The benefits

Delivering all these applications requires a new type of digital infrastructure.

If it can be created:

• Users will find life online easier, getting more stuff done with less hassle, and without risk to their privacy; and
• Organisations will find that they receive more reliable data about the people they interact with, without risk of contravening the data protection regulations

And, as beneficial side effects:

• Users will gain greater certainty about who they are dealing with online, so reducing the incidence of phishing attacks
• Organisations will gain more secure means of communicating with individuals (and vice-versa), suitable for use with ‘sensitive personal data’, and thus supplanting insecure email
• Overall costs should fall as systems for user control of data, and user control of money (i.e. payments) begin to converge