{"id":70044,"date":"2016-04-28T15:03:29","date_gmt":"2016-04-28T15:03:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?guid=f5eb89a6164d932fe230a00a63012d82"},"modified":"2016-04-28T15:03:29","modified_gmt":"2016-04-28T15:03:29","slug":"news-story-government-explores-blockchain-technology-to-improve-public-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/?p=70044","title":{"rendered":"News story: Government explores blockchain technology to improve public services"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"govspeak\">\n<p>Minister for the Cabinet Office Matthew Hancock has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/speeches\/digital-transformation-in-government-and-blockchain-technology\">announced that government will begin looking at blockchain technology<\/a> as a practical way to improve the efficiency of taxpayer money distributed as grants to agencies and partners for research and innovation. <\/p>\n<p>Speaking at a nationwide blockchain networking event at <a rel=\"external\" href=\"https:\/\/digital.catapult.org.uk\">Digital Catapult<\/a> in London, Mr Hancock said the Cabinet Office is looking at blockchain as a way to monitor and control what can sometimes be an incredibly complex process.<\/p>\n<p>Today\u2019s event, led by the Cabinet Office\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/organisations\/government-digital-service\">Government Digital Service<\/a>, <a rel=\"external\" href=\"http:\/\/www.imperial.ac.uk\/cryptocurrency\">Imperial College<\/a>, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/organisations\/department-for-culture-media-sport\">Department for Culture, Media and Sport<\/a>, focussed on bringing together government policy officials with academics and business to see what the opportunities are for using blockchain and how the government can help industries use it. <\/p>\n<p>After his keynote address to the conference, Matthew Hancock, Minister for the Cabinet Office and Paymaster General, said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>We have worked very hard in recent years to transform government, to bring it up to date with the internet age. We\u2019ve made great strides, but there\u2019s still a very long way to go.<\/p>\n<p>Government cannot bury its head in the sand and ignore new technologies as they emerge.<\/p>\n<p class=\"last-child\">If a government doesn\u2019t keep up with new and innovative technology, it falls behind on the ability to provide services for its citizens. We want to stay at the forefront. I believe as technology becomes part of the fabric of the nation, it must become part of the fabric of government.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Technology such as blockchain offers a number of opportunities to explore within government and was used as part of the bitcoin currency. Government is keen to work with cutting-edge private sector fintech companies and academics to see where it can support the sector.<\/p>\n<p>For example, the government has already <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gov.uk\/government\/consultations\/digital-currencies-call-for-information\">committed<\/a> \u00a310m to the Alan Turing Institute to investigate digital currencies and distributed ledger technologies and are looking for case studies showing blockchains can be used in government.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government has outlined ways the state could use blockchain technology to track payments and provide public services.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70044"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=70044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70044\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=70044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=70044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mostafa.openonline.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=70044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}