protect citizen data?"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Does encryption protect citizen data?</h2> <p>When we get to the responses of the hyperscalers to questions about data sovereignty, we will see an appeal to the fact that data in their systems is encrypted and that only customers hold the keys.</p> <p>We have also seen that the US Cloud Act does not compel a court-ordered company to hand over encryption keys, although FISA 702 can compel “technical assistance” to gain access to data.</p> <p>Here, it is important to drill down into encryption. </p> <p>Firstly, to say that for most data for most of the time, encryption is as good a protection as you can get. Current encryption standards dictate algorithms that are practically impenetrable.</p> <p>So, if you apply, for example, <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/definition/Advanced-Encryption-Standard">AES-256</a> to data-at-rest or data-in-transit, it cannot be read.</p> <p>The fly in the ointment comes when data is being processed. It’s also a problem for companies that argue that the data they hold is secure because it is encrypted.</p> <p>The problem is that – generally speaking – data-in-use must be unencrypted to be processed. And so, in theory, a foreign law enforcement agency that wanted to access data in a cloud system overseas could order data to be collected during processing.</p> <p>Memory scraping, in which malware scans active memory to steal unencrypted data, is possible, for example.</p> <p>It’s true that most data-in-use is unencrypted, although cloud providers do offer so-called confidential computing of some sort.</p> <p>For example, a <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchitoperations/definition/trusted-execution-environment-TEE">trusted execution environment (TEE)</a> in so-called confidential computing creates a hardware-encrypted “black box” inside the central processing unit (CPU), which means an unauthorised intruder cannot see inside it while data is being processed.</p> <p>TEEs are breakable, however. It is possible to “listen” to the CPU and measure power consumption or tiny timing fluctuations to guess the data being processed.</p> <p><a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/definition/homomorphic-encryption">Fully homomorphic encryption (FHE)</a> is the Holy Grail, however, because it allows for computation without decrypting data. But that also means it is computationally expensive and isn’t commonplace.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Air gaps, updates and follow-the-sun"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Air gaps, updates and follow-the-sun</h2> <p>Hyperscaler clouds are an international web of regions and availability zones. They comprise a global operating system, almost entirely managed by artificial intelligence (AI) and orchestrated automation.</p> <p>Cloud networks are made up of regions and availability zones (AZs). Regions are geographically separate – and thus upon them rests the claim of sovereignty by the cloud providers – while AZs are datacentres within a region. AZs within a region are connected by high-bandwidth connections, whereas regions are all interconnected but not by the same low-latency connections.</p> <p>Clouds run on software-defined everything, with every component represented as code, where faults can be monitored and workloads shifted to a different location should issues be detected, and with rolling updates on a non-disruptive zone-by-zone basis.</p> <p>Follow-the-sun in support terms is when support teams hand off responsibility to teams elsewhere in the world to benefit from more convenient (ie, less costly) working hours than the region in question. </p> <p>Follow-the-sun in workload terms means the movement of workloads across the globe to take advantage of lower energy costs or cooler ambient temperatures.</p> <p>In both cases, there is potentially a risk to sovereignty, by dint of where data resides at any given time and the jurisdiction under which support staff may operate, although customers can specify that data permanently resides in a given region. </p> <p>If you sign a standard business or enterprise support contract with a hyperscaler, you are opting in to follow-the-sun by default. A standard agreement usually means you agree to terms that allow the provider to support your account from any global location to meet 24/7 uptime guarantees. </p> <p>It also allows them to route technical metadata (logs, access records, telemetry) to global hubs to maintain the cloud and to allow global administrators access for emergency maintenance, regardless of where those administrators are.</p> <p>The fact that it is metadata that moves potentially allows a provider to say, “We don’t move your data”, but the metadata may be enough for a FISA Section 702 investigation, for example. </p> <p>You can’t just uncheck a box in the settings to opt out of follow-the-sun. Instead, you have to move to a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Sovereign-cloud-and-AI-services-tipped-for-take-off-in-2026">sovereign cloud</a> or regulated industry contract – the AWS European Sovereign Cloud or Microsoft Sovereign Cloud, for example. These guarantee that support and operations are handled only in a specific region.</p> <p>There are also “sovereign cloud” solutions, in which the “cloud” is disconnected from the wide area network (WAN).</p> <p>Obviously, if a customer is on a standard contract, support has full oversight of maintenance and updates, and quite likely from anywhere in the world. You’d think that a local sovereign cloud would remove that scenario, but the cloud provider’s infrastructure must still be maintained, and it is via patching that that occurs. Here is where unwanted snooping could be introduced. </p> <p>Even if the UK staff are the only ones physically in the datacentre, the private keys used to sign “official” software updates likely reside in a hardware security module (HSM) in the US or its facility elsewhere.</p> <p>So, if a US court compels the company to sign an update that contains legally sanctioned spyware, UK “sovereign” staff have no technical way to verify that the code doesn’t contain a backdoor. </p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Questions to the hyperscalers"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Questions to the hyperscalers</h2> <p>We asked <a href="#AWS">AWS</a>, <a href="#Google">Google Cloud</a> and <a href="#Microsoft">Microsoft</a> five questions around data sovereignty. We also asked <a href="#IBM">IBM</a> and Oracle, because they are both fair-sized US-based suppliers to the UK public sector. </p> <p>The intention was to gauge the levels of exposure their customers could face with regard to data sovereignty.</p> <p>All responded except Oracle, whose PR representatives failed to reply to three emails. </p> <p>The questions were preceded by a preamble that drew attention to the US Cloud Act, non-disclosure orders and FISA Section 702, and the powers therein to compel a provider to grant access, forbid notifications to customers of a court order, compel “technical assistance”, and the possibility of updates authored in the US as a means to effect access to customer data. </p> <p>The questions asked about:</p> <ul class="default-list"> <li>The technical barriers, if any, in the provider’s cloud services that prevent a court order from forcing the use of encryption keys to decrypt customer data.</li> <li>The technical means by which data-in-use functions are carried out without cloud provider access to encryption keys.</li> <li>Whether the cloud provider can guarantee a US-authored software update that contains “technical assistance” aimed at gaining access to data cannot bypass air-gapped systems.</li> <li>Whether the cloud provider has a wholly distinct UK region with exclusively UK-resident support and engineering, including third-party contractors. </li> <li>Whether standard terms of cloud service allow for customer data to be moved offshore, or whether a customer can have 100% UK data residency without a bespoke contract.</li> </ul> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Hyperscalers dodge the questions"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Hyperscalers dodge the questions</h2> <p>Here we summarise their responses. Full responses are available to view in the <a href="#QandAs">box at the end of this article</a>.</p> <p>Hyperscaler responses to our questions fall under the following categories.</p> <p><strong>“Don’t look there! Look at the air gap!”</strong> The subject of the questions was cloud services in general, but responses often shifted attention to specifically air-gapped offerings.</p> <p><a href="#Google">Google</a> opted to talk about its niche, air-gapped Google Distributed Cloud in response to nearly every question. Perhaps a tacit admission that standard cloud terms of service come nowhere near providing data sovereignty. </p> <p>Google wasn’t alone here, though; just the most dependent on the tactic. AWS also pointed to its AWS Dedicated Local Zones and Outposts managed on-premise offers when asked about cloud services.  </p> <p><strong>“Look! Local people!” </strong>A number of responses tried to distract from the inherent technical vulnerabilities that come with the global, linked nature of hyperscaler cloud. They instead drew attention to the residency or nationality of human operators rather than the reality that automated, US-signed code updates can bypass human gatekeepers entirely.</p> <p>It is virtually impossible for a locally resident operator to scan a multi-gigabyte compiled binary for a state-level backdoor. A backdoor in a modern cloud stack wouldn’t be a line of code that said, “<em>if (user == 'FBI') return data</em>”. It would be a subtle mathematical weakness in an encryption library or a port knocking sequence hidden in a network driver. </p> <p>Local operators can, at best, scan for known viruses, not state-level “technical assistance”.</p> <p><strong>Encryption? Of course. For data-in-use? Errr. </strong>All hyperscalers highlighted the use of encryption in customer data and customer key retention to imply total security. </p> <p>That works for “at-rest” and “in-transit” scenarios. But it glosses over data-in-use scenarios where data must, in most cases, be decrypted in memory. </p> <p>If a US-compelled “technical assistance” order under FISA Section 702 forces a US company to push a firmware update to its own HSMs or Nitro controllers, that update is signed by the US parent. Hardware isolation is only as sovereign as the person who holds the cryptographic signing key for the firmware.</p> <p>Also, in a software-as-a-service (SaaS) environment like M365, Microsoft provides the application and is the administrator. Here, customer-managed keys often break “search” and “discovery” features in SaaS. So, if a customer wants to search their emails in M365, the data must be decrypted by Microsoft’s service. </p> <p><strong>Is it sovereign? Of course; it’s in the EU. </strong>In some cases, hyperscalers responded by pointing to European sovereign solutions. <a href="#AWS">AWS</a>, for example, points to its <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366557158/AWS-to-open-European-sovereign-cloud-region">European Sovereign Cloud service</a>, which doesn’t locate data in the UK and is not technically sovereign anyway, given the EU is not a sovereign state. </p> <p>Meanwhile, if AWS Seattle has “control” over the AWS Germany subsidiary, which it does, financially and technically, a US court doesn’t care about the EU’s “Sovereign Cloud” label.</p> <p><strong>“Trust Me, Bro,” as a legal pledge.</strong> <a href="#Microsoft">Microsoft</a> majored on this one in its responses. It switches out technical proof of impossibility for corporate pledges to “challenge every government request” in court. This asks the customer to trust a legal process rather than a technical lock. </p> <p>Spoiler alert: There are zero known instances where a hyperscaler has successfully and permanently defied a final, non-appealable US court order to protect a non-US citizen’s data stored abroad.</p> <p>To sum all this up, the hyperscalers are essentially saying that standard cloud is not sovereign. To achieve a level of protection that would allow them to answer these questions with any level of integrity, a customer must move to isolated, air-gapped, or hardware-encrypted tiers that are significantly more expensive, regionally limited and functionally constrained. And would that be cloud?</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The paradox of data sovereignty in the cloud"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The paradox of data sovereignty in the cloud</h2> <p>At the end of the day, hyperscaler cloud is caught in a paradox when it comes to data sovereignty. If a cloud were truly sovereign – disconnected, local-only, human-managed – it would lose the cloud economics that make it attractive due to its global scale, automation and the accompanying economies. And so, “sovereign cloud” is really often a marketing term that means standard cloud with extra paperwork.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading"><a id="QandAs"></a>The questions we asked and hyperscaler responses</h3> <p>We wanted to get to the bottom of just how sovereign hyperscaler cloud services are. The main article discusses the key issues and summarises the responses of hyperscalers to the questions put to them by Computer Weekly.</p> <p>Here we reproduce the questions in full, along with hyperscaler responses.</p> <p>We asked for “specific, technical” answers to questions, and hyperscalers were told general marketing statements or high-level policy positions would not be printed (though that’s what some responses amount to and are printed here).</p> <p>The goal of the questions was stated as: “To provide readers with a clear view of which sovereignty claims are backed by verifiable technical mechanisms and which remain matters of corporate policy.”</p> <p>The following context was also given, namely that under 18 USC 2705(b), federal courts can issue non-disclosure orders alongside US Cloud Act data warrants that legally forbid providers from notifying customers of a breach. </p> <p>Also, that when combined with the “technical assistance” provisions of FISA Section 702, the US government can compel a provider to facilitate access to data. </p> <p>Finally, a key assumption stated in the preamble to questions was that because cloud stacks rely on a global supply chain where code is authored and signed at a US headquarters, the “update” is a potential invisible vector for state-level intervention that is difficult to obstruct.</p> <h2>What we asked the hyperscalers</h2> <p><strong>Question 1:</strong> If your cloud services require access to data “in the clear” to perform processing tasks (such as indexing, AI inferencing, or analytics), how do you technically prevent a US-compelled warrant from forcing you to use the required cryptographic keys to decrypt and surreptitiously provide that data to law enforcement?</p> <p><strong>Question 2:</strong> If you claim to never have access to encrypted customer data, how do you technically perform “data-in-use” functions without possessing the keys to decrypt that data within your processing environment?</p> <p><strong>Question 3:</strong> If your sovereign cloud relies on a software supply chain authored and signed by a US-headquartered parent company, how can you technically guarantee that a US-compelled “technical assistance” update – issued under a mandatory gag order – could not silently bypass local air gaps and data controls?</p> <p><strong>Question 4:</strong> Can you provide evidence of a wholly distinct UK region capable of operating all core services in total isolation from your global infrastructure, managed exclusively by a 100% UK-resident support and engineering framework – including all third-party subcontractors?</p> <p><strong>Question 5:</strong> Do your standard terms of service grant you the discretion to move or “offshore” customer data and metadata for residency, resiliency, or global support purposes, and if so, how can a UK customer maintain 100% residency without a bespoke contract that breaks your global automation model?</p> <h2><a id="AWS"></a>The responses: AWS</h2> <p><strong>Computer Weekly commentary</strong></p> <p>Where the questions ask for “specific, technical” responses, AWS answers vaguely, such as when it refers to “a range of technical measures and operational controls” in questions 1 and 2. </p> <p>Also, when what has been asked is specifically technical, what appears as a sleight of hand is to refer to operator and staff access to data. In the context of a massive, automated technical environment, whether an individual has access to masses of compiled code in updates is irrelevant. </p> <p>We see that type of response in questions 1, 2 and 3. The effect here is to draw attention away from a potential scenario in which a US court forced AWS to provide “technical assistance” in an update script that would easily cross borders and bypass human gatekeeping. The idea that some update code is written in European countries is another irrelevance thrown in. </p> <p>When asked in question 4 about a discrete UK region isolated from the rest of AWS’s global infrastructure, the response refers to AWS-managed on-premise infrastructure. Such an offer might provide in-country capacity – although we don’t know whether updates come from elsewhere – but it isn’t really the cloud. </p> <p>When asked whether “standard Terms of Service grant you the discretion to move or ‘offshore’ customer data and metadata”, AWS points to its European Sovereign Cloud service, which doesn’t apply to the UK and is arguably not sovereign, given the EU is not a sovereign state.</p> <p><strong>AWS response to question 1: </strong></p> <p><em>AWS customers have a range of technical measures and operational controls to prevent access to data, and AWS has designed products and services that make sure that no one – not even AWS operators – has any technical means to access customer content.</em></p> <p><em>The Cloud Act does not create any new authority for law enforcement to compel service providers to decrypt communications.</em></p> <p><strong>AWS response to question 2: </strong></p> <p><em>AWS customers have a range of technical measures and operational controls to prevent access to data, and AWS has designed products and services that make sure that no one – not even AWS operators – has any technical means to access customer content.</em></p> <p><strong>AWS response to question 3: </strong></p> <p><em>Only AWS European Sovereign Cloud employees located in the EU and subject to EU law have deployment authority over software updates. Authorised EU-resident employees of the AWS European Sovereign Cloud also have independent access to a replica of the source code needed to maintain the AWS European Sovereign Cloud services.</em></p> <p><em>“The premise of this question is also misleading. Amazon is a global company that operates worldwide supply chains reliant on suppliers and teams from every part of the world. Some of our largest AWS development teams are located in Europe – with key centers in Dublin, Dresden, and Berlin – contributing to core AWS solutions including the AWS Nitro System that powers all modern EC2 instances, Amazon Linux, and Amazon CloudWatch.</em></p> <p><strong>AWS response to question 4:</strong></p> <p><em>AWS offers several products that help customers address UK-specific sovereignty requirements. AWS Dedicated Local Zones can be deployed in a chosen UK location with local AWS employee operations and security features for data isolation and compliance. AWS Outposts deploy in customer UK facilities with hardware-enforced isolation ensuring no AWS operator access to customer data. </em></p> <p><strong>AWS response to question</strong> <strong>5:</strong></p> <p><em>With AWS, customers own their data, control where it’s stored, and decide who can access it. AWS is transparent about how services process customer data, and customers can use tools like AWS Control Tower for management. The AWS European Sovereign Cloud allows customers to keep all metadata they create entirely in the EU, including sovereign Identity and Access Management (IAM), billing, and usage metering systems. </em></p> <h2><a id="Google"></a>The responses: Google Cloud</h2> <p><strong>Computer Weekly commentary</strong></p> <p>The questions were about hyperscaler cloud services. Google provided more information than the other providers, but responded to nearly all the questions as if it had been asked about one very specific and not particularly common offering, namely Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped. </p> <p>GDC air-gapped is an on-premise solution, where – Google claims – any updates must be physically transported across the air gap and can be scanned by a trusted operator. Likewise, it says it literally could not comply with a US court order to spy on a customer or hand over data because it has no reach into their systems. That’s likely true for GDC air-gapped, but it’s not what it was asked about.</p> <p>But, Google – rather helpfully – provides information about its mainstream cloud offer that allows us to get a good idea about standard cloud services terms and conditions that the other hyperscalers don’t elaborate upon.</p> <p>For example, it says: “In a standard cloud, Google pushes updated code silently, and often multiple times in a day.” </p> <p>Similarly, it says: “Standard Terms of Service (ToS) that govern the public cloud . . . often include clauses for global load balancing, ‘follow-the-sun’ support, and data movement for resiliency.”</p> <p>And: “The standard ‘global support’ model relies on an engineer in any region being able to ‘see’ your project to troubleshoot.”</p> <p><strong>Google response to question 1:</strong></p> <p><em>In the context of Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped, the solution to the compelled disclosure dilemma isn't just a policy promise – it is a fundamental architectural constraint. Because the air-gapped version of GDC is physically and logically isolated from the public internet and Google’s corporate network, the technical barriers to a US-compelled warrant are built into the "sovereignty by design" model.</em></p> <p><em>1. Physical and Network Isolation</em></p> <p><em>No Remote Access: GDC air-gapped does not have a backhaul connection to Google’s global infrastructure. There is no persistent management plane or "phone home" feature that Google can toggle to extract data.</em></p> <p><em>Hardware Ownership: The hardware resides in the customer's chosen location (or a partner's sovereign data center). Google employees generally do not have unescorted physical access to the site.</em></p> <p><em>2. Customer-Managed Encryption Keys (CMEK)</em></p> <p><em>While processing data “in the clear” requires keys, the ownership of those keys is the technical pivot point:</em></p> <p><em>Hardware Security Modules (HSM): In a GDC air-gapped environment, the keys are stored in local HSMs physically located within the air-gapped boundary.</em></p> <p><em>Root of Trust: The customer (or a designated sovereign partner) holds the root of trust. Google does not possess a master key or a remote mechanism to bypass the local HSM to decrypt data for indexing or AI tasks.</em></p> <p><em>3. Tactical Operational Sovereignty</em></p> <p><em>To prevent surreptitious access, GDC air-gapped utilizes a Sovereign Operations model:</em></p> <p><em>No Google Personnel Required: The day-to-day operations, including patching and AI model deployment, can be handled by the customer or a local, cleared third party.</em></p> <p><em>Auditability: Every action taken within the environment is logged locally. Since Google cannot access these logs remotely, they cannot hide a data extraction process from the customer’s own security operations center (SOC).</em></p> <p><em>From a legal standpoint, if Google is served a warrant for data residing in a GDC air-gapped instance, the technical response is “Inability to Comply.” Because Google does not have the network path to reach the data, the physical access to the servers, or the cryptographic keys to decrypt the disks, they cannot “surreptitiously” provide the data. Any attempt to gain that data would require a physical raid on the customer’s own facility – which falls under the customer's local laws and security protocols, not Google’s.</em></p> <p><strong>Google response to question 2:</strong></p> <p><em>In the context of Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped, the claim of no access isn’t saying the data is never decrypted; it is saying that Google (the entity/personnel) never has access to the keys or the environment where decryption occurs. The distinction lies in the transition from Data-at-Rest to Data-in-Use within a boundary that Google cannot enter. Here is how that is technically achieved:</em></p> <p><em>1. Sovereign Boundary Logic</em></p> <p><em>In a standard public cloud, the provider manages the hypervisor and the orchestration layer. In GDC air-gapped, the entire stack, from the silicon to the AI workbench, is moved inside the customer’s perimeter.</em></p> <p><em>Local Decryption: When an AI model needs to “see” data in the clear to perform inferencing, the decryption happens on-premises using keys pulled from a local HSM </em></p> <p><em>Isolation of the Execution Environment: The decryption occurs within the customer’s air-gapped hardware. Because there is no network path back to Google, the “clear text” data exists only in the local RAM of the air-gapped servers.</em></p> <p><em>2. Customer-Controlled Key Access</em></p> <p><em>The software performing the processing must request the key from the local Key Management Service (KMS).</em></p> <p><em>Access Control Policies: The customer defines the Identity and Access Management (IAM) roles.</em></p> <p><em>Technically Barred: Google does not have an identity in the customer’s local air-gapped IAM system. Therefore, the processing environment can’t “ask” for a key on Google’s behalf, and Google cannot “push” a command to release a key to an unauthorized third party as these are Customer managed encryption keys (CMEK).</em></p> <p><strong>Google response to question 3:</strong></p> <p><em>In Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped, this risk is mitigated through a combination of Customer-Led Updates, Binary Authorization, Third-Party Operations.</em></p> <p><em>1. No “Automatic” Updates</em></p> <p><em>In a standard cloud, Google pushes updated code silently, and often multiple times in a day. In GDC air-gapped, there is no physical connection to Google.</em></p> <p><em>The Manual Bridge: Updates are provided as signed container images and binaries. The customer (or their trusted sovereign partner) must download these to a separate secure workstation, scan them, and then physically move them across the “air-gap” via encrypted media.</em></p> <p><em>Technical Sovereignty: This creates a human-in-the-loop bottleneck. A US-compelled “silent” update is impossible because Google cannot “push” anything. The customer chooses when and if to ingest the update.</em></p> <p><em>2. The “Sovereign Operator” Audit</em></p> <p><em>A critical technical defense is who applies the update.</em></p> <p><em>Third-Party Managed: GDC can be operated entirely by a local, cleared partner (eg, STE in Singapore, Proximus in Belgium). These operators act as a “sovereign shield.”</em></p> <p><em>Inspection: Before the update is applied to the live environment, these operators can deploy it in an isolated “staging” air-gap. They monitor for “phone home” behavior (which would fail anyway due to the air-gap) or unauthorized data export attempts at the virtual network layer.</em></p> <p><em>3. Technical Assistance vs. Technical Impossibility</em></p> <p><em>A company can be compelled to provide “technical assistance,” but they cannot be forced to perform the “technically impossible.”</em></p> <p><em>Hardware Root of Trust: Because the keys are in your HSM, Google cannot remotely sign a command to “export” data.</em></p> <p><em>The Gag Order Paradox: Even if Google were under a gag order, they cannot physically enter your data center to plug in a USB drive. If the only way to execute the warrant is to walk a physical drive into a sovereign facility, the legal burden shifts to the local government and the physical security team at the door.</em></p> <p><strong>Google response to question 4:</strong></p> <p><em>Yes - this could be built for customers using Google Distributed Cloud Air Gapped, like the landmark deal we have announced for the MOD. In 2025, Google Cloud and the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) formalized a landmark agreement for a sovereign, air-gapped cloud. [Link to press release]. </em></p> <p><em>Pasting the helpful info here: </em></p> <p><em>Google Distributed Cloud Air Gapped: The sovereign cloud environment will be built upon Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped, a platform designed for workloads that require strict data residency and security controls. GDC provides a hardened, air-gapped environment, ensuring that the MOD’s critical data remains within UK sovereign territory and under their direct control. This platform will also enable the responsible integration of Google's advanced AI and machine learning tools, empowering the MOD with enhanced analytical capabilities to provide operational efficiencies.</em></p> <p><strong>Google response to question 5:</strong></p> <p><em>The short answer is no. In the context of Google Distributed Cloud (GDC) air-gapped, the standard Terms of Service (ToS) that govern the public cloud which often include clauses for global load balancing, “follow-the-sun” support, and data movement for resiliency do not apply. GDC air-gapped is governed by a separate, specific legal and technical framework designed to ensure that the global automation model is physically unable to move our customers’ data or metadata.</em></p> <p><em>1. Service-Specific Terms</em></p> <p><em>Instead of the standard online ToS, air-gapped customers use GDC Air-Gapped Service Specific Terms. These terms explicitly recognize the disconnected nature of the environment:</em></p> <p><em>Removal of “Offshoring” Discretion: Because the system is air-gapped, Google legally and technically removes its own ability to move data. The terms define the "Sovereign Boundary," stating that data and metadata (logs, telemetry, and configuration) must remain within the customer-controlled or partner-operated facility.</em></p> <p><em>2. Breaking Global Automation</em></p> <p><em>You do not need a “bespoke contract” to prevent data movement because the automation model itself is local.</em></p> <p><em>Local Management Plane: In the public cloud, the control plane lives in a global mesh. In GDC air-gapped, the control plane is physically located inside the rack in your UK data center.</em></p> <p><em>Hardware-Locked Metadata: Metadata like IP addresses, VM names, and audit logs are stored on local disks within the air-gapped environment. There is no automated routine that can “call” this metadata back to a global database because there is no network route to the outside world.</em></p> <p><em>3. Sovereign Operations vs. Global Support</em></p> <p><em>The standard “global support” model relies on an engineer in any region being able to “see” your project to troubleshoot. GDC air-gapped replaces this with Resident Support.</em></p> <p><em>100% Residency of Support: Support is provided by a UK-resident, cleared team. If they need to look at a log, they do it within the UK boundary.</em></p> <p><em>No Remote Access: Even if a US engineer wanted to help, they have no technical way to log into the system. The "automation" for support is localized to a secure UK-based operations center.</em></p> <p><em>4. How to Maintain 100% Residency Without “Breaking” the Cloud</em></p> <p><em>The innovation of GDC air-gapped is that it provides a cloud-native experience that is functionally identical to the public cloud but architecturally siloed.</em></p> <p><em>Local Resiliency: Instead of relying on a US region for backup, you achieve resiliency by deploying multiple GDC racks across different UK-only zones</em></p> <p><em>The Secure Supply Chain: Google provides the code (the binaries), but you provide the home. Once that code is installed, it operates as a “black box” that answers only to your local UK administrators.</em></p> <h2><a id="Microsoft"></a>The responses: Microsoft</h2> <p><strong>Computer Weekly commentary</strong></p> <p>Microsoft chose not to respond to the questions inline, so it’s not as easy to see what its answers respond to.</p> <p>Again, we see reference to “workloads in air-gapped or disconnected environments”, when that was not the subject of the questions. </p> <p>Where questions asked for “specific, technical” responses, we get bland answers. There’s also a long paragraph about encryption keys that appears to be about data-at-rest or in-transit, which we didn’t ask about.</p> <p>There is also reference to “UK customers . . . ability to store and process their data within UK datacenters . . . [That] includes compliance with local regulations and provides geo-redundant protection for business continuity”. </p> <p>Microsoft Azure does have a data-in-use encryption offer in Azure Confidential Computing, although it doesn’t mention it by name.</p> <p>In its final paragraph, Microsoft talks of its commitment to and “strong record” in challenging court orders. But really, it amounts to “Trust me, bro.”</p> <p><strong>Microsoft responses</strong></p> <p><em>Microsoft customers can deploy workloads in air-gapped or disconnected environments using Azure Local and Microsoft 365 Local, with full control over update management, monitoring, and lifecycle operations via a local control plane.</em></p> <p><em>External Key Management allows customers to use their own on-premises or third-party Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) for encryption, ensuring Microsoft does not have access to customer keys. Microsoft’s custom HSM is deployed globally. In addition, Azure Confidential Compute, Azure Key Vault, and Double Key Encryption, are designed, deployed, and operated such that Microsoft is incapable of accessing, using, or extracting data stored in the service, including cryptographic keys.</em></p> <p><em>Microsoft performs "Data-in-Use" functions without possessing customer encryption keys by leveraging a layered encryption model and customer-managed keys.</em></p> <p><em>Microsoft offers UK customers the ability to store and process their data within UK datacenters. This includes compliance with local regulations and provides geo-redundant protection for business continuity.</em></p> <p><em>Microsoft does not provide any government with direct, unfettered access to customer data. Any data access request is subject to rigorous review, according to a strict process, by internal and external legal teams to ensure it is legally valid and compulsory, compliant with all applicable law, and strictly limited to specific account identifiers.  Further, as part of our Defending Your Data initiative we’ve committed to challenge every government request for an EU public sector or commercial customer’s data where we have a lawful basis for doing so. We have a strong record of doing just that, including through litigation where necessary.</em></p> <h2><a id="IBM"></a>The responses: IBM</h2> <p><strong>Computer Weekly commentary</strong></p> <p>IBM considered that question 1 merged disparate issues, so it didn’t answer it.</p> <p>Like others, it answered questions as if it had been asked about air-gapped environments, when it wasn’t. </p> <p>When asked about data-in-use encryption, it refers to its new IBM Sovereign Core, which appears to be a product aimed at holding encryption keys in-country but doesn’t specifically mention in-memory encryption. It references the same product when asked about “a wholly distinct UK region”.</p> <p>IBM Sovereign Core is currently in tech preview and published materials are a little light on detail. We’d want to know more about in-use encryption and connections to IBM’s global network, updates, and so on.</p> <p><strong>IBM response to question 1:  </strong></p> <p><em>This question merges several distinct concepts that are technically separate. In modern software applications data‑in‑use processing, encryption key management and lawful access requests, are all designed and governed by different architectural and operational controls. Please refer to questions 2 and 3 for relevant information. </em></p> <p><strong>IBM response to question</strong> <strong>2:</strong></p> <p><em>IBM Sovereign Core processes data‑in‑use within the customer application’s trusted execution environment, where purpose‑bound application code determines when and how data is processed; decryption, where required, is transient, in‑memory, and under the application’s control with customer visibility. Capabilities like Keep Your Own Key encryption ensure keys are held and managed exclusively by the customer and are not accessible to IBM.</em></p> <p><strong>IBM response to question 3:</strong></p> <p><em>Software supply‑chain, execution in air‑gapped environments, and legal access frameworks are all independent by design, governed by separate technical and operational controls: our clients hold full technical authority in air gapped environments, and IBM technology places transparency and control in the hands of our clients, consistent with our publicly available data access principles and law‑enforcement transparency reports. </em></p> <p><strong>IBM response to question</strong> <strong>4: </strong></p> <p><em>IBM Sovereign Core enables UK enterprises to run and govern AI workloads within the UK jurisdictional boundaries, without relying on a global provider control plane, and with the flexibility to choose UK‑based operating partners. </em></p> <p><strong>IBM response to question</strong> <strong>5:</strong></p> <p><em>For more than a century, IBM has earned the trust of our clients by responsibly managing their most valuable data. IBM is transparent about how it handles client data and does so in accordance with all applicable laws.</em></p> </div> </div> </section> Hyperscaler cloud is inherently global. Does that make data sovereignty unattainable – especially given the powers US courts hold? We grilled the hyperscalers in an attempt to find out https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/German/article/cloud-access-and-identity-2-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Is-cloud-data-sovereignty-all-just-a-case-of-Trust-me-bro Wed, 06 May 2026 06:18:00 GMT Is cloud data sovereignty all just a case of ‘Trust me, bro’? <p>Every organisation today is measured by two things: “exit velocity” and its “ability to pivot”.</p> <p>Exit velocity is how quickly you can move away from a technology, platform or contract the moment it stops serving you. Ability to pivot is how easily you can shift direction, technologically or operationally, without destabilising the business.</p> <p>Together, they define a company’s real digital resilience. And right now, most organisations don’t have either.</p> <p>This is the backdrop to new research findings:<a href="https://www.suse.com/navigating-digital-resilience-2026/"> 98% of IT</a> leaders now <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">prioritise digital sovereignty</a>, yet half still lack a formal strategy. Meanwhile,<a href="https://www.suse.com/navigating-digital-resilience-2026/"> 94% say open source</a> is very or extremely important to resilience. The intent is there but the ability to act is lagging. The gap between aspiration and execution reveals a deeper truth: knowing where your data sits is not the same as being in control of it.</p> <p>If you look at recent headlines and analysis on digital sovereignty, the discussion is mostly framed in terms of risk and the need for nation-states to exert greater control over their data and digital infrastructure. </p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about data sovereignty</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">The rise of the splinternet? Data sovereignty risks and responses</a>. We look at the political, legal and economic risks around data sovereignty, the fears for digital dependency and massive hyperscaler penetration in the UK public sector.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">Breaking the stranglehold: Responses to data sovereignty risk</a>. We look at the political and government responses to risks around data sovereignty and massive dependence on the three US hyperscalers – AWS, Azure and GCP – in the UK and Europe.</li> </ul> </div> </div> <p>Commentators are heavily focused on the downsides of continued over-reliance on big tech, with the tone skewed towards "threats", "battlegrounds", "traps" and other significant concerns. Crucially, though, much of this commentary conflates two distinct dimensions of the problem and that conflation is itself a risk, because it allows jurisdictional measures to stand in for genuine technical independence.</p> <p><strong>Lack of control</strong></p> <p>So, what’s the problem? In a nutshell, organisations everywhere have built much of their critical infrastructure on platforms they don’t control. This is hardly surprising. The <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Software-as-a-Service-SaaS">outsourced as-a-service model</a> has delivered enormous performance and financial benefits everywhere it is available. </p> <p>The numbers don’t lie. The global cloud computing market was valued at over<a href="https://www.fortunebusinessinsights.com/cloud-computing-market-102697"> $780 billion</a> last year, with the sector continuing to trend upwards. And as we know, US-owned providers occupy a dominant position. </p> <p>And it’s precisely the issue of control, or the lack of it, which has given rise to the digital sovereignty movement. </p> <p>In Europe, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">the regulatory wheels have been in motion</a> for some time. NIS2, DORA, and in the UK the Cyber Security and Resilience Bill, have tightened expectations around resilience and supply chain accountability in critical sectors. </p> <p>On an organisational level, many businesses believe they are addressing the underlying issues by moving to a national or regionally hosted cloud environment. The focus here is on ensuring data is stored under the governance of localised, relevant rules. After all, sovereignty is primarily about where data is stored, right?</p> <p>Well, not necessarily. The issue is that data location does not equate to control. In reality, even when the infrastructure is in the appropriate geographic location, the systems, software and underlying platforms often remain owned and governed by external providers.</p> <p>In these circumstances, legal jurisdiction and access rights can still sit outside the organisation, particularly as digital systems become more deeply embedded across operations and supply chains. The result is a growing mismatch between perceived sovereignty and actual control.</p> <p><strong>The hidden risks of outsourcing</strong></p> <p>These issues are nuanced. Organisations no longer simply store data in these environments. They run core operational systems on them. </p> <p>The risk here is one of usage vs control, where heavy reliance on third-party platforms is accompanied by limited visibility into how the underlying infrastructure and software actually operate. </p> <p>A good example is system updates and configurations, which typically sit with the provider, with customers dependent on decisions made outside their own governance structures. This introduces a dynamic in which critical systems are effectively governed externally, with vendor roadmaps or policy decisions having a direct, sometimes immediate, impact on operations. </p> <p>The issue is not just dependency <em>per se</em>, but concentrated dependency, with a small number of providers as stakeholders in a significant share of digital infrastructure across multiple sectors.</p> <p>The problems often only become apparent when a particular organisation needs to respond to new risks or when a change in regulation can’t be fully addressed because it lacks the required level of control. The point is that what appears to be a technology decision (ie, which cloud provider to use) actually adds to operational and regulatory risk.</p> <p><strong>Structural vulnerability</strong></p> <p>Is this anything more than a theoretical problem? The short answer is yes, because the implications of this model reach well beyond IT environments to mission-critical real-world systems in daily use.</p> <p>Take sectors such as energy, manufacturing, logistics and aviation, for example, where digital platforms support practically every key process. When control over these platforms is limited, the risk is not just technical but also extends to potential disruptions to services and outputs.</p> <p>In these and many other environments, concentrated reliance on a small number of non-domestic providers introduces a structural vulnerability, where issues that affect a single platform can have wide-reaching consequences across multiple organisations and sectors.</p> <p>This is particularly relevant in the context of unexpected or sudden shifts in policy or international relations that could affect access or service continuity. In these circumstances, organisations may find themselves exposed to risks beyond their direct control, despite meeting baseline compliance requirements. As we have all seen, government policies and ways of doing business can change rapidly and with little to no advance warning. Limiting exposure to such situations is important, including via tech infrastructure.</p> <p>The underlying risk, therefore, is a form of hidden fragility, where systems appear resilient on paper but are constrained in practice by external dependencies to the extent that digital sovereignty becomes an illusion. </p> <p>Sovereignty needs to be reframed so organisations can have complete confidence in how their outsourced systems and services are governed and changed. </p> <p>In practical terms, this means having sufficient visibility into services and dependencies to understand how they function and where risks sit. A key requirement is flexibility, particularly the ability to move workloads and data without being constrained by proprietary formats or tightly coupled architectures. </p> <p>Open standards, open source and containerisation are central to this approach because they decouple workloads from the underlying infrastructure, making it possible to move between providers or environments without being locked into a single vendor's ecosystem. This is common knowledge among IT teams, and now boardrooms and government offices are starting to realise. Without this kind of portability built in from the start, the freedom to act remains theoretical.</p> <p>Without this clarity and freedom of action, organisations remain dependent on external roadmaps and decisions that may not serve their own priorities. Sovereignty, ultimately, is not a legal status, it is a practical capability, measured by exit velocity and ability to pivot.</p> <p></p> Digital sovereignty is hugely important to IT leaders but in most cases systems have been built on foundations they don’t control. Open standards are key to organisational agility https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/surveillance-camera-security-spy-AlexeyAchepovsky-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/The-illusion-of-digital-sovereignty-and-the-reality-of-control Wed, 06 May 2026 04:47:00 GMT The illusion of digital sovereignty and the reality of control <p><span style="font-size: 8pt;"><strong>By <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Apostolis-Fotiadis">Apostolis Fotiadis</a> | <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Giacomo-Zandonini">Gaicomo Zandonini</a> | <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Ludek-Stavinoha">Luděk Stavinoha</a> | <a href="https://correctiv.org/en/team/frida-thurm/">Frida Thurm</a> | <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Lydia-Emmanouilidou">Lydia Emmanouilidou</a> | <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Bill-Goodwin">Bill Goodwin</a> | <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/contributor/Sebastian-Klovig-Skelton">Sebastian Klovig Skelton</a></strong></span></p> <p>Europol, the European Union’s (EU) police agency, operated a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634419/Hungry-for-data-Inside-Europols-secretive-AI-programme">shadow data repository containing vast amounts of sensitive personal information</a> and used it for years beyond its lawful scope, according to internal documents and whistleblower accounts.</p> <p>Described by former officials as a “shadow IT environment”, the system lacked basic security or data protection safeguards required under EU law. It was used to store and analyse highly sensitive data – phone records, identity documents and geolocation information – including details of people who were not suspected of a crime.</p> <p>This investigation by <em>Solomon</em>, <em>Correctiv</em> and <em>Computer Weekly</em>, based on leaked emails, internal reports and testimonies from former officials, found that in practice, the system became the agency’s primary environment for large-scale data analysis, despite lacking essential controls over who could access or modify the data.</p> <p>For the first time in the agency’s history, several former high-ranking officials have come forward to reveal that the use of this shadow environment to store vast amounts of data – and the use of a clandestine intelligence tool known internally as the “Pressure Cooker” – had been concealed from the EU’s top privacy watchdog until 2019.</p> <p>“They protect the law while breaking it,” one former senior official said of Europol.</p> <p>The findings come at a pivotal moment: the European Commission is expected to propose new legislation that would expand Europol’s mandate and double its annual budget. At the same time, Europol’s executive director, Catherine De Bolle, stepped down on 1 May, after leading the agency for eight years.</p> <p>Conservative MP David Davis, an outspoken critic of creeping data collection by governments, said that the findings, “if true, point to serious failures of oversight, legality and data protection”. He added: “Systems appear to have operated significantly beyond what is lawful and processed vast quantities of sensitive information, including information about innocent individuals, without proper scrutiny.”<br><br>Responding to this investigation, a Europol spokesperson said the agency had reported its operational data processing systems and applications to the EU’s privacy watchdog in a transparent manner: “The allegation that Europol ‘kept hidden’ information about systems or processing environments is a misrepresentation of the facts.”</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="A shadow IT environment"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>A shadow IT environment</h2> <p>At the centre of the agency’s shadowy data practices was a system known as the Computer Forensic Network (CFN), an environment holding vast amounts of sensitive personal information.</p> <p dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">According to Europol, the system was established in 2012 to process complex operational data linked to investigations it supported. Its purpose was to provide a “secure, compartmentalised” environment for processing information that could not be handled in its existing systems, due to its volume, format, or potential security risks, including malware from digital devices.</p> <p>By 2019, the CFN held at least two petabytes (PB) of data – almost 420 times bigger than Europol’s primary database for non-forensic work – and effectively held almost all of Europol’s operational data.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-system-comparison-1200px.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-system-comparison-1200px_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-system-comparison-1200px_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-system-comparison-1200px.jpg 1280w" alt="Graph shows use of Computer Forensic Network versus forensic analysis" data-credit="Europol" height="182" width="559"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>A preliminary report by Europol’s data protection officer, looking at a sample of Europol’s analytical projects, found that the Computer Forensic Network was being used for far more than forensic analysis and warned of risks that it could lead to intervention by the European Data Protection Supervisor </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>Under EU law, sensitive personal data – whether provided by member states, collected during cross-border investigations, or transferred by online platforms such as Facebook or Telegram – is subject to strict rules governing how it can be stored, accessed and analysed. But internal documents and witness accounts indicate that, in this case, effective safeguards were absent.</p> <p>Previously unseen evidence indicates that vast volumes of sensitive data were made available to Europol’s analysts via the CFN, a system with significant security and privacy flaws that did not fully log who accessed data, or whether it had been modified or deleted. For years, it operated without effective official scrutiny, even as it became central to the agency’s analytical work.</p> <p>The agency is designed to <a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366634419/Hungry-for-data-Inside-Europols-secretive-AI-programme">function as a central, artificial intelligence (AI)-powered hub</a>, analysing large volumes of personal and criminal data in near real time to identify patterns and leads. Based in the Hague, Europol’s more than 1,000 staff sit at the centre of European policing. The agency pools and analyses data from national law enforcement authorities across the EU, supporting investigations into terrorism, child sexual abuse, serious organised crime and cyber crime.</p> <p>To understand how Europol’s shadow IT system took shape, it is necessary to go back to a moment of crisis.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Pressure to deliver"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Pressure to deliver</h2> <p>In November 2015, coordinated attacks across Paris killed 130 people and injured hundreds more. Amid reports of police failures, pressure on Europol intensified. “We were really expected to step up at that point,” Europol’s then-director, Rob Wainwright, recalled last year. “That was the moment where we had to deliver.”</p> <p>Europol set up Task Force Fraternité, and member states’ law enforcement authorities began sending large volumes of data to the agency: phone records, intelligence reports and travel information. Much of it ended up in the CFN system. Among the data ingested, for example, were phone logs of individuals who happened to be in the vicinity of the Bataclan attacks.</p> <p>The expectation was clear: Europol would turn this flood of information into actionable intelligence to help trace and prevent new terrorist plots.</p> <p>The role of the “shadow IT system” expanded dramatically after the attacks.</p> <p>Europol told this investigation that its policy stated that Europol’s Cyber Crime Centre (EC3) – a unit created within the Operations Directorate in 2013 – and its ICT Operations Unit co-managed the CFN. That policy was still in force in 2019 and “known to all relevant stakeholders”.</p> <p>But according to five former Europol officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity, the agency’s EC3 effectively seized control of the CFN during the tenure of then-executive director Wainwright.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The network that became a ‘black hole’"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The network that became a ‘black hole’</h2> <p>The CFN, established in 2012, formed part of Europol’s Forensic IT Environment (FITE). It had originally been designed to store and initially process, or filter, the growing amounts of digital material and link it to specific investigations, under strict handling and data protection rules.</p> <p>Within a few years, though, the CFN evolved far beyond its original purpose, becoming what one former senior official described as a “black hole” for unregulated data analysis by Europol’s cyber crime unit. Large volumes of data could be stored and analysed with fewer constraints than in the agency’s formal systems.</p> <p>Wainwright, who led the agency at the time, responded to this investigation that his recollection “is not great on specific issues and details that date back to a period of 8-14 years”. </p> <p>He added that he does recall “working very closely” with Europol’s data protection officer, Daniel Drewer, “and the relevant data supervisory authorities on the establishment and promotion of a strong data protection framework”, and that this “was an essential part of Europol’s mission and a core strategic priority”.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The threat of a ‘complete shutdown’"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The threat of a ‘complete shutdown’</h2> <p>When new <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/GDPRs-7th-anniversary-in-the-AI-age-privacy-legislation-is-still-relevant">data protection laws came into effect across Europe in May 2018</a>, protecting data became a legal imperative. By the following year, the scale of Europol’s non-compliant data practices had become impossible to ignore.</p> <p>On 15 February 2019, a five-page report by Drewer – who continues to serve as the agency’s internal data protection officer – landed on the desks of Europol’s three deputy executives.</p> <p>The message was blunt: 99% of Europol’s data was being stored and processed in the CFN, without basic data protection and security safeguards.</p> <p>In effect, a system designed to pre-process raw bulk data had become the agency’s primary platform for large-scale crime analysis. Europol investigators were able to sift through vast troves of personal data, including information they were not legally entitled to retain, and repurpose it for criminal investigations.</p> <p>“There are indications that the CFN is practically not only being used for actual forensic work but also for other forms of operational analysis,” Drewer wrote. The volume and diversity of files in the database, he said, suggested that “CFN has factually evolved into the environment of choice for all possible forms of crime analysis”.</p> <p>Drewer had time to review only a selection of Europol’s investigations, known as analytical projects. He found, just for the limited selection of analytical projects he reviewed, that the CFN held nearly 25 million records – more than 20 times the 1.2 million records held in Europol’s primary system for non-forensic work.</p> <p>Drewer warned that data protection safeguards used elsewhere in Europol had not yet been fully implemented on the CFN. And many users appeared to have administrator rights, suggesting that some operations might have been launched without a <a href="https://www.techtarget.com/searchcio/definition/data-protection-impact-assessment-DPIA">data protection impact assessment (DPIA)</a> or, in the case of sensitive data, seeking prior approval from the EU’s data watchdog.</p> <p>Except for the use of the CFN for Taskforce Fraternité – an exceptional case for which mitigating measures had been put in place – Europol’s data protection function had not been consulted about the use of the CFN for non-forensic tasks, he said.</p> <p>Unless Europol overhauled the entire system, Drewer warned of “a possible processing ban” by the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), the EU’s independent privacy watchdog. Such a ban could “factually come close to a complete shutdown of operational business at Europol”, while severely damaging trust with member states, Drewer wrote.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-1-SOURCE-Europol-1200px.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-1-SOURCE-Europol-1200px_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-1-SOURCE-Europol-1200px_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-1-SOURCE-Europol-1200px.jpg 1280w" alt="Image shows excerpt of report" data-credit="Europol" height="228" width="560"> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-2-SOURCE-Europol-1200px.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-2-SOURCE-Europol-1200px_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-2-SOURCE-Europol-1200px_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/DPF-scrutiny-of-CFN-usage-extract-2-SOURCE-Europol-1200px.jpg 1280w" alt="Image shows excerpt of report" data-credit="EUROPOL" height="109" width="559"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>An internal report warned that Europol’s use of the Computer Forensic Network for non-forensic work risked regulatory action that could lead to a “complete shutdown” of operational business </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Parallel processing environments"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Parallel processing environments</h2> <p>The enormous scale of irregular practices at the heart of Europe’s main criminal database, unveiled by Drewer’s report, has remained unknown to the public, as well as lawmakers, until today.</p> <p>Former Europol officials interviewed by this investigation described how personnel within the Operations Directorate – which is responsible for criminal investigations – worked to install additional computing and storage capacity to the system outside of regular procedures. New tools and applications for data processing were developed within this environment, without external oversight.</p> <p>“Having a parallel processing environment where guardrails cease to exist is cheaper, faster and more effective,” a former senior Europol official told this investigation. “But without these, anyone is at the mercy of the guy in front of the screen,” he said. In other words, decisions about who could access Europol’s data were left to Europol staff, with little oversight.</p> <p>Europol maintains that the CFN was part of a “regulated processing environment” that included a research and development environment, and said the former official’s comments were “a misrepresentation of the facts”.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Grasping the scale of the problem"> <h2 dir="ltr" class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Grasping the scale of the problem</h2> <p>On 1 April 2019, Europol’s then-executive director, Catherine De Bolle, formally notified the EU’s data protection watchdog, the EDPS, of Drewer’s findings, after intense internal deliberations over how to respond.</p> <p>The disclosure triggered what became known as the “Big Data Challenge” – a years-long standoff between Europol and the external watchdog, culminating in <a rel="noreferrer" href="https://www.edps.europa.eu/system/files/2022-01/22-01-10-edps-decision-europol_en.pdf">an order from the EDPS</a> that Europol delete data it kept in breach of EU law.</p> <p>Publicly, the dispute came to focus on data retention. But previously unpublished internal documents reviewed by this investigation suggest the concerns ran deeper. They point to security vulnerabilities embedded in the system itself. </p> <p>Inside the agency, staff were working to grasp the scale of the problem.</p> <p>A comprehensive security assessment, triggered by Drewer’s findings and conducted in early 2019, found that CFN lacked “baseline security controls applicable to an operational environment”. Addressing the issues, the report noted, would require Europol to abandon the system “as it stands today and implement a new setup” – from scratch.</p> <p>Dozens of grave security vulnerabilities within the CFN system, listed in reports obtained via Freedom of Information (FoI) requests, reveal a pattern of systemic failures:</p> <ul class="default-list"> <li dir="ltr" value="1">“ineffective assignment of security roles and responsibilities”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="2">“insufficient management of privileged access rights”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="3">“unrestricted software installation”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="4">“incompliance with the Europol security rules”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="5">“lack of password management”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="6">“lack of administrative usage logs”, “insufficient protection of log information”, “insufficient event logging and monitoring”</li> <li dir="ltr" value="7">“insufficient network access control”</li> </ul> <figure class="main-article-image half-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-security-concerns-Europol-800px-f.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-security-concerns-Europol-800px-f_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-security-concerns-Europol-800px-f_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/CFN-security-concerns-Europol-800px-f.jpg 1280w" alt="Europol CFN security concerns" height="734" width="559"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>A Europol task force identified 32 security concerns with the agency’s Computer Forensic Network </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>Taken together, these failures meant that access to sensitive data could not be reliably tracked, controlled, audited or safeguarded. Access controls and audit logs are not mere technical formalities, experts say, but fundamental security and accountability safeguards, required under EU law.</p> <p>“The alleged existence of large numbers of administrator accounts is very concerning and an obvious breach of the integrity and confidentiality requirements,” said Peter Sommer, an independent digital forensics expert. He explained that administrators can access, modify, or delete any data – including system logs – making it difficult to trace activity and increasing the risk of abuse and external attacks.</p> <p>“Unnecessary multiplication of administrator facilities makes it easy for rogue employees to cause harm, but also is a strongly favoured gateway for external hackers,” said Sommer.</p> <p><a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/44962-steven-murdoch"></a><a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/44962-steven-murdoch">Steven Murdoch</a>, professor of security engineering and head of the Information Security Research Group at University College London, told Computer Weekly that the agency’s failure to implement system controls could result in breaches of confidentiality or allow undetected data tampering. “Another consequence is that, if breaches are detected, it might be impossible to identify who is responsible,” he said.</p> <p>Failure to track data access could also raise questions about the reliability of evidence used in criminal prosecutions. “Data related to criminal investigations can be extremely sensitive, and breaches of confidentiality could compromise ongoing investigations or sources of intelligence. If information was modified without authorisation, its value as evidence in courts could be invalidated,” said Murdoch.</p> <p>Responding to questions about the management of CFN users, a Europol spokesperson said that a Forensic IT Environment (FITE) use and management policy had been in place since 2012, and was still in force and known to all stakeholders in 2019.</p> <p>They said the policy “contained dedicated user access and audit logging provisions” for the CFN.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Data held on Europol’s forensic network at risk from security failures</h3> <p><a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://profiles.ucl.ac.uk/44962-steven-murdoch">Steven Murdoch</a>, professor of security engineering and head of the Information Security Research Group at University College London, reviewed the findings of Europol’s 2019 internal security assessment for Computer Weekly, which flagged up 32 issues, including nine high-severity issues in the Computer Forensic Network (CFN).</p> <p>“Based on the information available, I would agree with the ratings. While it’s rare for systems to have perfect security, the more sensitive information they hold, the higher the expectation of security. For something as important as the CFN, I would expect few, if any, high-severity issues,” he said.</p> <p>Murdoch said he was particularly concerned that there were inadequate controls to prevent software from being installed on such a high-security network, leaving it at risk of both malware and inadvertent data breaches.</p> <p>Peter Sommer, an independent digital forensics expert, said the alleged presence of many people with administrator rights on Europol’s CFN could expose the agency to security risks from rogue employees and hackers.</p> <p>Administrators have unlimited powers to access, modify and delete every item of information and every programme in a computer system. They also have the power to modify or delete log files, which record who accessed what data.</p> <p>“Unnecessary multiplication of administrator facilities makes it easy for rogue employees to cause harm, but also is a strongly favoured gateway for external hackers,” he said.</p> <p>Three information security experts from the Open Rights Group (ORG), a digital rights campaign group, also reviewed the findings of Europol’s 2019 internal security assessment for Computer Weekly.</p> <p>Jim Killock, the ORG’s executive director, said the experts’ analysis found that Europol’s CFN had serious and widespread cyber security issues relating to access control, asset management, network security and other issues.</p> <p>He said that having many users with admin rights to the CFN posed a security risk that was compounded by other failures, such as a lack of administrative logs, which could allow for human error or a malicious actor to modify forensic data.</p> <p>“In a worst-case scenario, these findings might indicate that there are insufficient safeguards to prevent unauthorised personnel from accessing and modifying data,” he said.</p> </div> </div> <p>By the time the scale of the problem was clear, the system had already become deeply embedded in Europol’s operations.</p> <p>Although Europol initiated a project to deliver an alternative data analysis platform with the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">controversial US tech company Palantir</a>, the project collapsed in 2017.</p> <p>Abandoning the platform was therefore no longer a realistic option.</p> <p>Instead, Europol sought to bring it into compliance – a process that would take years of negotiation with the EDPS.</p> <p>In a written response, Europol said it had disclosed the system in 2019 to the European Data Protection Regulator “in the interest of full transparency”, describing it as a necessary environment for processing complex operational data, particularly large or technically challenging datasets. The agency said reforms had been underway since 2019 to replace the CFN with a new forensic environment and align practices with data protection requirements.</p> <p>The EDPS continued to monitor the system in the years that followed – but key problems persisted.</p> <p>As of late 2023, the watchdog found that it was still not always possible to determine whether specific personal data had been accessed or modified. An EDPS spokesperson told this investigation that limitations in the logging system meant that investigators could only “infer” that data had been “accessed” or “modified”.</p> <p>In February 2026, the EDPS informed the Joint Parliamentary Scrutiny Group – an oversight committee of European and national parliamentarians – that it would close its monitoring of the CFN after nearly a decade of exchanges with Europol, <a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://www.edps.europa.eu/system/files/2026-02/26-02-04_18th-jpsg-on-europol_en.pdf">even though </a><a dir="ltr" rel="noreferrer" href="https://www.edps.europa.eu/system/files/2026-02/26-02-04_18th-jpsg-on-europol_en.pdf">15 out of 150 recommendations had not been implemented</a>.</p> <p>Those outstanding issues, the watchdog noted, concerned “issues of particular importance”, including core security safeguards.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="‘Pressure Cooker’ shielded from scrutiny"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>‘Pressure Cooker’ shielded from scrutiny</h2> <p>Even as Europol’s leadership rotated and worked with the EDPS to address problems in its data systems, elements of the infrastructure appear to have remained outside formal oversight.</p> <p>The existence of one of the hidden systems, known internally as the “Pressure Cooker”, emerges through leaked internal emails and whistleblower accounts from former Europol officials. References to the system appear as early as 2019, right before Europol formally disclosed compliance issues to the EDPS.</p> <p>An internal email reveals that Europol’s online counter-terrorism unit, the Internet Referral Unit (IRU), had set up a pilot area to gather open data from the internet, without the support of Europol’s ICT operations.</p> <p>The IRU referred to the system as the Internet Facing Operational Environment (IFOE). But the IRU’s project was effectively a shadow IT operation that existed outside of the official project of the same name.</p> <p>When the head of the Internet Referral Unit demanded urgent ICT support for IRU’s IFOE, it was flatly turned down.</p> <p>“What you call ‘IFOE’ is an environment prepared in emergency mode under the ‘Pressure Cooker agreement’, and is in its entirety managed by IRU,” he was told.</p> <p>There was no relationship between the IFOE project that the ICT had in its work programme and the IRU’s “unofficial” version.</p> <p>“There is clearly a severe misunderstanding between what ICT calls IFOE (future state, designed and agreed by all stakeholders) and what you call IFOE,” the email added.</p> <p>On 5 October 2022, a Europol staff member sent an email marked “Importance: High” to senior officials, warning that regulators might soon become aware of the “irregular situation” with the Pressure Cooker and the Internet Facing Operational Environment, which Europol used to collect data for investigations from open sources on the internet.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Email-extract-redacted-800px-f.jpg"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Email-extract-redacted-800px-f_mobile.jpg" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Email-extract-redacted-800px-f_mobile.jpg 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/Email-extract-redacted-800px-f.jpg 1280w" alt="Redacted copy of email sent by a member of staff at Europol" height="305" width="559"> <figcaption> <i class="icon pictures" data-icon="z"></i>A Europol staff member sent an email to senior officials, warning that regulators might soon become aware of the “irregular situation” with Europol’s “Pressure Cooker” </figcaption> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>“We (ICT) flagged multiple times the importance of eliminating the Pressure Cooker and transforming it into [a system] with proper designs, controls, etc,” the staffer wrote. “However, it was usually de-scoped as other projects were prioritized by the business.”</p> <p>According to former insiders, the system was understood within parts of the agency as a space where operational data could be stored and analysed quickly without the constraints of EU law.</p> <p>Oversight, however, depended largely on what information Europol chose to disclose.</p> <p>“You have to understand,” a former top Europol official told this investigation, “when we say inspection in this case, we don’t mean a raid with IT experts monitoring systems and confiscating servers. We are talking about a polite conversation.”</p> <p>And shadow IT systems that were not clearly identified or formally presented might not be examined, raising questions about whether shadow IT systems might still be in use today.</p> <p>EDPS told this investigation that it was not made aware of the Pressure Cooker during its Big Data Challenge inquiry, which started in April 2019.</p> <p>The former official said it was “quite possible” that even as Europol worked with regulators to address problems in the CFN, “people within the operations devised clusters where they could keep doing data analysis without any of the newest checks and balances”.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Europol seeks to regularise its systems"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Europol seeks to regularise its systems</h2> <p>The EDPS said that it became aware of the term “Pressure Cooker” when it appeared in Europol’s ICT work plan for 2022, where it was used as a shorthand for a proposed interim internet-facing environment.</p> <p>Fast forward to 2024, and Europol had plans in place to build a new system to respond to situations that required rapid analysis of data gathered from the internet.</p> <p>Known as the Internet Facing Operational Environment – Quick Response Area, the system was intended to be legally compliant and address previous internal concerns raised over the lack of adequate controls around the “Pressure Cooker”.</p> <p>However, as late as February 2026, the EDPS warned that the IFOE-QRA “risks becoming a full-fledged parallel environment to Europol’s regular operational environment”. That created a risk that Europol would fall foul of regulations that only allowed personal data to be processed for limited purposes.</p> <p>EPDS also said it sees a risk of Europol staff going on “fishing expeditions” that infringe upon fundamental rights, by collecting personal data without relevance to any ongoing criminal investigations.</p> <p>In response to this investigation, Europol claims that the “Pressure Cooker” is simply the internal name for its Internet Facing Operational Environment and that it operates in accordance with the law.</p> <p>It said the suggestion that Europol was seeking to collect information without relevance to criminal investigations outside the scope of the Europol Regulation, the legal framework which governs its operation, was a “misrepresentation” of the facts.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="An expanding mandate"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>An expanding mandate</h2> <p>Europol is entering a new phase of expansion.</p> <p>The European Commission is expected to propose new legislation that would expand the agency’s mandate and significantly increase its capacity to collect and process data,<span style="background-color: #ffffff;"> </span>as part of a broader effort to turn Europol into a “truly operational police agency”.</p> <p>In March, the European commissioner for migration and home affairs, Magnus Brunner, proposed to double Europol’s staff and budget, in front of the European Parliament’s LIBE Committee, which oversees the agency’s work.</p> <p>The push comes even as Europol faces questions about its data practices.</p> <p>British MP David Davis said the issues identified by this investigation raise questions for the British government, where data supplied by Europol had been used by UK police forces.<br><br>“We must have clarity from the Home Office as to whether UK data or prosecutions are affected and demand full transparency. We must also be told whether any personal data of entirely innocent British citizens is being stored in Europol’s systems and, if so, why it is being stored and why the UK government is allowing it to be stored,” he added.</p> <p>“The integrity of our justice system depends on evidence being gathered, handled and governed lawfully at every stage,” he said.</p> <p>Computer Weekly contacted the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA), which acts as a liaison between UK law enforcement bodies and Europol, about the findings of this investigation – including whether it was aware of the parallel processing within the shadow IT estate and if it will now review the data sharing mechanisms and practices in place with Europol as a result – but received no response by time of publication.</p> <p>Jim Killock, executive director of Open Rights Group, a digital campaign group, said the revelations of this investigation call for “urgent scrutiny”.</p> <p>“Europol requires the highest levels of data security and integrity, as an investigating organisation, holding data on individuals who may be accused or prosecuted, or are witnesses to very serious crimes. Europol’s decisions need to be trusted and able to withstand intense legal scrutiny,” he said.</p> <p>“As a matter of urgency, Europol needs to explain how deep these problems go, and whether they extend to questions over evidential integrity.”</p> <p>Catherine De Bolle, Europol’s executive director at the time of this investigation, declined to be interviewed for this story.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Europol response</h3> <p>Responding to detailed questions from this investigation, Europol said its IT estate was “a regulated data processing environment”.</p> <p>Europol said it kept the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) regularly updated about issues with the system, and has been committed to transparency and scrutiny of the Computer Forensic Network (CFN).</p> <p>It added that, after the topic of CFN was brought to the attention of the EDPS in April 2019, Europol’s executive director and the data protection officer had a “very constructive” meeting with then-EDPS chief Giovanni Butarelli.</p> <p>“Afterwards, the EDPS was regularly informed by Europol on the progress made and the activities of the task force,” said a spokesperson. “Accordingly, Europol provided the EDPS in a proactive manner information about the required improvements of the CFN back in 2019, hence Europol addressed its identified improvement needs in full transparency towards its data protection supervisor, which were addressed accordingly through the referred internal Europol task force.”</p> <p>Europol said that the term “Pressure Cooker” referred to Europol’s Internet Facing Operational Environment (IFOE), and that the agency has reported to the EDPS about its operational data processing systems and applications in a transparent manner.</p> <p>“The allegation that Europol ‘kept hidden’ information about processing environments or systems is a misrepresentation of the facts,” it said.</p> <p>On the “inherent risks identified” with the IFOE Quick Response Area by the EDPS, Europol added that this is a “normal” part of the prior consultation process, and that it works to implement all relevant actions to reduce the associated data protection risks to an acceptable level.</p> <p>“In the FITE [Forensic IT Environment], data from publicly available sources, such as in relation to terrorist content online, is collected and triaged, before being entered into Europol’s operational data environment,” said a spokesperson. “The allegation of Europol seeking to collect information without relevance to criminal investigations outside the scope of its tasks under the Europol Regulation is a misrepresentation of the facts.”</p> </div> </div> <p><em>Additional research by Anna Mahtani.</em></p> </section> Under pressure to deliver in the fight against serious cross-border crime, Europol built and operated a shadow data analysis platform containing large volumes of sensitive information, which operated without key legal and technical safeguards https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/Europol-building-2-PR-hero.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642525/They-protect-the-law-while-breaking-it-Inside-Europols-shadow-IT-system Tue, 05 May 2026 04:00:00 GMT ‘They protect the law while breaking it’: Inside Europol’s shadow IT system <p>In early April, Chi Onwurah, chair of the Science, Innovation and Technology Select Committee, <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642254/Science-Innovation-and-Technology-committee-chair-questions-UKs-tech-sovereignty-approach">made some pointed remarks</a> about the UK government’s technology strategy, or its relative lack thereof.</p> <p>Her argument centred on our dependency on a small number of Big Tech providers, principally Microsoft and AWS, with Palantir receiving mention due to their NHS and military contracts, along with legitimately framed concerns over UK dependencies on foreign supply chains.</p> <p>There was much to agree with in Onwurah’s article, with just one jarring point – her definition of sovereignty. Namely that, “it means exactly what you want it to mean.” Such a formulation might be political shorthand; the politician making a soundbite of complex concepts for public consumption, but for digital and data sovereignty it’s dangerous to over-simplify.<br><br>Politicians sometimes choose to be imprecise, but it’s important to be unambiguous here. Digital sovereignty requires that the only legislation acting on a piece of sovereign data is that of its parent country, or if you prefer; “the laws a country accepts to provide judicial primacy”.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Sovereignty an active digital battleground"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Sovereignty an active digital battleground</h2> <p>Despite this, Onwurah’s article was a call to action on a topic many readers probably didn’t realise was an issue. Make no mistake, sovereignty is already an active digital battleground for Big Tech and hyperscalers. It is likely to be the defining factor of technology delivery in the UK, Europe and globally for the next few years.</p> <p>The digital sovereignty issue is largely a product of public cloud, and more directly<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-53418898"> high-profile court cases such as Schrems II</a>, which sought to control personal data transfers to regimes deemed less likely to protect it than our own. Before public hyperscale cloud, nearly all domestic and government data processing was performed in datacentres in-country.</p> <p>Non-sovereign IT or software providers occasionally required remote engineer access for support, but most access to your data was physically, as well as logically and digitally, limited to in-country.</p> <p>Cloud adoption, and in particular the UK’s decision to adopt US-headquartered public cloud services, broke down those sovereign walls.</p> <p>Mandated sovereign processes and contracts gave way to as-a-service models while supplier-defined terms of service allowed data offshoring, and it’s the effect of those that have led to pan-European calls for digital sovereignty.</p> <p>Sovereignty is therefore commonly suggested to be a hyperscaler issue, but it’s actually broader than that. All non-sovereign (which principally means US) service providers must adjust. </p> <p>So, the term hyperscaler isn’t a useful frame for these discussions. Others like IBM, Oracle, HPE need to adapt too, and all the various approaches to sovereign cloud and IT services now distinctly fall into three types that don’t neatly meet the hyperscaler-or-not classification.</p> <p>That means that a hyperscaler-specific focus when it comes to sovereign cloud and AI is counterproductive. Each provider needs to be considered independently on their own merits and approaches.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Geopolitical tension and offshoring worries"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Geopolitical tension and offshoring worries</h2> <p>Sovereignty worries have also been driven by a period of unusually high geopolitical tension. Whilst the US remains a valued European ally, threats and posturing from the White House have caused concern amongst UK and EU leaders. The result is a swing in the pendulum, with European nations seeking more sovereign control after years of increasing reliance on US-based cloud providers. The IT industry is responding, but not all providers are making the changes they must to operate in markets defined by sovereignty rather than scalability.</p> <p>Of the big three, Microsoft were the first to think about sovereign capabilities. They built a German M365 outpost years ago, though that went defunct in 2022 and they appear to be struggling most with the transition now.</p> <p>Their global public cloud services (Azure and M365) <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632040/Microsoft-hides-key-data-flow-information-in-plain-sight">operate in more than 100 countries</a> that support UK and some European services, so to restructure that into sovereign-first operating models will take some work.  Conversely, AWS and GCP, who both use offshore processing, but are principally regional in nature, are adapting more quickly.</p> <p>Another issue for Microsoft is historic lack of transparency around global data flows and exactly how their platform works. Last year <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366629871/Microsoft-refuses-to-divulge-data-flows-to-Police-Scotland">Redmond was unable to give information on data flows when requested to do so</a> by the Scottish Police Authority (a legal requirement under Data Protection laws). And more recently ProPublica<a href="https://www.propublica.org/article/microsoft-cloud-fedramp-cybersecurity-government"> revealed that US FedRAMP authorities</a> had encountered exactly the same issues trying to certify Microsoft cloud services for US government use.</p> <p>ProPublica claimed that after five years of trying and failing to get core information about Microsoft’s security and data processing in Microsoft’s US Government Community Cloud High platform, they had to give up.</p> <p>This raises a question unique to Microsoft. Can they actually re-model their complex global-by-default services to deliver pure in-country sovereign cloud delivery?</p> <p>They look to be struggling so far. Their commitment to deliver CoPilot in-country AI inference by the end of 2025 for the UK has<a href="https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2025/11/04/microsoft-offers-in-country-data-processing-to-15-countries-to-strengthen-sovereign-controls-for-microsoft-365-copilot/"> just been rolled back to the end of 2026</a>, whilst EU nations will now apparently only get regional, and not sovereign inference.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Sovereignty Levels 1 and 2"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Sovereignty Levels 1 and 2</h2> <p>Instead of national capabilities, Microsoft is trying to focus buyers’ minds on re-defining what sovereignty means to fit their existing product stack; a strategy that previously sufficed but is unlikely to be successful again.</p> <p>This is the Sovereignty Level 1 response: Adapt the definition to better align with existing product architectures.</p> <p>Most non-sovereign providers have introduced “data boundary” constructs, supported by additional technical controls, though these may not fully satisfy stricter interpretations of sovereignty from data protection authorities.</p> <p>Microsoft leans on this more than AWS or Google, who both have this in their sovereignty catalogue but have already moved most customer discussions on to Sovereignty Level 2.</p> <p>That approach is to partner regionally and work with a local partner through a sovereign operating model.</p> <p>This can improve customer confidence, but where the control plane or ultimate corporate control remains offshore, sovereignty concerns may still persist depending on the implementation.</p> <p>The AWS approach centres on this option, namely that their European Sovereign Cloud is a regional platform they claim fully adheres to EU rules and regulations but fails in the basic respect that the EU is a collective, not a sovereign, entity. </p> <p>EU alignment also creates a political barrier to non-EU members like the UK. Ceding digital sovereignty to EU controls might be too much for the government to accept. It’s also not yet fully clear that corporate control is 100% vested in the AWS German representatives and Cloud Act jurisdiction might still apply.<br><br>Microsoft’s efforts to build in-country sovereign cloud in Germany and France are yet to achieve full operation, and moves by both governments to reduce Microsoft dependency may further impact their realisation.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Google and S3NS"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Google and S3NS<strong><br></strong></h2> <p>Google’s in-country partner approach has had more success. In a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252525925/Google-Cloud-fleshes-out-sovereign-cloud-capabilities-for-European-enterprises">joint venture with Thales, named S3NS</a>, they’ve taken a hands-off position. S3NS now offers assured France-specific air-gapped capabilities, a fundamental requirement for sovereign cloud or AI services. Platforms that periodically “phone home” for upgrades, licence checks, or processing do not pass the sovereignty test.</p> <p>S3NS bridges the gap from the Level 2 to the Level 3 approach with fully air-gapped operations, wholly under local control to give self-evident sovereign cloud.</p> <p>AWS and Microsoft have air-gapped options on the table, but Google Distributed Cloud Air-Gapped (GDC-AG) is currently the most well developed and capable, despite still lacking some services that are in their public cloud platform.</p> <p>It’s not particularly cheap – isolated working carries a premium – but the MOD’s announcement of a <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630792/Ministry-of-Defence-signs-400m-sovereign-cloud-deal-with-Google">£400m contract</a> over five years, and others of similar size in Nato and the German military attest to their trust in its sovereignty.</p> <p>AWS’s alternative, LocalStack, works for development purposes but is not rated for production workloads. <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Azure-Local-Disconnected-looks-the-part-for-sovereignty-It-isnt">My previous analysis of Microsoft’s Azure Local Disconnected</a> product makes that look distinctly beta-like in comparison.<br><br>The landscape of hyperscaler offers for sovereign cloud is thus immature. Google has found a way to deliver locally, AWS is yet to break out of the EU-region model, and Microsoft is already slipping on sovereign commitments it made for AI.</p> <p>Meanwhile, as sovereignty becomes increasingly important, local cloud providers can become viable recipients of investment once again. They will however need time, government support and forward-looking investors to grow. Even then, some will likely fail.</p> <p>One logical answer is a future of hybrid, partnership-led solutions. That requires a technology-neutral, cloud-ready procurement approach from government that makes portability, switching, and multi-vendor operation possible in practice. The big providers also need to be willing to make that work and may need to do so with country specific partnerships.<br><br>Google’s approach in France through S3NS provides insight into what a national cloud and hyperscale collaboration could look like; a scalable “hyper-core” under national management with flexible in-country SME delivery partners for the edge.  </p> <p>If we’re serious about digital sovereignty across Europe and UK, it’s about time we started these conversations.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about data sovereignty</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/This-rise-of-the-splinternet-Data-sovereignty-risks-and-responses">The rise of the splinternet? Data sovereignty risks and responses</a>. We look at the political, legal and economic risks around data sovereignty, the fears for digital dependency and massive hyperscaler penetration in the UK public sector.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">Breaking the stranglehold: Responses to data sovereignty risk</a>. We look at the political and government responses to risks around data sovereignty and massive dependence on the three US hyperscalers – AWS, Azure and GCP – in the UK and Europe.</li> </ul> </div> </div> <ul class="default-list"></ul> <p></p> </section> As data sovereignty comes under scrutiny the more chimera-like it looks, but ventures like Google’s S3NS in France show potential https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/UK-border-control-passport-travel-getty.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Data-is-a-sovereignty-issue-And-broader-than-just-the-hyperscalers Thu, 30 Apr 2026 11:27:00 GMT Data is a sovereignty issue. And broader than just the hyperscalers <p><i>Inside FDP is an exclusive series of articles written by the former deputy director of data engineering at NHS England, Tom Bartlett, who led the 150-person team that built the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620412/NHS-chief-data-officers-concerned-with-FDP-roll-out">Federated Data Platform</a> (FDP), the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366640417/Health-workers-call-for-Palantir-to-be-booted-from-NHS-contracts">controversial Palantir-supplied system</a> linking data across the health and care service. His insights into the challenges facing NHS data, and the solutions available to resolve them, make essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand what’s really happening with FDP in the NHS.</i></p> <p>Since I left NHS England in March I have been speaking publicly about the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP). The response has been striking. Senior analysts, clinical leaders, healthtech founders and journalists keep asking variations of the same questions.</p> <p>Why is the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366560657/Palantir-awarded-NHS-FDP-data-contract">software platform from Palantir</a> uniquely suited to this? What does FDP do that existing platforms cannot? Why can't the NHS – or a UK-based software company - just build one itself? Why aren't we using our existing investments? Is it really just an expensive data warehouse?</p> <p>And underneath all of them, the question that matters most - what problem is FDP actually trying to solve?</p> <p>The more I have these conversations, the more I realise that the answer has never been clearly stated in public.</p> <p>The programme's own communications have described FDP in terms of connecting vital health information across the NHS, helping staff deliver better care for patients and work more efficiently.</p> <p>Critics have focused on the supplier and its controversial reputation. Commentators have discussed the procurement.</p> <p>Almost nobody has named the underlying problem that the platform was designed to address, or the architectural vision that some of the most senior data leaders in NHS England have been working toward but have rarely articulated publicly.</p> <p>This series of articles is an attempt to fill that gap.</p> <p>The argument rests on a concept I call a "frontline-first" approach to data. The idea is not new. Elements of it exist in pockets across the NHS and in the thinking of people who have been working on this for years. But as a named concept with a clear definition, it has not been part of the public discourse. I think it should be.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> FDP is the first attempt to build the integrated foundation that the NHS has been accumulating workarounds in the absence of, for 30 years </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>The series has five parts. This first post defines the problem. Part 2 defines the Frontline-First concept and what it looks like in practice, including how FDP delivers it. Part 3 describes the architectural choice that makes FDP structurally different - the ontology, object types, and actions. Part 4 explains why the Canonical Data Model is the most important asset in the programme. Part 5 addresses the objections I hear most often, including whether the NHS needs a single platform at all.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="How we got here"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>How we got here</h2> <p>The current NHS data architecture was not designed. It accumulated.</p> <p>When I started my first job in the NHS I worked at the Royal Cornwall Hospital in Treliske, in a massive warehouse office called the megashed. Elsewhere in the warehouse were thousands of paper patient notes, and if I looked out of the window at any time of day I would see porters carrying red waterproof satchels containing those notes between departments. Accessing a record was extremely slow and resource intensive. You literally had to go and get the paper from the warehouse.</p> <p>Electronic patient records (EPR) improved on this by making notes available at the click of a mouse. That was the primary purpose - replace paper. The analytical use case crept in slowly afterwards, driven by NHS initiatives like Referral to Treatment targets, Payment by Results, and the national targets originally linked to achievement of Foundation Trust status. Each new national requirement added another reason to extract data from the EPR, but the EPR was never designed to support this. Analytics was retrofitted onto a system built for a different purpose.</p> <p>Shared care records were a further retrofit. They allowed individual records held in one EPR to surface in view of a clinician working in a different organisation. This was the digital equivalent of the red waterproof satchel - one record, carried from one place to another. Useful, but still a point-to-point solution rather than an integrated system.</p> <p>At no point did anyone design an NHS-wide integration of all NHS data across all care settings, all organisations, and all use cases. The ambition to do so stunned me when I heard it for the first time, and I knew I had to be a part of it.</p> <p>That ambition is what FDP represents. It is not another retrofit. It is the first attempt to build the integrated foundation that the NHS has been accumulating workarounds in the absence of, for 30 years.</p> <p>Understanding this history matters because it explains how the following problems came to exist, and why they have persisted despite decades of investment in NHS data infrastructure.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="The problems that Frontline-First is designed to solve"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>The problems that Frontline-First is designed to solve</h2> <p>The NHS has several interconnected data problems that have persisted for decades. They are well known individually but rarely discussed as a connected picture. Before explaining what Frontline-First means, it is worth naming them together, because the case for FDP only makes sense once you can see how they reinforce each other. FDP was designed to address all of these problems. But the argument for how it does so, which begins in Part 2 of this series, only lands if the problems are understood first.</p> <h3>The feedback gap</h3> <p>Every patient interaction generates structured records that are used directly in the clinical process and also flow upward through NHS Trust data warehouses, through national submissions, and into the analytical infrastructure the centre uses to monitor performance.</p> <p>A large proportion of what clinicians are asked to record, particularly items captured for national returns, performance metrics, coding for Payment by Results and secondary uses, gives them little in return that is locally useful.</p> <p>The data leaves the point of care and the person who recorded it never sees what happened to it. Often they are asked by a performance manager to correct a record for reasons that seem low priority to the clinician. The consequence is that when workloads are pressured, clinicians will not prioritise low-value recording. Where they see local value in recording well, they do - medication prescribing, for instance, where accuracy has immediate clinical consequences.</p> <p>But for items recorded primarily for downstream consumption, where the system gives no useful feedback, recording quality varies. The incentive to get it right is weak when the recording feels like an administrative overhead rather than a clinically useful act. This creates gaps and inconsistencies in the data that compound through every downstream use.</p> <h3>The shadow IT problem</h3> <p>Where formal systems fall short of the operational workflow a team actually follows, staff build something that does. Spreadsheets tracking waiting lists. Whiteboards in nurse stations. Word documents containing discharge proposals. Emails coordinating theatre schedules. Printed patient lists updated with biro on ward rounds. Daily phone calls from a ward coordination administrator to wards establishing bed state, recorded on a spreadsheet.</p> <p>This is not laziness or poor governance. It is staff putting in place a workable, efficient solution to a gap the formal system left. The work has to happen, the EPR does not support it, so the team builds a tool that does.</p> <p>Some years ago I did an audit at one Trust with the Caldicott Guardian – the person responsible for protecting patient confidentiality in health and care organisations - and we found over a thousand non-approved data sources of exactly this kind.</p> <p>No information governance official could eliminate shadow IT without bringing the clinical service that depends on it to a halt. Few individual items of shadow IT are prioritised for investment to promote it to a formal system.</p> <p>On the other side of the same gap, the clinical transformation team in IT who could change the EPR configuration to capture what the frontline actually needs are largely bypassed. Clinical teams would rather build a spreadsheet that fits their process now than wait months for a configuration change that may not match what they need. This is one reason shadow IT persists even in Trusts that have invested heavily in EPR.</p> <p>The consequence is that the real operational data - the data that reflects what is actually happening on the ward - stays locked in these local tools and never enters the formal data estate. It is not linkable to the data warehouse, to national submissions, to the research environment, or to any other Trust. Data becomes more valuable as it connects to other data. Shadow IT severs that connection at the source.</p> <h3>The inaccessible record</h3> <p>Some of the most clinically meaningful data in the NHS is recorded diligently inside the formal system but is functionally lost to everyone, including the team that recorded it.</p> <p>In one clinical team I observed, outcome scores in mental health from DIALOG (a set of questions where patients are asked to rate their satisfaction) were recorded as free text in generic progress note fields, buried in a mountain of clinical notes, never accessible to the Trust's data warehouse, difficult for the clinical team to resurface at the next multi-disciplinary team (MDT) meeting, and invisible to national returns like the Mental Health Services Data Set (MHSDS).</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> Frontline users suffer detriment from problems that would be addressable if information was better integrated. Data recorded at the point of care is not enriched by data from elsewhere in the system before decisions are made </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Tom Bartlett</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>Discharge letters from a mental health consultant to a GP contain clinical reasoning, risk assessments, medication rationale and follow-up intentions that are more clinically useful than anything in the structured record. But they sit as free text or PDF attachments, inaccessible to any downstream analytical process.</p> <p>The data exists. A clinician thought it mattered enough to write down. But because it was entered as narrative rather than structured data, it is invisible to every downstream process. This is not shadow IT. It is data that is technically inside the formal system but recorded in a form that no other part of the system can use.</p> <h3>The timeliness problem</h3> <p>Clinicians often do not record their data on formal systems in real time. I have seen queues in a care team's office for the only operational PC on a Friday afternoon. Occasionally, clinicians leave the queue to end their shift before they've had the chance to input their week.</p> <p>When data is sent up the line, national data lands months after the clinical event. By the time a metric is published, the Trust has already lived through the period and moved on. Changes to the scope of national collections take months or sometimes years to implement, so if a new clinical pathway emerges or a coding practice changes, or if a new question comes up, the national data model is still measuring the old world long after the frontline has moved on.</p> <p>Worse, national returns generally do not allow retrospective revision. Data quality issues discovered after submission, corrections, late entries, updated coding, are rarely corrected in the published datasets. When the clinician who went home on the Friday manages to get their data into the system the following week it is too late to be included in the national figures, because the data has already been sent. The month’s submission with the coding error becomes the permanent version used for planning, funding allocation and research. The error is baked in.</p> <h3>The integration gap</h3> <p>Frontline users suffer detriment from problems that would be addressable if information was better integrated. Data recorded at the point of care is not enriched by data from elsewhere in the system before decisions are made.</p> <p>The clinician makes the next decision based on what they personally know and what is in front of them, not on what the system knows. The A&E clinician does not see the mental health history. The consultant does not see how their outcomes compare to peers. The discharge coordinator does not see what community services have arranged. In every case, the problem is the same - data exists somewhere in the system that would improve the decision being made, but it does not reach the person making the decision at the time they need it.</p> <h3>Insights without context</h3> <p>When national or regional analysis does reach the frontline, it often arrives without the operational context that would make it accurate.</p> <p>NHS England's productivity tools send Trusts headline figures identifying financial opportunities based on national benchmarks. One Trust I am aware of received a figure of £89m. When the financial turnaround team started working through it, they found that £7.8m of an apparent £8m opportunity in women and children's health was clinical negligence insurance premiums, a cost the Trust has no ability to influence. The headline looked actionable. The reality required hours of decomposition by people with operational knowledge before anyone could distinguish genuine opportunity from noise.</p> <p>The analysis was produced centrally, without the context that would have filtered out the irrelevant before it reached the Trust. The frontline becomes a validation function for centrally produced insight, rather than a recipient of useful intelligence.</p> <h3>The technology barrier</h3> <p>Where clinical leadership teams have had embedded analysts - people who sit with the clinical team and understand the context - the work is far superior. These analysts contribute directly in the meeting rather than the service manager having to note the question, go back to the data team, wait for a response, and return two weeks later with a spreadsheet nobody has time to interpret.</p> <p>But even embedded analysts are tethered to the back office. They still have to return to the data warehouse and business intelligence (BI) stack to get their answers, because the technology sits behind them rather than in front of the clinical team.</p> <p>For this reason many Trusts centralise their analyst teams. The staffing model follows the technology architecture even if the outcomes are better with embedded analysts.</p> <h3>The invisible error</h3> <p>The data does not announce that it is wrong. The numbers look plausible. The dashboard is green. Nothing in the Integrated Care Board’s (ICB's) dataset or the national submission flags the coding quirk that double-counted three urology cases, or the rota model that was never updated after two consultants left.</p> <p>These problems do not show up as errors. They show up as slightly different numbers within the range of normal variation. An analyst at ICB or national level, querying data extracted weeks ago from a system they have never used, has no context for what the values mean operationally and no way to distinguish a genuine outlier from a local recording practice. The data is passing validation while being wrong in ways that only someone at the point of care would recognise.</p> <p>This is what makes the other problems so hard to fix - the people with the authority to invest in solutions cannot see the problems from where they sit.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="How these problems connect"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>How these problems connect</h2> <p>These are not eight separate problems. They reinforce each other in ways that make each one harder to fix in isolation.</p> <p>Two things happen in parallel. Clinicians record inconsistently because the data they are asked to capture gives them little back. And staff build shadow IT because the formal systems do not support their workflows. Both have the same effect - the analytical layer works from an incomplete picture.</p> <p>Because the picture is incomplete and late, national and ICB-level decisions are based on data that does not reflect reality. Because nobody at those levels knows the data is wrong, no corrective signal flows back to the source.</p> <p>The damage to the reliability of data used for decisions does not stop at Trust level. At ICB level, commissioning decisions are based on data that is months old and semantically inconsistent across Trusts, because each Trust codes and submits differently.</p> <p>Population health management - the work of identifying at-risk patients before they become expensive acute admissions - is built on linked datasets assembled from extracts that arrived at different times with different definitions. The frail elderly patient known to community services, mental health and the GP may not appear as a single coherent person in the ICB's linked data because the linking is probabilistic and the extracts were taken on different days. The intervention that would have prevented the A&E attendance never happens.</p> <p>At national level, policy is made on data that does not reflect reality. Cohorts of patients to be shielded are incomplete. Elective recovery targets are set on Referral to Treatment data that is months old. Funding formulae that allocate resources to ICBs depend on activity data with enough coding variation across regions that some areas are systematically overfunded and others underfunded. National programmes launch without accurate baselines, so progress gets claimed or denied on numbers that do not reliably reflect what patients are experiencing. Research is slower than it should be because researchers spend months cleaning and validating data before they can begin analysis.</p> <p>All of this is downstream of the same root cause. If the data were right at source, because the clinician had the means and a reason to record it carefully, every downstream use would improve as a side effect.</p> <p>The ICB's linked dataset would be more reliable. The national submission would be more timely. The funding formula would be less distorted. The research would be faster.</p> <p>You do not fix commissioning data by building a better ICB warehouse. You fix it by giving the clinician a reason to record well at the point of care. Everything downstream follows.</p> <p>These problems are addressable. Not with better dashboards, not with another warehouse, and not by asking clinicians to try harder. The next article describes what a Frontline-First approach to data looks like, and why FDP is the first platform designed to deliver one.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about NHS data challenges</h3> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Electronic-health-records-are-still-creating-issues-for-patients">Electronic health records are still creating issues for patients</a> - Almost every NHS trust will have moved onto a digital system by this spring. Experts have cautioned many patients are still struggling to access their own health data.</p> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366639993/Child-rapist-could-have-profiled-victims-through-unaudited-access-to-NHS-databases">Child rapist could have profiled victims through unaudited access to NHS databases</a> - NHS analyst’s conviction for child sexual abuse offences raises concerns over unaudited access to patient data.</p> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366574914/Women-In-Data-panel-NHS-needs-to-get-data-basics-right-before-rushing-into-AI">NHS needs to get data basics right before rushing into AI</a> - During a panel discussion at a Women in Data event, speakers from across the public healthcare sector outlined the groundwork that has to be laid for artificial intelligence to take the NHS by storm.</p> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620174/NHS-investigating-how-API-flaw-exposed-patient-data">NHS investigating how API flaw exposed patient data</a> - NHS patient data was left vulnerable by a flaw in an application programming interface used at online healthcare provider Medefer.</p> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641178/NHS-digital-drive-hit-by-usability-gaps-despite-progress-national-survey-finds">NHS digital drive hit by usability gaps despite progress, national survey finds</a> - The shift from analogue to digital across the NHS is hindered by usability issues in electronic patient record (EPR), but the newly launched frontline productivity programme could be the answer.</p> </div> </div> </section> In the first of an exclusive series of articles by the former deputy director of data engineering at NHS England, we examine the real story behind the NHS's controversial Palantir software project, the Federated Data Platform https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/German/article/healthcare-doctor-health-data-IoT-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Inside-FDP-part-1-Understanding-the-problems-facing-NHS-data Thu, 30 Apr 2026 07:00:00 GMT Inside FDP – part 1: Understanding the problems facing NHS data <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/resources/Cloud-computing-services">Cloud service provider</a> revenues worldwide for the first quarter of 2026 were up by $35bn year-on-year (YoY) and reached $129bn, according to data from US-based datacentre and cloud market analysts <a href="https://www.srgresearch.com/">Synergy Research Group</a>, which takes into account the hyperscalers – Amazon Webs Services (AWS), Google Cloud and Microsoft – plus tier two providers that include artificial intelligence (AI-)focused neoclouds, as well as more general cloud providers.</p> <p>The market is accelerating quickly – possibly <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366638605/Gartner-AI-and-datacentre-spending-ramps">driven by AI deployments</a> – when comparing run rate with actual trailing 12-month revenues. Q1 2026 was the ninth successive quarter in which YoY growth increased, attaining 35%.</p> <p>According to the Synergy data, cloud service revenues have hit their highest growth rate since the fourth quarter of 2021, when the market was 40% of its current size. That swelling of revenues could be down to AI driving major changes in the cloud market.</p> <p><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Breaking-the-stranglehold-Responses-to-data-sovereignty-risk">The hyperscalers maintain a strong lead</a> in the market, with Amazon in top position – however, Microsoft and Google achieved substantially higher growth rates, with their Q1 worldwide market shares 28%, 21% and 14% respectively. </p> <p>Among tier two cloud providers, those with the highest growth rates include CoreWeave, OpenAI, Oracle, Crusoe, Nebius, Anthropic and ByteDance. Based on cloud infrastructure service revenues, five <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/feature/Weighing-up-the-enterprise-risks-of-neocloud-providers">neocloud companies</a> are now among the top 30 cloud providers.</p> <p>Synergy estimates that – with the majority of major cloud providers having now released earnings data for Q1 – quarterly cloud infrastructure service revenues were $128.6bn, with trailing 12-month revenues reaching $455bn. Those include IaaS, PaaS and hosted private cloud services.</p> <figure class="main-article-image full-col" data-img-fullsize="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/SynergyResearchGroup-Q1-rev-GrowthRate.png"> <img data-src="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/SynergyResearchGroup-Q1-rev-GrowthRate_mobile.png" class="lazy" data-srcset="https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/SynergyResearchGroup-Q1-rev-GrowthRate_mobile.png 960w,https://www.computerweekly.com/rms/computerweekly/SynergyResearchGroup-Q1-rev-GrowthRate.png 1280w" alt="Graph entitled 'Cloud infrastructure services market growth', showing cloud revenue ($ billion) with year-on-year growth rate, tracked against financial quarters from 2020 to 2026. The growth rate shows gradual growth since Q3 2023. " data-credit="Synergy Research Group" height="419" width="559"> <div class="main-article-image-enlarge"> <i class="icon" data-icon="w"></i> </div> </figure> <p>With historical – i.e. trailing 12-month revenues of $455bn – and a run rate of $514.4bn calculated from this year’s Q1, the $59.4bn difference shows how quickly the market is accelerating, equating to an acceleration delta of 13%.</p> <p>“The Q1 market is now fifteen times larger than it was a decade ago and continues to expand at 35% annually,” said John Dinsdale, chief analyst at Synergy Research Group. “Reaching a half-trillion-dollar run rate underscores the far-reaching impact of cloud computing and AI on the IT landscape.</p> <p>“Our forecasts point to sustained strong growth in the years ahead, with AI continuing to drive usage, unlock new use cases and boost cloud provider revenues. At the same time, the competitive landscape is evolving, with neoclouds playing an increasingly significant role and already accounting for 5% of the total cloud market and a substantially larger share of AI-focused segments.”</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="US fastest growing region"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>US fastest growing region</h2> <p>Public IaaS and PaaS services account for the bulk of the market, according to Synergy, and those grew by 38% in Q1. The leadership of the major cloud providers is even more pronounced in public cloud, where the top three account for 67% of the market. </p> <p>Geographically, the cloud market continues to grow strongly in all regions of the world. When measured in local currencies, the major countries with the strongest growth included India, Indonesia, Ireland, Taiwan, Thailand and Malaysia, where growth rates were all well above the worldwide average. </p> <p>The US remains by far the largest cloud market, with its scale far surpassing the whole APAC region. The US market grew by 37% in Q1. In Europe, the largest cloud markets are the UK and Germany, but the markets with the highest growth rates were Ireland, Norway and Poland.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about the cloud market</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636876/Global-cloud-infrastructure-spending-hits-1026bn-in-Q3-2025">Global cloud infrastructure spending hits $102.6bn in Q3 2025</a>. The cloud infrastructure market grew 25% year on year, driven by enterprises moving from AI experimentation to scaled deployment, according to research from Omdia. </li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Why-the-CMA-must-act-now-on-cloud-before-the-UK-loses-its-digital-future">Why the CMA must act now on cloud before the UK loses its digital future</a>. The UK competition watchdog is prevaricating over tackling the dominance of AWS and Microsoft in the cloud market – it needs to enforce change soon or UK businesses will suffer.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> Synergy Research figures put Q1 cloud revenues at $129bn. Meanwhile, AWS, Microsoft and Google have 63% of the world market, which shows an acceleration delta of 13% https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/performance-fotolia.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642488/Cloud-revenues-up-35-YoY-in-a-hot-market-thats-accelerating Thu, 30 Apr 2026 06:20:00 GMT Cloud revenues up 35% YoY in a hot market that’s accelerating <p>IT contractors are being forced to work through <a href="#Umbrellas">umbrella companies</a>. Often, they can’t determine whether those companies are tax compliant, and therefore frequently suffer from unknown deductions, late payments, and inaccurate and opaque payslip information.</p> <p>Those are among the findings of a survey by contracting authority ContractorCalculator ahead of a government consultation set to close on 1 May. </p> <p>The consultation – <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/make-work-pay-modernising-the-agency-work-regulatory-framework">Make Work Pay: Modernising the Agency Work Regulatory Framework</a> – aims to modernise the Conduct Regulations that govern agency treatment of employees and <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620175/IR35-Government-outlines-two-pronged-approach-to-umbrella-company-regulation">bring umbrella companies into clearer regulatory scope</a>, improve worker security and pay transparency.</p> <p>The <a href="https://www.contractorcalculator.co.uk/">Contractor Calculator</a> survey asked 730 contractors and freelancers about the impact of IR35 reforms, the role of umbrella companies, and ongoing transparency issues across the UK’s flexible workforce sector.</p> <p>The vast bulk of respondents indicated that the use of an umbrella company is effectively compulsory in most cases. Some 88% said being paid via an umbrella company was the only option in their most recent engagement, while 85% had been told they must use an umbrella company for certain roles.</p> <p>At the same time, contractors are deeply unhappy about being <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366553224/IT-contractors-forced-against-their-will-to-work-for-umbrella-companies-survey-finds">forced into this position</a>. Of those questioned, only 5% said they were happy to use an umbrella company, while 25% said they would never use one and 39% would only use one if forced to.</p> <p>The effect, said the survey commentary, is that a lack of choice is impacting the market, with contractors declining roles or leaving altogether, and so reducing access to talent for hiring firms.</p> <p>The survey also highlighted increased exposure faced by <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366614704/Autumn-Budget-Employment-agencies-to-take-on-PAYE-processing-from-umbrella-firms-from-April-2026">agencies and end clients</a> under Joint and Several Liability (JSL) rules that came into effect on 6 April 2026.</p> <p>Under these rules, organisations can be held responsible for unpaid tax where <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610276/HMRC-could-lose-millions-in-unpaid-tax-as-non-compliant-umbrella-enters-pre-pack-administration">non-compliant umbrella companies</a> are used. But, according to the survey, JSL has not really reduced risk and is difficult to manage. </p> <p>The survey found 69% of contractors cannot determine whether an umbrella company is tax compliant, and in any case, 34% choose umbrellas based on the highest take-home pay rather than compliance. </p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading"><a id="Umbrellas"></a>What are umbrella companies?</h3> <p>Umbrella companies are often used by recruitment agencies and end clients to run payroll procedures for contractors and freelance workers.</p> <p>The <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366621018/IR35-Research-highlights-rise-in-outside-IR35-engagements-among-contractors">number of contractors who provide services via umbrella companies is thought to have soared</a> in recent years, following changes to <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366632435/IR35-Conservative-Party-pledge-to-reform-off-payroll-rules-gets-lacklustre-response">IR35 tax avoidance rules</a> in the public and private sector.</p> <p>Under the reworked rules, end clients must determine how freelance workers they engage should be taxed, where previously this was the responsibility of the contractors themselves.</p> </div> </div> <p>Additionally, payslip complexity and unclear deductions remain widespread, with gaps that can leave contractors vulnerable to errors and potential exploitation.</p> <p>Half of those surveyed (50%) have discovered unexpected deductions, while 39% report being paid late. Meanwhile, only 30% can confirm payslip accuracy, and just 35% can calculate gross pay from an assignment rate. Assignment rates are the total amount an agency pays an umbrella company for a contractor’s services. </p> <p>Dave Chaplin, CEO of ContractorCalculator, said: “Our survey results strongly reinforce the direction of travel set out in the government’s Make Work Pay consultation. They highlight, in real terms, the lack of choice, transparency and understanding that contractors are currently facing across the agency and umbrella landscape.</p> <p>“Crucially, our survey shows just how widespread the issue of restricted choice has become, with many contractors being offered roles conditional on using a specific umbrella company. The proposal to remove this practice is essential. Giving contractors genuine freedom to choose how they work will help prevent the kind of market distortions that have previously led to workers being channelled into high-risk or non-compliant arrangements.” </p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about IR35</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366620175/IR35-Government-outlines-two-pronged-approach-to-umbrella-company-regulation">IR35: Government outlines two-pronged approach to umbrella company regulation</a>. The government looks set to deliver on its long-promised vow to roll out regulation for umbrella companies. </li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366610695/HMRCs-list-of-known-tax-avoidance-schemes-and-non-compliant-umbrellas-nears-100-names">HMRC’s list of known tax avoidance schemes and non-compliant umbrellas nears 100 names</a>. The number of non-compliant umbrella companies and tax avoidance schemes on HMRC’s name and shame list has doubled in the past 12 months. </li> </ul> </div> </div> IT skills market impacted as contractors forced to use umbrellas or opt out altogether, while tax compliance remains deeply uncertain, with late payments and payslip inaccuracy rife https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/Hero%20Images/weather-rain-umbrella-climate-RomoloTavani-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642498/Umbrella-companies-not-working-for-IT-contractors-survey-finds Thu, 30 Apr 2026 04:00:00 GMT Umbrella companies not working for IT contractors, survey finds <p>In a speech at the Royal United Services Institute, UK technology secretary <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366630328/Liz-Kendall-appointed-tech-secretary">Liz Kendall</a> discussed technological disruption and Britain’s role in the tech economy.</p> <p>“<a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641649/UK-businesses-must-face-up-to-AI-threat-says-government">Technology is disrupting</a> our economies and societies in ways that were unimaginable a few years ago,” she said.</p> <p>Kendall referenced geopolitical rivalry, which she said was driving nation-state investments in technology. “Why has China poured billions into the semiconductor industry? To catch up. Why does the US invest billions in drones and autonomous warfare? To stay ahead,” she said.</p> <p>“When rival countries glimpse a new technology, they rush to build it first, so they lay claim to the future,” Kendall added.</p> <p>She urged policymakers and the UK tech sector to act now to cement Britain’s place in the new technological era.</p> <p>Drawing on her non-tech background, having studied history at university, Kendall spoke about how, in the past, a nation’s ability to pull ahead was determined by the size of its navy, which, as the news headlines over the past few weeks have claimed, is now largely depleted in the UK.</p> <p>“Today, the defining currency is AI,” she said. “And the countries which harness AI will not only lead the race to cure diseases, discover new materials and create trillion-dollar companies, but also build far more powerful militaries.” </p> <p>Kendall believes artificial intelligence (AI) is the engine of both economic power and “hard power”.</p> <p>“The future is coming at us fast – not in the next few decades, but the next few years,” she warned. With the speed of AI model development, Kendall projected that by the end of next year, AI will be able to complete in hours what would currently take software engineers weeks.</p> <blockquote class="main-article-pullquote"> <div class="main-article-pullquote-inner"> <figure> For Britain, AI sovereignty is about reducing over-dependencies and increasing resilience in key national strategic priorities </figure> <figcaption> <strong>Liz Kendall, Department for Science, Innovation and Technology</strong> </figcaption> <i class="icon" data-icon="z"></i> </div> </blockquote> <p>In what appears to be a shift away from US-led tech, Kendall spoke about building sovereign AI capabilities in the UK. She stressed this is not about isolation or trying to build everything alone, but about ensuring Britain is indispensable in the technologies that will define the future – a keystone in the global AI architecture rather than a bystander to decisions taken elsewhere.</p> <p>“For Britain, AI sovereignty is about reducing over-dependencies and increasing resilience in key national strategic priorities. We secure greater control and greater leverage over the issues that matter most. And if you want true leverage for your country, you need to be a keystone in the global tech architecture – an indispensable partner,” she said.</p> <p>On 16 April, the government opened applications to the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641874/UKs-Sovereign-AI-supports-supercomputing-and-drug-discovery-AI-startups">Sovereign AI Fund,</a> which is offering grants of between £1m and £9m to fund the creation of strategic AI assets and is designed to help the UK’s most promising AI startups grow, scale and succeed in Britain. The programme is initially focusing on high-value AI datasets and autonomous or automated laboratory infrastructure.</p> <p>The <a href="https://www.find-government-grants.service.gov.uk/grants/sovereign-ai-strategic-assets-grants-programme-1#eligibility">UK’s Sovereign AI</a> focus areas cover compute efficiency and sovereign architecture, next-generation AI labs, health and life sciences, AI for scientific discovery, and AI trust, integrity and assurance. Companies can also apply for funding if they are considered relevant to defence and national security.</p> <p>Along with backing UK AI startups through the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642362/Government-funds-self-learning-AI-company">Sovereign AI Fund</a>, Kendall said Britain needs to work more closely with international partners, especially “so-called middle power nations”. </p> <p>Discussing how the country is working with allies to develop sovereign capabilities and increase its leverage, Kendall spoke about the Strategic Science and Technology Partnership with Germany, which includes a £6m joint quantum project; the Entente Cordiale with France; the Growth and Innovation Partnership with Canada, which includes joint work on AI security; and the Digital Partnership with Japan.</p> <p>“We recently invited foreign ministers from countries including Australia, Canada and the Republic of Korea to discuss the most pressing geo-economic challenges of our age, including technology,” she said. “We are once again asserting the importance of our international alliances because we know we can achieve more together than we can do alone.”</p> <p>To strengthen the UK’s position in the race to deliver sovereign AI capabilities for the future, Kendall announced that the UK government will develop a UK AI hardware plan to secure Britain’s capability in chips and the semiconductor technologies that underpin the full AI hardware stack.</p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more stories about UK sovereign AI</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li>The UK government’s <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641874/UKs-Sovereign-AI-supports-supercomputing-and-drug-discovery-AI-startups">£500m Sovereign AI Fund</a> announces first cohort of startups backed to boost economic growth and national security.</li> <li>The UK government is launching a £500m <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366641682/UK-governments-50m-sovereign-AI-fund-bids-to-commercialise-research">Sovereign AI Unit</a> to boost artificial intelligence startups and drive economic growth through strategic and long-term investments.</li> </ul> </div> </div> The technology secretary speaks about the importance of forging alliances to make UK tech more resilient to geopolitical pressure https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/Brexit-Europe-UK-Thaut-Images-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366642532/Liz-Kendall-talks-up-work-with-middle-power-nations-on-sovereign-tech Tue, 28 Apr 2026 11:00:00 GMT Liz Kendall talks up work with ‘middle power nations’ on sovereign tech <p>The UK is in the middle of shaping <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366618655/Major-obstacles-facing-Labours-AI-opportunity-action-plan">the public sector's artificial intelligence (AI) capability</a> for decades to come. The visible part, comprising Copilot rollouts, foundation model partnerships and the headline contracts, is already well advanced.</p> <p>The less visible part is whether, in the course of those deployments, we also build the buying capability, cultivate a plural supply base, and establish the shared standards that will let us adapt as the technology evolves.</p> <p>We have made a strong start on the first half of the task. The second half is the one that will determine whether the first half pays off.</p> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Silent lock-in"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Silent lock-in</h2> <p>We can call this the "silent lock-in" trap. It is the accumulation of AI capability on top of infrastructure, management practices and governance approaches that are individually defined, poorly coordinated and mismatched to the pace at which the technology is changing.</p> <p>Despite the hard work of individuals and teams to <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/The-governments-AI-push-is-at-risk-if-we-dont-establish-clear-accountability">procure and experiment with AI’s emerging capabilities</a>, the pieces are not adding up the way they should.</p> <p>What can we do to learn from the last decade’s digital transformation experiences to accelerate the UK’s AI adoption? That is the subject of <i>Making AI work for Britain</i>, published by London Publishing Partnership and available for download at <a href="https://FutureOfAI.uk">FutureOfAI.uk</a> under an open-access licence. The book draws on several years of research into the UK's AI strategy and ecosystem, and on over a decade working with <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Digital-transformation-the-missing-government-mission">UK government on digital transformation</a>.</p> <p>In the book, I set out a framework for AI success based on a simple strategy - consolidate demand, diversify supply. The short extract that follows is drawn from the final chapter and summarises three of the key recommendations flowing from this analysis: Build buyers who can push back; pool demand that is already shared; and keep the supply side plural.</p> <div align="center"> <hr align="center" width="100%" size="2"> </div> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Build buyers who can push back"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Build buyers who can push back</h2> <p>The smart-buyer problem is easy to describe and difficult to solve. AI suppliers, particularly the larger ones, now routinely make claims that require significant technical capability to evaluate - claims about training data provenance, model behaviour under distribution shift, security properties of the fine-tuning pipeline, interoperability with alternative providers.</p> <p>Most procurement functions were designed to assess claims like, "this system meets this specification" and "this supplier has these references." They were not designed to assess claims like, "this model will remain useful as underlying capabilities change."</p> <blockquote> <div class="imagecaption alignLeft"> <img src=" https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/rms/computerweekly/Alan-Brown.jpg " alt="Alan Brown headshot"> </div> <p><strong><span style="color: #34495e;"></span></strong></p> <p><strong><span style="color: #34495e;">“None of this requires new powers or new money. It requires the decision to treat AI procurement as a capability we are actively building rather than a series of individual deals”</span></strong></p> <p><em><span style="color: #34495e;">Alan Brown</span></em></p> <p><em><span style="color: #34495e;"></span></em></p> </blockquote> <p>The smart-buyer model does not mean building deep AI expertise in every department. It means, in each organisation spending meaningfully on AI, having a small core of people who can sit opposite a vendor and know what they are looking at. That core needs three things - the authority to say no, the technical depth to justify it, and enough exposure to current practice to recognise when claims have quietly drifted from their evidence.</p> <p>Where that capability exists, suppliers behave differently. Where it does not, they behave as suppliers to an unsophisticated market always have.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Pool the demand that is already shared"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Pool the demand that is already shared</h2> <p>Many of the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/Google-Cloud-Next-Its-time-to-create-value-not-slop-from-the-AI-boom">AI problems</a> public sector organisations are solving are the same problem. Case summarisation. Triage. Translation between policy language and operational systems. Document extraction. These requirements do not vary meaningfully between one department and the next, and the money spent separately working them out is considerable.</p> <p>Consolidating demand is the less celebrated half of the lesson we took from digital government reform. When the specification of a shared requirement is done well once, as a common evaluation framework, a reference architecture or a shared procurement vehicle, the supplier market responds to it. Three or four suppliers quickly learn what "good" looks like, and they compete on it.</p> <p>The aim is not to buy the same system everywhere - that was the mistake of an earlier generation. The aim is to agree on what the shared requirement is, measure it consistently, and let departments make the local calls within that frame.</p> </section> <section class="section main-article-chapter" data-menu-title="Keep the supply side plural"> <h2 class="section-title"><i class="icon" data-icon="1"></i>Keep the supply side plural</h2> <p>No market stays plural on its own. Left to itself, enterprise AI will concentrate, because the economics of foundation models favour scale and because the switching costs of deeply integrated AI services are high. That concentration is not inevitable, but avoiding it requires active stewardship rather than hope.</p> <p>In practice, stewardship means three kinds of move. First, treat open source and open-weight models as first-class options in public sector procurement, with evaluation criteria that credit them for the strategic flexibility they preserve.</p> <p>Second, use the UK's research base and AI ecosystem as suppliers as well as subjects of study, which means procurement vehicles that smaller providers can actually clear and contract durations that give them a realistic shot at building capability.</p> <p>Third, treat the <a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366636655/AI-safeguards-improving-says-UK-government-backed-body">AI Security Institute</a> and the UK's sovereign compute investments as part of the operational supply map available to departments, not as national prestige projects standing apart from day-to-day procurement.</p> <p>These three recommendations illustrate the way forward for AI in the UK. Over the next few months, most large public sector organisations will sign AI contracts that shape what they can do with the technology well into the next decade. Each is a chance to build smart-buyer capability, to consolidate shared requirements, and to keep a seat at the table for new suppliers.</p> <p>None of this requires new powers or new money. It requires the decision to treat AI procurement as a capability we are actively building rather than a series of individual deals.</p> <p><i>Alan W. Brown is the author of </i><a href="https://futureofai.uk/">Making AI work for Britain</a><i>, published by LPP. He is a professor in digital economy, an experienced business executive and a strategic advisor. He has spent more than 30 years in the US, Europe and the UK driving large-scale software-driven programmes with commercial high-tech companies, leading R&D teams, building state-of-the-art solutions and improving software product delivery approaches.</i></p> <div class="extra-info"> <div class="extra-info-inner"> <h3 class="splash-heading">Read more about AI in government</h3> <ul class="default-list"> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366628066/The-UK-governments-AI-Growth-Zones-strategy-Everything-you-need-to-know">The UK government’s AI growth zones strategy: Everything you need to know</a> - Plans to make the UK an AI superpower imply pervasive use of the technology. Ramping up adoption of AI will require more datacentres to host compute-intensive workloads, which is where the AI growth zone strategy comes in.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366637838/UK-government-signs-more-partners-to-boost-AI-skills-across-the-country">UK government signs more partners to boost AI skills across the country</a> - The government is seeking to educate 10 million adults in the UK on how to use artificial intelligence tools to streamline their work.</li> <li><a href="https://www.computerweekly.com/news/366633173/Do-government-services-need-a-rethink-for-AI-and-automation">Do government services need a rethink for AI and automation?</a> Evidence presented in a new Public Accounts Committee report covering smart public services delivery suggests a change in tack is needed.</li> </ul> </div> </div> </section> The government must learn from years of experience introducing digital transformation if the UK is to make the most of the opportunities AI offers to the public sector https://cdn.ttgtmedia.com/visuals/ComputerWeekly/HeroImages/London-Westminster-Houses-of-Parliament-aerial-zgphotography-adobe.jpg https://www.computerweekly.com/opinion/How-to-make-AI-work-for-Britain-consolidate-demand-diversify-supply Tue, 28 Apr 2026 03:00:00 GMT How to make AI work for Britain: consolidate demand, diversify supply ComputerWeekly.com 60 editor@computerweekly.com