On May 12, the Diet passed a set of six bills for digital reform including one to launch the Digital Agency on September 1 under the jurisdiction of the Cabinet Office. It is designed to promote standardization and cloud migration of the entire administrative systems with extensive authority given to control the relevant budgets of ministries.

In line with the electronic authentication of My Number identification cards, the linkage with bank accounts and health insurance certificate, as well as the omission and abolition of use of personal seals and paper documents, the efficiency of the overall administrative procedures will be enhanced in various ways.  It is a matter of course that strict operation to ensure personal information protection is essential and it will greatly improve the convenience of national life when the optimal digitalization is fulfilled.

At the same time, occurrence of globalized risks is inevitable. On April 20, a Chinese national got referred to prosecutors as he was thought to have conducted a number of large-scale cyberattacks on the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and other domestic research institutions. Suspicion lingers over the involvement of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in the cyber crime. Likewise, a fuel pipeline on the east coast of the United States was hit by a cyberattack on May 7. According to the FBI announcement, it was highly possible that a group of Russian hackers maneuvered the attack. Obviously, a combined administrative system is prone to be an easy target for criminal groups. It is imperative to strengthen countermeasures for emergencies in collaboration with related organizations for the integration of decision-making and the associated instruction systems.

Incidentally, Japan seems to be recognized as one of those digitally underdeveloped nations, but I do not think IT has been neglected in this country. In 2000, Basic Act on the Formation of an Advanced Information and Telecommunications Network Society was enacted with a goal of “becoming the world's most advanced IT nation within 5 years.” Subsequently in 2002, the Online Administrative Procedures Law was established, focusing on the fact that “approx. 52,000 procedures of the central and local governments will be made through the online communications by the end of 2003.” However, the legislation to promote IT strategies proved to be indefinite and faded away. As a result, the current slow progress of digitalization was revealed by the delay in the distribution of the “100,000-yen cash handout per person” last year. The barrier to progress is attributable to multiple factors such as lack of long-term strategies, vertically divided administration system, and ambiguity of locus of responsibility. However, after all, those IT policies adopted by Japanese government were merely temporary substitutes. Now I dare say it is high time to achieve the digital reform on the basis of long-term vision and strategies.

One more point is added lastly. DX promotion for public administration does not mean a simple replacement of the current administrative system with the utilization of IT to improve the procedural efficiency. Rather, it is intended to restore the proper framework of administrative entity itself in terms of organizations, competences and duties, decision-making processes, and flexible working pattern and practices. In other words, it would be a comprehensive task of reconfirming responsibilities and obligations to the public. Remember the requirements for retaining data including, "Retention of all records" and "Public data disclosure is the basic principle." I earnestly hope the principle, which is "Information on the government and administrative organizations belongs to the people of the nation (the sovereigns)”, should always be placed at the basis of the policy design concept.

This Week’s Focus, May 14

Takashi Mizukoshi, the President