Britain's national digital ID scheme may be dead, but Whitehall appears to have forgotten to tell the infrastructure. Despite the government scrapping its controversial plans, officials told MPs on Monday that work continues on GOV.UK One Login, digital wallets, and a growing collection of digital credentials designed to help people prove who they are. The abandoned scheme was one of Keir Starmer's flagship policies, originally pitched as a compulsory digital ID card to crack down on illegal working. Privacy campaigners weren't impressed, warning of surveillance and government overreach, and ministers eventually made it voluntary before Andy Burnham, decided to bin the whole thing. But scrapping the scheme hasn't dented Whitehall's digital identity ambitions. Officials told MPs this week that more than 80 types of documents are earmarked for the government's digital wallet, including proof of benefits, driving test certificates, and Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) certificates. That's quite a lot of paperwork for something that's supposedly dead. The revelations came during a Public Accounts Committee hearing on Monday, where MPs wanted to know what exactly had been scrapped. "But is it not the case, based on the answers you've given us this afternoon, that the infrastructure of digital ID in the public sector is still being pursued?" asked Sarah Green, Liberal Democrat MP for Chesham and Amersham. Susannah Storey, DCMS permanent secretary, was keen to draw a line between the national scheme ministers had scrapped and the digital identity projects Whitehall had no intention of abandoning. One Login already allows people to prove who they are online, she said, but "that is not the same as a national digital identity strategy." Rod Latham, DCMS director for cybersecurity and digital identity, had a convenient explanation for why so much of digital ID was still standing: the government had only scrapped plans for a new identity product. "We already had One Login and the Gov Wallet," he told MPs, adding that work on the digital identity trust framework was also underway before the national scheme was announced. Whitehall isn't wasting time putting that technology to use, with officials confirming that testing is already underway to enable digital credentials to work with private businesses. Natalie Jones, the senior responsible owner for GOV.UK One Login, revealed that the government had opened a testing environment for private sector providers to integrate with its digital wallet technology. This would let people use digital driving licenses to prove their age in pubs, collect parcels, or verify their identity online. "We've got a bit of a chicken and egg situation. A digital driving license is only useful if there are people ready and shops and businesses ready to receive it,” Jones said, noting that further testing is planned for December, with a national rollout of digital driving licenses targeted for 2027. MPs also pressed officials on privacy, particularly whether citizens would have to consent before their information was shared between government departments. "In the confines of digital ID used in digital services, then consent is the model," said Christine Bellamy, interim director general for digital products at the Government Digital Service. There's a catch, of course. Government departments can already share data without asking permission, and officials couldn't quite explain how that squares with their promises about consent. "The strategy needs to be fully finished," Bellamy admitted, which might not be the reassurance MPs were hoping for. Jones insisted that One Login was "not a big data lake," saying it stores identity information separately and cannot see what users do inside government services. "One Login does not issue a single identifier to people," she added. Rupert Lowe MP remained unconvinced, warning that Britain could end up getting digital ID "by the back door rather than the front door." Officials maintained that the canceled national scheme was fundamentally different from the services still being developed, and that people would retain alternatives to digital identification. National digital ID may be officially dead, but between One Login, digital wallets, and dozens of planned credentials, Whitehall still has plenty of identity-related work to keep it busy. ®

South Korean president Lee Jae Myung has told the nation’s cabinet that it’s time to develop AI-powered defensive tools to combat AI-wielding attackers. “Recently, a series of personal information leak incidents have been occurring at financial and public institutions,” he said yesterday – likely referring to incidents like the breach at e-tailer Coupang and last week’s raid on local banks that exposed customer data. “Circumstances indicate that artificial intelligence was utilized, causing great concern and anxiety among the public,” he claimed. “I request that the relevant authorities swiftly and clearly identify the circumstances of these incidents, and rapidly deploy and concentrate the necessary personnel and resources to minimize damage,” he added, before calling for South Korea’s government to “build security capabilities that can detect attacks in advance and preemptively block them.” “I urge the relevant ministries to quickly inspect the security systems across the entire national core infrastructure, as well as the private sector, and immediately implement any necessary security measures,” he continued. “I hope we can accelerate the development and distribution of AI technologies specifically tailored for cybersecurity.” President Lee thinks South Korea needs to “completely innovate our society's security paradigm to fit the AI era.” That work will involve public and private sector players collaborating “to transform our technology, systems, and awareness.” The remarks amount to a major policy statement, and a very public one at that. South Korean ministers and tech giants now get to turn the president’s words into action, a complex task given the broad scope of the leader’s demands and the fact that nobody thinks it's possible to defeat cybercrime. Meanwhile, Down Under Also yesterday, Australian politicians had their chance to grill OpenAI Chief Strategy Officer Jason Kwon, who fronted a parliamentary committee to answer questions about how his company’s agents accessed a government medical records website. Kwon allowed that OpenAI should have done better than emailing the abuse reporting email address at the relevant Australian government agency but defended the company’s efforts to learn from the Hugging Face incident. The committee is sitting for another two days this week, with one topic of debate being how or if Australia should tweak its copyright laws to ensure AI companies pay content creators whose works they use when training their models. Australian law doesn’t include a fair use provision like those that AI companies in the USA relied on when sourcing content. Creators fear a rumored opt-in payments scheme will be too weak, but Australia’s government fears it may miss out on big datacenter investments and access to onshore frontier models if it doesn’t change copyright law to make it more AI-friendly. ®

The UK government has corralled £7.8 billion of cross-departmental spending into a new space strategy intended to boost growth and national security through to 2030. The package covers orbital collision warnings, low Earth orbit communications, military intelligence, launch capabilities, and space science. The strategy brings together activity across government, including the newly created Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade (BIST), the Ministry of Defence (MoD), the Department for Transport, UK Research and Innovation, and the Met Office. The government says the domestic space sector is worth £18.6 billion and supports more than 55,000 skilled jobs. In a prepared statement, BIST Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said space was becoming a new frontier of economic and military competition. "This plan will help keep Britain secure by strengthening our ability to launch satellites, detect threats and protect the services people rely on every day. At the same time, this plan will enable our excellent UK industry to seize the boundless opportunities of this new age in space, creating skilled jobs, driving growth and improving connectivity for all of us." The plans include work to strengthen space domain awareness – tracking and analyzing satellites, rockets, and debris in orbit – backed by £149 million for European Space Agency (ESA) space safety work, including the Vigil mission, and £85 million for the National Space Operations Centre. The funding is intended to improve warnings of potential satellite collisions, hostile activity, and solar storms, helping protect power, communications, and navigation services. The government has also allocated £880 million during this Parliament to space control and space-based intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. The investment is intended to help track military activity on the ground, identify potential attacks on satellites, and protect British assets in orbit. The strategy also identifies £2.8 billion for satellite connectivity, including the Connectivity in Low Earth Orbit program and the military's SKYNET communications system. Funding of up to £160 million through March 2030 has already been announced for the UK Space Agency's Connectivity in Low Earth Orbit (C-LEO) program, helping British companies and researchers develop satellite communications technology. The strategy also puts £40 million towards technology for servicing, assembling, and manufacturing equipment in orbit. The government says this could support everything from repairing satellites and clearing debris to producing semiconductors and pharmaceuticals in space. Another £148 million is allocated to European rocket programs, while SaxaVord Spaceport in Shetland is set to receive £30 million, subject to due diligence. A further £163 million will go toward space science and exploration missions, including delivery of the UK-built Rosalind Franklin Mars rover. The package also includes £57 million to improve rail connectivity, £190 million for astronomy and space science research, and £9 million to strengthen space weather forecasting. The government also plans to adopt a single approach to buying and developing space technology, beginning with satellite communications, in an effort to steer more work towards British suppliers, accelerate delivery, and secure better value for taxpayers. In July, the government's projects authority sounded the alarm over progress on Skynet 6, the £8.35 billion program to upgrade the military's satellite communications. The National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA) gave Skynet 6 a red rating, meaning "successful delivery of the project appears to be unachievable" in its current form. Confidence had fallen from last year's amber rating because department-wide recruitment and resourcing constraints had created workforce shortages, while "sub-par supplier performance continues to delay delivery of the first SKYNET 6 satellite," the report said. The new document formally replaces the UK's 2021 National Space Strategy, which a House of Lords report warned last year had failed to turn its ambitions into reality. "The UK space sector lacks the strategic direction necessary for success," it said. ®

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