Another corporatised medical record platform widely used in our public health system, another data breach and resulting outage;
"Health NZ is aware that MediMap, a privately owned and operated medication management platform, has taken its platform offline after identifying unauthorised activity within its system."
https://www.tewhatuora.govt.nz/news-and-updates/medimap-health-nz-statement
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As @lightweight pointed out in an excellent blog post on this a decade ago;
"As such, the governments and businesses of the world are, in effect, subsidiaries of the Microsoft Corporation. This compromises their sovereignty and ability to make the best decisions on behalf of their citizens.'
https://davelane.nz/new-zealand-dependence-microsoft-corporation
Anyone in business should be familiar with an old truth: if you build your business so that it depends on a single supplier's product, that you can't get anywhere else, you don't actually have a business. Your business is effectively a non-voting subsidiary of your supplier. At the very least, you have a potentially catastrophic dependence. The supplier could choose, at any time, to
The Labour website policy page lists only what they've announced as flagship election policies
https://www.labour.org.nz/our-policies/
I had to dig around the site to find their full policy platform, via a link half way down their party information page;
https://www.labour.org.nz/party_info
... which links to a PDF in a Goggle Drive;
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1grZhXiJNoRyoatvp2IOtnU2bu33UyvgK/view
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"One thing, it's just going to take a while. These old girls, they've got old software. OK? It's just because that's what the government buys, they go for the cheapest software, that's why everything's crap, and that's why the government's so inefficient. LOL.
Don't quote me on that."
Jeremy, 'Nobody WINZ', 2025
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eH23qYXKo-s
#HatTip to @bigblen for the short film link. It's a bit surrealist, but it perfectly captures the Kafkaeque feeling of dealing with WINZ.
I just finished binging the 2024 UK mini-series Mr Bates vs The Post Office. It's based on true events, and I have so many thoughts!
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#TV #UK #drama #BasedOnATrueStory #MrBates #GigEconomy #OutSourcing #AI #GovtIT
OMG someone said the quiet part out loud! I wonder how much money the public of Aotearoa gave BorgSoft over the last 5 years? How much we will fork over during the course of the next 5? How much of our sensitive government data is stored in systems that are legally obliged to give the US government full access on request?
The strategy laid out towards the end of the linked article is bang on.
@feld
> (2017) Senate approves encrypted app Signal for staff use
A Matrix-based messaging app developed specifically for government use, and hosted by dedicated in-house tech staff, would be a better choice. Every aspect of it would be fully aduitable, not just source code published by a third party host. Plus public disclosure of official comms could be automated, in line with existing public records rules.
We expect all NZ government websites to be served from a .govt.nz subdomain. By the same token, any scripts those sites serve ought to come from a .govt.nz subdomain too. Like using HTTPS, it needs to be a legal requirement.
No more of this corner-cutting, by loading unaudited proprietary scripts in realtime, from commercial third parties. This is a huge security hole in any website. It's unacceptable in government sites.
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Stefan Korn is not wrong that public service website need to be simple static sites. Which can be accessed by voice assistants just as easily as web browsers without JavaScript (#MakeJavaScriptOptional!).
He's just wrong that they're not already designed that way.
He either doesn't know about NZ government website standards like Web Accessibility Standard 1.1;
https://digital.govt.nz/standards-and-guidance/
... or he's hoping that you don't.
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I mean, do BorgSoft email systems even support sending encrypted email? Because if not, anyone can get a copy of all emails sent and received from Parliament. By packet sniffing everything sent from its internet connections.
I'd like to think the NZ government are smart enough to think about this. But I don't. Remember them conducting Cabinet meetings over Zoom during pandemic lockdowns?
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Strypey
