The first Singapore-China (Shenzhen) Smart City Initiative (SCI) Joint Implementation Committee (JIC) meeting was held today, helmed by the Ministry of Communications and Information’s Permanent Secretary, Yong Ying-I, and Shenzhen Mayor, Chen Rugui.
Eight Memoranda of Understanding (MOU) were also inked at the meeting which will enable both enterprises and individuals to have greater ease of access to market opportunities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) and Southeast Asia (SEA).
The Smart City Initiative signifies the commitment by both sides towards digital connectivity which has become even more pertinent amid COVID-19. The SCI is centred around three pillars– Digital connectivity, Innovation and entrepreneurship, and Tech talent exchange and development – to better support businesses and individuals as technological advancements in today’s digital economy have transformed the way businesses operate and how individuals consume services.
Permanent Secretary of MCI, Yong Ying-I said, “The Singapore-China (Shenzhen) Initiative has produced substantial positive outcomes just months after its launch last year, in spite of the COVID-19 situation. Indeed, COVID-19 has accelerated the pace of digitalisation in our economies. Singapore will continue to work with like-minded partners like Shenzhen, to drive innovation and entrepreneurship in digital economies, and to enhance trade and connectivity to create exciting opportunities for businesses, communities and individuals.”
New Asian SME Hub
A new Asian SME Hub will be set up to facilitate access to a larger ecosystem of buyers, sellers, logistics service providers, financing, and digital solution providers. Operational by July 2020, it will facilitate trusted cross-border partnerships as businesses scale up and expand into new markets to help businesses innovate and tap on growth opportunities.
To begin with the 50 SMEs are already selling industrial hardware, chemicals, safety, medical and office supplies on Eezee.sg, a B2B digital platform supported by IMDA and ESG under the Grow Digital initiative, will have access to a buyer base of 4 million SMEs in YiQiYe’s SME Ecosystem in China.
As more SME ecosystems are being developed in ASEAN, they will also be able to form partnerships for innovation and leverage business opportunities with SMEs in China through the new Asian SME Hub.
Through digital trade connectivity, businesses will enjoy greater efficiency with faster, digitalised insurance and financing processes with banks which are facilitated by expeditious validation of data.
Businesses can also benefit from seamless trade transactions with the streamlining of electronic documentations as both parties work towards the mutual recognition of these documents.
Co-operation for mutual benefits in Digitalisation
With increased international trade and business activities, businesses from both cities will soon be able to rely on an efficient and effective “mediation-arbitration” dispute resolution model offered by the Singapore International Mediation Centre in collaboration with the Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration to resolve cross-border disputes.
This will help boost business confidence, allowing them to maintain relationships as there is assurance that settlement agreements can be mutually enforced.
In addition, both cities agreed to explore cooperation in talent exchange and work towards mutual recognition and interoperability of both parties’ digital identity platforms.
Mr Chen Rugui, Mayor of Shenzhen Municipality said: “This meeting has helped to elevate the Singapore-China (Shenzhen) Smart City Initiative to a new level. Shenzhen will follow the principles of “cooperation for mutual benefits, government-guided, enterprise led and a market-based approach”, to comprehensively deepen the SCI cooperation between Singapore and Shenzhen, accelerate the implementation of cooperation projects in areas such as digital trade, digital payment, cross-border data management, and mutual recognition of digital identities.
We will actively promote exchanges between enterprises, research institutions and institutes of higher learning from both sides, with an aim to jointly create a new benchmark for global smart city cooperation.”
Having battled the global pandemic for more than 6 months and foreseeing its lasting impact in the times to come, it is important to ask how prepared we are for the life after COVID–19. What are some of the valuable lessons that we have learnt in the past few months that we must take with us as we venture into the ‘new normal’?
In an attempt to discover and delve into the answers to these questions, OpenGov Asia hosted an OpenGovLive! Virtual breakfast insight with financial industry executives based in Indonesia.
The timely and thought-provoking issues saw a 100% attendance and high engagement rate from the audience for the session.
Balancing digital transformation along with managing fraud and risk is a major challenge for banks
Mohit Sagar, Group Managing Director and Editor-in-Chief, OpenGov Asia set the tone for the discussion by pointing out that the new, transformed workspace is no longer a physical place that employees go to but a cluster of virtual work tools that lets employees stay productive anytime and anywhere.
This free and flexible style of working has posed a major challenge for the financial sector industry. They are under a lot of pressure to balance their digital transformation efforts with the increasingly stringent regulatory guidelines alongside managing stakeholder expectations.
Apart from being resilient, banks have to constantly ensure that they are compliant and not flouting any regulations to ensure their presence amongst other contemporaries.
Operational resilience, which was earlier a seldom-discussed topic in the boardrooms, has been elevated on the priority list of CIO’s.
Mohit also highlighted the fact that mere compliance is not enough to ensure survival in the post-COVID-19 world. Constantly pushing the envelope by innovating and thinking outside the box is more important than ever.
He left the audience with advice that to effectively manage these distinct aspects of their business, it would be expedient to seek help and support of partners who specialise in it and who can help them prioritise right in the new uncertain normal.
How SAS can help and support financial institutions in the post COVID era
After Mohit’s challenging opening, Anggaraini Rahayu, Director-FSI, SAS Indonesia, shared her insights on the topic.
Anggaraini began by explaining how SAS can support, help respond to sudden changes and mitigate risk for the financial institutions as they recover in the post COVID–era.
She shared that SAS is doing this by identifying the volatility in macroeconomic factors that are key drivers of change, building up data and analytics capabilities along the journey to recovery and getting ahead of the innovation curve and applying analytics for future strategies.
Anggaraini elaborated on the various trends and opportunities in the FSI that have emerged beyond the pandemic. They are enhanced focus on digital transformation, better integration of financial services to the monetary policies, the robustness of asset and liability management, heightened security risks and surge in contactless payments.
She also talked about the way SAS operates in the financial industry space by enabling effective operations and working with innovative solutions that are driving amazing outcomes for their customers. As SAS champions driving value from analytics, she some of their use cases across the financial institution value chain shared with the delegates.
Anggaraini delved into the biggest focus area of SAS I.e. risk management for banking and insurance industry. She shared with the delegates the details of the SAS fraud and security intelligence solutions and how it enables users to stay resilient and relevant in the post-COVID-era.
She concluded her presentation by sharing some successful implementations of the above-mentioned solution.
Speed of service delivery is of utmost importance in the new financial industry world
After Anngarani’s information-rich presentation, Gerard Mcdonell, Regional Solution Director Fraud & Security Intelligence, SAS came forward to share his perspectives with the audience.
In his very first slide, Gerard highlighted the importance of the speed of delivery in the post-Covid era. Banks and financial institutions are under a lot of pressure to meet the changing demands of their customers in this new world. The need to go digital for financial institutions in the current scenario comes with the downside of increased risk of financial crimes and fraud.
He underscored the need for speed by quoting Klaus Shwab, who said that in this new world it’s not the big fish that eat small fish but the fast fish eating the slow fish.
Gerard validated his statement by citing a recent example where a large European bank lost an opportunity to expand their market due to the lack of agility and velocity in their DNA.
He also echoed the sentiment that the pandemic has only exacerbated the situation for financial institutions forcing the unbanked population to make a leap to digital banking. This, on one hand, has added to the existing challenges for the banks but, on the other, has exposed them to a new customer base that they can tap on.
He went on to shed light on the ways AI can support them. They include accuracy and efficiency with compliance, quick identification of fraudulent transactions, fast and accurate credit scoring.
Gerard strongly advised the colleagues from the industry to embrace the latest advancements in AI to tap on this newly created customer base.
He concluded his presentation by sharing how SAS helped a major bank to significantly improve its fraud management by implementing the fraud management and credit authorisation solution together.
Learning to mitigate the effect of COVID-19 crisis in the financial sector industry
After Gerard, Alfanendya Safudi, Senior Vice President, Head of Credit Portfolio Risk at PT. Bank Mandiri shared his learnings with the delegates.
Alfanendya opened his slot by sharing that, just like the most of delegates and their organisations, Bank Mandiri had very limited visibility of the impact the COVID-19 crisis would have on the economy.
But early stress testing and contingency actions are key to mitigating the impact of COVID–19 outbreak. He ardently advocates stress testing as an effective way of mitigating COVID risk and also emphasised that the test needs to be updated frequently as well as supported by robust tools and systems.
He cautioned the delegates to not rely on a singular stress cycle and undergo multiple rounds of it as they did at Bank Mandiri.
Towards the end of his presentation, Alfanendya shared with the delegates how banks need to prepare as they move forward in the new normal. He also agreed that there is an increase in non-financial risks like fraud, scams, cyber-attacks etc. during the COVID-19 crisis that needs to be better prepared for in times to come.
After the informative presentations, it was now time for the more interactive part of the session: the polling questions and discussions.
On the question about your organisation having the tools to model out the P&L under a wide range of different economic and non-economic scenarios, a majority of the audience voted that they use traditional forecasting techniques, and they are good enough (77%).
One one of the delegated reflected that they are currently using the traditional techniques that are sufficient for now but they are also open to new technologies out there that can help them do it better.
On the question about the impact of the pandemic on their operational risk exposure, particularly relating to fraud and compliance, a major chunk of the delegates voted that increased online and application fraud, along with greater resource demands to keep AML/ KYC/ screening compliance under control have been impacted (50%).
A digital executive shared that increased online or payment fraud and application fraud are bigger impact areas in their organisation that they need to work on.
On the final question about the top priorities, while managing risk management portfolio, the delegates seemed divided between updating their legacy with a modernised risk infrastructure (36%) and using AI and machine learning for credit scoring, capital optimisation, back-testing and model validation and regtech (36%).
After the polling session, the Virtual Breakfast Insight reached a timely conclusion with closing remarks by Febrianto Siboro, Country Managing Director, SAS.
Febrianto began by thanking all the delegates and speakers for joining the session and sharing their insights with the audience. He encouraged the audience to make use of various AI/ML and analytics solutions by SAS to augment their service delivery and team SAS would be happy to entertain their queries and demonstrations for the same.
The Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) and the Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre (MaGIC) in partnership with the Malaysian branch of an American multinational technology company have launched the “Highway to a 100 Unicorns” initiative, which is part of a joint initiative to empower local start-ups and strengthen Malaysia’s start-up ecosystem.
Eligible start-ups will gain access to focused workshops on business and technology, as well as monthly knowledge-sharing webinars with the global start-up community. Additionally, the top start-ups from Malaysia will stand to gain from a year-long mentorship program, access to enterprise clients, as well as engagement opportunities with the firm’s experts and industry leaders.
The Managing Director of the tech firm’s Malaysia arm stated that the country has a vibrant start-up ecosystem, and they play a vital role in the economy as innovators, disruptors. In partnering with MDEC and MaGIC, the firm introduced the ‘Highway to a 100 Unicorns’ initiative in Malaysia.
The initiative is part of the firm’s collective commitment to empowering local start-ups with the right technology and expertise, enabling them to scale and achieve more globally. The start-ups could potentially become tomorrow’s unicorns, helping to shape economic recovery and resilience and build a stronger long-term future in Malaysia.
The Chief Executive Officer of MDEC stated that Kuala Lumpur has been ranked 11th among emerging start-up ecosystems in the world by Startup Genome, which adds to the confidence that Malaysia is primed to be the preferred land and expansion base for the best innovators and tech start-ups regionally.
As the spearhead of Malaysia’s digital economy, the CEO highlighted that MDEC is firmly committed to assisting tech start-ups in their fundraising journey, global market expansion, and forging corporate partnerships to entrench Malaysia, “as the Heart of Digital ASEAN.”
The CEO of MaGIC noted that the Highway to a 100 Unicorns initiative is in line with their commitment to driving the development of a sustainable start-up and social enterprise ecosystem in Malaysia.
While steady growth has been witnessed over the years, the entire ecosystem has been challenged to innovate and accelerate its growth at a much faster pace in recent times. This initiative presents an exciting opportunity for Malaysian innovators and founders to scale and move beyond borders, through global collaborations, as well as industry-led mentorship and guidance.
Starting point
To be considered for the initiative, start-ups will first have to apply to the Emerge X competition. There are three criteria for Emerge X, which are:
- Business-to-Business companies with product-market fit, revenue-generating with at least 3-4 clients.
- Business-to-Consumer companies with a large customer base (upward of 100K customers) and are revenue-generating.
- Funding is a plus.
All Emerge X start-ups will be awarded free GitHub and Azure credits and focused business and technology workshops.
The top finalists from Malaysia will be announced in November, joining other shortlisted innovators and entrepreneurs from 16 other Asia Pacific countries, including Bangladesh, Bhutan, Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, New Zealand, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam.
Additionally, the finalists will benefit from a year-long mentorship with technical and business deep dives, a Founder Bootcamp over 3 days, access to enterprise clients globally through Microsoft’s unique co-sell program as well as opportunities to interact with Microsoft experts and industry stalwarts.
The Highway to Unicorn programme was first launched by the firm for start-ups in India, where only 56 start-ups were selected to the Emerge X program from six states, which have over 15,000 start-ups. The Emerge X winners have greatly benefited from global market access support, a 3-day founder bootcamp with world-class mentors, access to funding, ongoing mentorship, and guidance on Azure, artificial intelligence, machine learning and more. Following the success, the programme has been extended to the Asia Pacific region.
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) in collaboration with a local tech reseller and an American tech manufacturer to launch a new technological learning space, the AktivUKM ruang space for students and the entire campus community. The Vice-Chancellor of UKM stated that the AktivUKM™ space is the first learning space in public universities in Malaysia, which involves strategic collaboration with industry.
The idea of establishing the AktivUKM™ space begun with the aim of aligning with the UKM Strategic Plan 2019-2021 with the concept of House of Quality where Teaching-UKM has been given the mandate to realize the Empowerment of Teaching and Learning and Talent Outreach.
In line with the mandate, the establishment of the AktivUKM™ space is expected to empower students with relevant and futuristic skills to face the era of the 4th Industrial Revolution. The space was created as a knowledge hub that connects students, lecturers and UKM staff.
Its location, located in the Tun Sri Lanang Library, makes it a bridge to connect knowledge in the physical world and the digital world. True to its name, AktivUKM™ is symbolic to drive digital teaching and learning activities among campus residents and the community.
Apart from that, he said, the skills cultivated in the space are expected to provide students, lecturers and UKM staff to share, inspire, impart knowledge and further be able to increase the marketability of graduates.
Through this learning space, students will join the two industry partners in gaining hands-on experience and live digital and futuristic skills for their future careers. Students can also work with digital experts in the space to apply active learning with an American multinational technology company technology as well as develop and create innovative digital materials with futuristic space and technology.
In addition, the AktivUKM™ space provides a hub for lecturers to further strengthen strategic alliances with Apple in transforming teaching and learning (PdP) approaches. With this network, technology experts will be with lecturers in redesigning teaching with Apple’s futuristic ecosystem technology in line with Education 4.0. Lecturers can also create and innovate in PdP and in turn drive education based on the 4th Industrial Revolution.
Preparing Malaysian youth with digital skills
The current COVID-19 pandemic has made it apparent that equipping the workforce with digital skills is imperative for economic recovery. To enable this, the Malaysia Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) has introduced a Digital Skills Training Directory during its recent #MyDigitalWorkforce Week, an initiative to assist youth job-seekers and the unemployed.
The CEO of MDEC said the directory would act as a guide for Malaysians in selecting digital courses that meet their career needs. The introduction of the directory is consistent with the agency’s focus on developing digitally-skilled Malaysians. It will be the go-to guide for all Malaysians and the workforce on what to look out for when it comes to digital tech up-skilling and re-skilling programmes.
Businesses that are looking to hire personnel and have plans to equip talent with relevant digital tech skills can refer to the digital-first focused directory catalogue as it lists down courses that address in-demand digital skills. In addition, most of the courses have been approved for funding – for organisations or talents – under the government’s National Economic Recovery Plan (PENJANA) Hiring Incentive that the Social Security Organisation (Socso) manages.
Should the candidates require training, up to RM4,000 training subsidy will be available for the unemployed who are selected for recruitment by Socso-registered employers.
This arrangement is also available for unemployed Malaysians who are registered with the Socso Employment Insurance System.
The directory covers all areas of digital skills training, from beginner up to advance level. The courses on the list consist of data science (50 courses); cybersecurity (44 courses); animation (19 courses); game development (five courses); and software development (55 courses). These include, but are not limited to, data science, cybersecurity, animation, game development, and software development for the new digital era.
JTC and the Singapore Business Federation (SBF) signed a Memorandum of Understanding yesterday to support manufacturers, especially SMEs, to kick-start their Industry 4.0 journey or to scale their current efforts through the adoption of technologies and solutioning for business operations through the new JTC-SBF Industry Transformation Initiative.
This initiative will provide companies that are keen in furthering their Industry 4.0 ambitions access to relevant Industry 4.0 related resources.
These include curated workshops, capability building initiatives tailored to companies’ digital readiness, and link-ups to a larger pool of technology partners and its consortiums, for solution matching to help companies develop the expertise to implement and scale Industry 4.0 solutions in their operations.
Over 300 companies are expected to be supported under this initiative and undergo Industry 4.0 transformation in the next two years. This will help them to develop new capabilities for their workforce, enhance its productivity and ensure long-term competitiveness.
Mr Tan Boon Khai, CEO of JTC, said, “SBF is an instrumental partner to drive the next phase of Industry 4.0 transformation by companies. With our large base of customers, strong network of partners, and robust advanced manufacturing ecosystem in Jurong Innovation District, more companies can become the forerunner in Industry 4.0. With this new partnership, we hope to see more businesses in Singapore transform and capture new growth opportunities in the region.”
Mr Ho Meng Kit, Chief Executive Officer of SBF, said, “The COVID-19 situation has brought disruptions to economies, making businesses rethink strategies, relook operating models and recalibrate resources. This has led to an accelerated need for a better understanding and adoption of Industry 4.0 to help local enterprises emerge stronger from the pandemic.
With the present downturn expected to be protracted, we hope that through this JTC-SBF partnership, we can further encourage more companies to take a holistic view at how Industry 4.0 solutions can help their businesses transform and thrive in the future economy.”
New initiatives to support and accelerate the next phase of Industry 4.0 transformation
This new collaboration will allow JTC and SBF’s combined network of companies to more easily access relevant Industry 4.0 resources across JTC and SBF’s networks and platforms.
Together with partners, joint engagement sessions will be carried out to further strengthen the various initiatives and encourage higher adoption of solutions for businesses to scale up their Industry 4.0 capabilities.
Companies can participate in curated training workshops and capability building programmes tailored to their level of Industry 4.0 readiness, and develop roadmaps to guide their implementation.
They will gain access to successful case studies and embark on learning journeys at Factories of the Future, giving them greater exposure to Industry 4.0 solutions in real production facilities. This will further encourage companies to transform and remain competitive amidst the pandemic.
Building a collaborative community through Industry Connect to help businesses capture new Industry 4.0 opportunities
This partnership with SBF is part of JTC’s ongoing efforts to build a collaborative community that can help companies to stay ahead of the curve. In January this year, JTC launched the Industry Connect Initiative to help businesses across its estates grow through technology adoption while enhancing talent development and environmental sustainability.
With over 14,000 customers, JTC can effectively promote business transformation to these companies by connecting them to solutions providers, trade associations, and government agencies.
To date, over 1,000 businesses in JTC’s estates have been engaged through various Industry 4.0 outreach initiatives, with around 200 companies embarking on their Industry 4.0 journey.
Leading players in the business community are sharing relevant technologies and experience to address problems faced by various industries. This has created new opportunities for businesses and their workers.
The National Super Computing Mission (NSM) of India is making significant headway in boosting the high power computing capacity in the country. The nation is rapidly expanding its supercomputer facilities and developing the appropriate capacity to manufacture its supercomputers in the country.
The NSM is jointly steered by the Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) and Department of Science and Technology (DST) and implemented by the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC), Pune and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru.
The National Super Computing Mission is deploying a phased strategy through its various arms to meet the increasing computational demands of academia, researchers, MSMEs, and startups in areas like oil exploration, flood prediction as also genomics and drug discovery.
With the infrastructure planned in NSM Phase-I already installed and much the infrastructure of Phase-II in place, the network of supercomputers through the country will soon reach to around 16 Petaflops (PF). Phase-III, to be initiated in January 2021, will take the computing speed to around 45 Petaflops.
Param Shivay, the first supercomputer assembled indigenously, was installed in IIT (BHU), followed by Param Shakti and Param Brahma at IIT-Kharagpur and IISER, Pune, respectively.
Thereafter supercomputing facilities were set up in two more institutions, and one is being set up in Phase-I, ramping up high power computing speed to 6.6 PF under Phase-1. In Phase-II, 8 more institutions will be equipped with supercomputing facilities by April 2021, with a total of 10 PF compute capacity. Work on Phase-III will start in 2021 and will include three systems of 3 PF each and one system of 20PF as a national facility.
MoUs have been signed with 14 premier institutions of India to establish supercomputing infrastructure along with assembly and manufacturing capacity within the country. These include IITs, NITs, National Labs, and IISERs. While some of these have already been installed, more will be done by December this year. The Phase-II installations will be completed by April 2021.
The three phases will provide access to High-Performance Computing (HPC) Facilities to 75 institutions and thousands of active researchers and academicians working through Nation Knowledge Network (NKN) – the backbone for supercomputing systems.
HPC and Artificial Intelligence (AI) have converged together. A 100 AI PF Artificial Intelligence supercomputing system is being created and installed in C-DAC, which can handle incredibly large-scale AI workloads increasing the speed of computing-related to AI several times.
The mission has also created the next generation of supercomputer experts by training more than 2400 supercomputing manpower and faculties till date.
Powered by the NSM, India’s network of research institutions, in collaboration with the industry, is scaling up the technology and manufacturing capability to make more and more parts in India. While in Phase-I, 30% value addition is done in India, that has been scaled up to 40% in Phase-II.
Efforts are being made to design and develop parts like server board, interconnect, processor, system software libraries, storage, and HPC-AI converged accelerator domestically. India has developed an Indigenous server (Rudra), which can meet the HPC requirements of all governments and PSUs. This is the first time that a server system was made in India, along with the full software stack developed by C-DAC.
Experts said that the pace at which things are moving forward, we may soon have the motherboards and sub-systems manufactured in India, making the supercomputers indigenously designed and manufactured.
Such indigenously designed systems with most parts designed and manufactured in India will be installed at places like IIT-Mumbai, IIT-Chennai, and Inter-University Accelerator Centre (IUAC) at Delhi, C-DAC, Pune, which are covered under Phase-III and help move towards supercomputers developed and manufactured totally in India paving the way for self-reliance in the field.
The Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) has expressed complete support for the vision of e-governance as outlined in the Senate Bill 1738 (E-Governance Act of 2020) as a means of institutionalising e-Governance in the Philippines to cope with the transition to the new normal and the challenges posed by the COVID-19 threat.
“In an age where almost everything can be done online and through other digital platforms, the government must harness the power of information and communications technology to better serve its purpose and bring the government closer to the people,” Senator Go, who filed the Bill on 27 July 2020.
The DICT was confident that the Bill when enacted, would complement and enhance the current efforts it has undertaken to transform public service delivery through prioritisation of digitalisation initiatives.
“We are ramping up our digitalisation plans to accelerate solid client-responsive reforms, and the filing of Senator Go of the Bill is a welcome development towards an apparently shared vision between the Executive and the Legislative when it comes to national digital transformation,” DICT Secretary Gregorio B. Honasan II said. “Digital transformation should be done with interoperation as a long-term goal and with client experience always as a top consideration.”
The proposed legislation aims to establish an integrated and interoperable information system for the whole of government, an internal records management system, an information database, and digital portals for government services. The bill also aims to do away with paper-based and outdated models of bureaucratic work within government agencies and units to improve efficiency.
It envisions the establishment of the Integrated Government Network (IGN) which would serve as the primary mode of information and resource sharing among the government and function as the government’s focal information management tool and communications network.
DICT is currently focusing on interconnecting government agencies and integrating their services towards a long-term target of seamless interoperation. The Department is focusing on various digitalisation solutions under its ICT-enabled government agenda, which includes both a strengthening of existing platforms as well as looking into inter-sectoral initiatives to improve public service delivery for a recalibrated Digital Government.
DICT is enhancing government interconnectivity with the Philippine Government Network (GovNet), that provides government offices with high-speed broadband connection linked to a secure data centre, allowing the processing and transfer of sizeable data for more efficient public services. GovNet interconnects government agencies to promote better information exchange and improve the accessibility of resources.
Additionally, the department continuously provides efficient and quality services through the National Government Portal (NGP), a centralised platform where citizens can currently access 231 e-Government services online through www.gov.ph for easier navigation. Another key program to integrate government services is the National Government Data Center (NGDC) Project, which addresses the ICT system needs of government agencies by providing centralised locations where computing and networking equipment shall be housed.
DICT Department supports efforts to promote ease of doing business through the NationalBusinessOne-Stop-Shop(NBOSS), which was launched in partnership with the Anti-Red Tape Authority (ARTA), to allow for the simpler business registration process that can be completed within 7 and a half days. Similarly, the Central Business Portal (CBP) complements the NBOSS as the online platform that receives business applications and links registrants to the concerned government unit/agency to complete the transactions.
The Department is also gearing for e-Government interoperability for 2021 through a portfolio of inter-sectoral initiatives it is currently developing, in line with the recommendations of the “We Recover as One” Report of the IATF-MEID’s Technical Working Group (TWG) for Anticipatory and Forward Planning (AFP).
With these enhanced initiatives in place, the DICT affirms its commitment to lead efforts towards government digital transformation in support of the President’s directives and parallel to the legislative push for digitalisation of services.
“We are extending all efforts to transform how we deliver public services, how we transact with the people, and how we move forward in the new normal by maximising the benefits of information and communications technology,” Secretary Honasan said.
The Vietnam government strongly believes that ensuring safety in cyberspace will accelerate the process of national digital transformation as it is the key to a successful and sustainable digital transformation.
Speaking at the opening ceremony of the ITU Digital World 2020, Minister Nguyen Manh Hung said that Vietnam considers digital platforms as a way to accelerate national digital transformation, considering cybersecurity a key factor to create digital trust and Institutional reform the decisive factor for digital transformation. Vietnam considers digital platforms as a way to accelerate national digital transformation, considering cybersecurity a key factor to create digital trust and institutional reform the decisive factor for digital transformation.
Vietnamese technology not only solves Vietnamese problems but also contributes to solving global problems. The platforms showcased in ITU Digital World 2020 online exhibition and the technological solutions in the prevention of Covid-19, such as Bluezone and Ncovi, are concrete examples. According to Minister Nguyen Manh Hung, digital infrastructure with “Make in Vietnam” digital products and platforms are ready for the digital economy and society, ready for a digital Vietnam.
Vietnam has conditions to become a technology country, to use technology as a driving force for national development, to go at the same pace as other countries, for global cooperation and together build a digital world. The government considers telecommunications and IT infrastructure development one of the top priorities, and digital transformation an important solution for the country’s fast and sustainable development.
However, spam messages, e-mails and calls have been a burning issue for years in Vietnam. The issues of how to prevent spam have and are a topic of discussion at many National Assembly’s sessions.
After one year of compilation with many amendments, Decree 91 was issued by the government on August 14. The latest decree has many positive developments as compared to decrees 90 and 77 addressing the same issue. Legislators and experts are confident that the decree will have a significant impact on reducing spam in the Vietnamese digital landscape.
The strong measures were designed after learnings from the experience of developed countries were applied to strategies. Case in hand: since Australia started a DoNotCall list, 50% of subscribers have registered not to receive ad messages.
Decree 91 gives new definitions about spam messages and emails and adds a new concept about a ‘spam call’, which helps set the criteria for recognizing spam messages, calls and emails. The new decree mentions new measures for users to protect themselves from spam, including DoNotCall, the list of subscribers refusing advertising messages.
As the compiler of Decree 91 on fighting spam SMS, calls and messages, an official with the Authority for Information Security, Dang Huy Hoang, said he was happy that he could contribute to reducing ‘garbage’ in digital space, “All my enthusiasm and 8-year experience in fighting against spam are shown in the content of the decree.”
Hoang began working on the anti-spam segment in late 2012 and early 2013 when he had the chance to work with an expert at VNCERT. Since then, he has been fighting against spam. Hoang said over the last 10 years of working at the Ministry of Information and Communication, his colleague and he have been working determinedly to resolve the issues at hand. In addition to compiling Decree 91, he was also one of the compilers of circulars and other legal documents and set the criteria applied to technological solutions that recognize and authenticate genuine subscribers using artificial intelligence for prevention of spam messages.
Decree 91 also stipulates that mobile network operators have to improve techniques to prevent and filter spam, using modern technologies such as AI, Big Data, Machine Learning and behaviour analysis technology. The decree also sets new sanction methods to deter violators and protect users.
Soon after the decree was issued, Hoang and his colleagues put in place a plan to bring the decree to fruition. The new management mechanism is hoped to help mitigate spam and promote the legal advertising market and create a more secure digital ecosystem for the nation.
Recently OpenGov Asia reported don the sharp decrease in virus-infected computer networks in Vietnam. The initiative is a large-scale campaign aiming to ensure the safety and benefits of communities, businesses, individuals and families that use internet-connected devices that are networked in a cyber environment.
