16 November 2024

Finding security in digital public infrastructure

Justin Sherman

Digital public infrastructure (DPI) has evolved as a term used to describe everything from state-run digital payment systems to national cloud and data-exchange platforms to comprehensive backups of public documents and societal information. There is no single, cohesive, standard approach to digital public infrastructure—and examples range from Kenya to India to Ukraine—but DPI efforts share state involvement in the creation or operation of key digital platforms, are intended to be used country-wide, and have significant impacts on digital trust, privacy, and cybersecurity.

This issue brief examines the potential opportunities and risks of DPI across digital trust, data privacy, and cybersecurity and resilience. As part of an Atlantic Council working group, academic, civil society, and industry experts from the United States and South Asia explored these questions as they relate to DPI payment, public service delivery, data backup, cloud, and other projects and proposals—with an eye toward the biggest unresolved public policy, legal, and technological questions associated with state development and guidance of these systems. The working group’s virtual convenings were held under the Chatham House Rule.


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