[Opinion] Digital Platform Government and MyData

During the last presidential election, one of the People Power Party's campaign pledges was the establishment of a digital platform government. While the concepts of digital government and platforms are familiar, the combined concept of a digital platform government is new. According to the president-elect's explanation, it is a "citizen-tailored service government based on digital technology and big data." Additional explanations state that it aims to connect all government ministries into one to provide fast and efficient administrative services, and also offers a one-site total service where citizens can access all information and civil complaints through a single site. Furthermore, it provides a "My AI Portal" that assigns a unique account to each citizen and inputs various administrative data into each account, so that citizens do not need to search for welfare, medical records, health information, etc., as the government takes care of these like a personal assistant.

In summary, the digital platform government consists of three components: inter-ministerial data integration services, citizens' one-site total services, and the My AI Portal service. However, since data integration and one-site total civil complaint services are similar to those already being pursued under the existing digital government and e-government 3.0 plans, the main focus appears to be on the My AI Portal service.

The My AI Portal is similar to the recently launched MyData, especially the public MyData introduced in the public sector, in that AI analyzes data to provide the administrative services desired by individuals. MyData is based on the right of data subjects to transfer their personal information, allowing data subjects to request data providers to transfer their data to MyData operators, who then analyze the transferred data to provide services related to credit, assets, health management, and more to the data subjects.

In the public sector, the government amended the Electronic Government Act in June 2021 to introduce the right to request provision of administrative information about oneself held and managed by administrative and public institutions. Since December, the government has been fully operating the "Public MyData Portal," which allows citizens to check their administrative information and provide it to third parties. Citizens can verify 95 types of administrative information from 26 institutions, such as resident registration certificates and income certificates, and submit them directly to about 873 institutions (third parties), including administrative agencies, banks, and credit information companies.

If AI is added to the Public MyData Portal to analyze individuals' information searches or service application histories and recommend necessary administrative services, it would be similar to the My AI Portal. However, the current public MyData service is designed to be provided directly by the public sector, which differs from the ideal of MyData.

In the financial sector, private MyData businesses are limited to integrating and managing scattered financial information, but in the future, MyData aims for private MyData operators to collect data across various fields such as commerce, education, healthcare, and public sectors to provide comprehensive asset, health, and administrative services. The government is also preparing legal systems and working on data standardization necessary for the expansion of MyData across all sectors.

From this perspective, the My AI Portal should consider a model led by private MyData operators or at least a collaborative model with private MyData. If structured this way, a true digital platform government model will emerge, mediating interactions between individual citizens as data subjects and private MyData operators.

Seong-Yeop Lee, Professor at Korea University Graduate School of Technology Management and President of the Korean Data Law and Policy Association