Researchers from the Veracity Lab, an initiative co-directed by Te Herenga Waka—Victoria University of Wellington’s Associate Professor Markus Luczak-Roesch, say the Government’s Digital Strategy for Aotearoa presents a chance to become a values-based, equitable, and self-determining digital society.
The Veracity Lab is a research and development initiative supported by the Science for Technological Innovation National Science Challenge (SfTI). The Lab is focused on promoting a high-integrity digital future for Aotearoa New Zealand.
Associate Professor Luczak-Roesch, from the Wellington School of Business and Government’s School of Information Management, says it is important to recognise the significant implications the goals, priorities, and activities of the Digital Strategy will have on Aotearoa’s future.
“This is an amazing window of opportunity for Aotearoa to change the conditions of a deteriorating global digital landscape. We can simultaneously leverage our high-trust reputation and be the safe-haven digital nation the world is looking for.
“As a nation, we can demonstrate this change, not because we are better, faster, bigger, smarter, but because we are profoundly simple—that is our advantage. We have the in-country design science expertise, the highest level of international support, and wide industry interest to make this opportunity real.”
The Veracity Lab’s submission on the government’s strategy is optimistic, Associate Professor Luczak-Roesch says, but it also recognises that there are significant risks to consider.
“The digital world is increasingly a world with borders, where we witness a race for who accumulates the most data from people and businesses around the globe. Large data monopolies are the ones that have the ability to make progress in critical areas such as Artificial Intelligence, while smaller players are left behind or completely locked out,” Associate Professor Luczak-Roesch says.
“While Veracity Lab’s submission is positive, and suggests that we have to be ambitious, we are also very clear that the current situation is quite dangerous.
“All the data we currently assume to own, whether that be trade information, harvest information or medical information, is held, not within the systems of the entity providing the service or product, but by the associated data company—which is often offshore. This means that anyone who wants to create additional value from the data collected here in Aotearoa often has to buy it back or is in the power of the offshore player.”
Associate Professor Māui Hudson from the University of Waikato, who is the other co-director for Veracity Lab, says: "For Māori and Indigenous people worldwide, data is a taonga—something that is highly prized. There is growing concern among Indigenous communities that use of their data by external parties could lead to misappropriation and cultural harm."
“People, communities, and businesses globally are experiencing a loss of their digital assets and are starting to look for safe havens for their data and digital transactions,” Associate Professor Luczak-Roesch says. “Aotearoa has an opportunity to create this safe haven, backed by a strong national digital infrastructure that can give trusted assurances.
“But work must have as its starting point a social contract, a co-designed understanding of what ‘good’ in the digital future looks like, not just a technological solution. We would be perfectly placed to fulfil this role, and Veracity Lab’s team is in the perfect place to help make that happen.”
Watch a video about the Veracity Lab.