Singapore to foster digital identity trust with new research center

Jun 3, 2022, 10:55 am EDT | Ayang Macdonald

Singapore to foster digital identity trust with new research center

Singapore’s Minister for Communication and Information Josephine Teo has announced that a new national Digital Trust Center (DTC) is to be opened as part of the country’s support for the development of innovative solutions that enhance digital identity trust.

Funding for this project, estimated at $50 million, will be provided by the Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) and the National Research Foundation, with the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) having been picked by the Singaporean government to implement the project, reports The Straits Times.

The NTU’s associate vice-president of strategy and partnerships, Professor Lam Kwok Yan, is expected to be named the pioneer executive director of the center when it reaches operations, the report indicates.

Teo explained during a Tech x Singapore event recently that once established, the new research center will work in close partnership with the country’s universities and research institutes to support research initiatives and mature local talents in the development of digital trust technologies. About a hundred persons will receive training.

“It will focus on trusted data sharing and computation, digital identity and algorithms that evaluate the trustworthiness of systems. Besides local partners, the centre will also collaborate with international partners from both the public and private sectors,” Teo is quoted by The Straits Times as saying.

More specifically, the research center will pay attention to four focus areas, namely research in trusted analysis, digital identity, accreditation and computation.

News about the imminent building of the DTC comes at a time when the IMDA also recently concluded a partnership agreement with the International Center of Expertise in Montreal for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (ICEMAI) to work on a project that focuses on the development of privacy-enhancing technologies, per The Strait Times.

In February, Thales launched two research centers in Singapore to further efforts aimed at strengthening the country’s digital ID ecosystem.