27 Apr 2018

Scottish Government and digital identity

What are people’s experiences of identifying themselves online? We’ve been working with the Scottish Government Digital Transformation team to find out.

We have been working for Scottish Government Digital Transformation team conducting Discovery phase research to try to understand people’s motivations and experiences, hopes and fears related to creating and using a trusted online identity. We have been supported in this work by David Alexander of Mydex and Richard Pope of Projects by If, both of whom have considerable expertise and experience of working in this area.

Many people already have multiple digital identities for different services such as banking, online shopping, social media etc. Some also already have online identities through HMRC, Verify or myaccount for public services. Our research aimed to learn more about people’s experiences of and attitudes to online identity.

There are two distinct aspects of a trusted online identity and they are directly related to what people are trying to achieve. The most basic element involves firstly proving that this person exists and that you are this person. This is sufficient for many basic services which only require you prove who you are and where you live.

For other eligibility-related services you need to provide more information about your life circumstances, such as disability, dependent family members and income, to prove that you are eligible for things such as mortgages, loans, grants or benefits.

The video included in this blog is from the Show and Tell event we held on 28th March at Victoria Quay, Edinburgh. We had over 50 participants ranging from public sector managers and frontline workers in third sector agencies, to interest individuals. We used the event as an opportunity to present some of the findings from the research and engage participants in adding further insights, challenging and validating the findings.

We are still collating the findings from the research and our report will shortly be submitted to Scottish Government and, once approved, be made available online. You can look out for any updates on the Scottish Government Digital Participation blog.

Snook – Online Identity Assurance – Scottish Government Show & Tell from Snook on Vimeo.

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