Government Acts to Maintain Information Integrity

5 September 2006

The State Services Commission today released guidance aimed at ensuring that new technologies do not undermine the ability of the government to protect information privacy, security and accessibility.

The Trusted Computing and Digital Rights Management Principles and Policies ensure New Zealand government-held information or related government systems are not adversely affected by these technologies.

"New Zealand government is determined to maintain the integrity of information entrusted to it and to ensure that access to that information is not compromised now or in the future. Protecting the integrity of this information is a critical part of a Trusted State Services.

"Trusted Computing and Digital Rights Management may provide some benefits for security, but they also present real risks to the ability of the government to access information provided to it, and to store and maintain information necessary to carry out its business," said Laurence Millar, Deputy Commissioner Information and Communications Technology.

The Principles and Policies for Trusted Computing and Digital Rights Management describe what government agencies must do to maintain the integrity of government information when using these technologies.

The State Services Commission is continuing work to further develop standards and processes to support these principles.

Laurence Millar commended the efforts of the group of government agencies and technology vendors, led by the SSC, that developed the Principles and Policies over the last 12 months. The group included officials from central and local government, as well as representatives from HP, Microsoft and IBM.

"This work is attracting international attention and it is hoped that other governments would adopt similar approaches so that technology vendors would recognise that the particular needs of governments in managing information had to be met,” Mr Millar said.