The Changing Landscape of Data Collection in UK Public Services

In recent years, the UK government’s approach to data collection within public services has undergone a significant shift. With major policy initiatives such as the Online Safety Act 2023 and the forthcoming UK Digital ID Scheme. Organisations across sectors – including public, education, healthcare and local government. Are facing heightened expectations around how they collect, process and manage user data. These developments reflect broader priorities around safety, identity verification and digital accountability. Creating new challenges for IT support teams tasked with ensuring secure, compliant infrastructure and workflows.

Key Policy 1 – The Online Safety Act: What It Requires and Why It Matters

The Online Safety Act 2023 established a new regulatory framework for online services in the UK, focused on protecting children and adults from harmful online content. Among its many provisions, the Act places a duty of care on in-scope platforms to identify, mitigate and manage risks of harm stemming from content, user interactions, or service design. 

Importantly for data collection and IT support, the Act defines “user data” broadly: it includes data provided by users (for example when registering an account) as well as data created or compiled by service providers (such as usage logs or metadata). This means organisations must review their data-collection practices, retention policies and system architecture.

As the regulator Ofcom begins implementation, the emphasis is shifting toward “safety-by-design” and “privacy-by-design” frameworks. Meaning IT teams must embed compliance, monitoring, and auditability into systems from the outset when navigating these changes. 

For organisations that support or provide online services, these changes are more than legal obligations,they demand a proactive mindset and a robust IT support strategy that can anticipate and mitigate evolving risks.

Key Policy 2 – The UK Digital ID Scheme: The Data Being Collected and the Tech Behind It

Running parallel to online safety regulation is the UK Digital ID Scheme, which aims to provide citizens with a trusted digital credential for use across public and private services. According to government guidance, the credential will include core identity attributes such as name, date of birth, nationality or residency, and a photograph for biometric verification. The scheme consultation is also considering whether additional personal data, such as an address, should be incorporated.

One of the stated goals is to streamline services such as right-to-work checks, entitlement to public benefits, and secure access to digital services. However, this inevitably introduces new technical and data-governance obligations: systems must support secure identity proofing, encrypted data storage and strong authentication. As well as audit logs of access and verification events.

For IT support teams and managed service providers, this means being ready to support identity-centric services, managing data flows across identity proofing, credential issuance, and authentication. It also means that any connected systems – such as citizen portals, service logins or data-matching platforms. need to have data governance, access control and monitoring built in before live deployment.

Implications for Organisations: What IT Support Teams Now Must Address

For public sector organisations – including local authorities, education trusts, healthcare providers and regulated digital platforms. The convergence of the Online Safety Act and the Digital ID scheme shifts IT support from simply reactive maintenance to a function of strategic risk management.

Firstly, system architectures must be reviewed to ensure data is collected only where necessary, securely stored, auditable, and retained in line with policy and regulatory timelines. Secondly, identity and access management (IAM) become central: verification of users, appropriate privilege controls, and segregation of duties must be enforced. Thirdly, real-time monitoring and logging become mandatory components. Support teams must capture access events, verification attempts, and potential misuse or anomalies.

Moreover, outsourced or managed-service elements must be aligned with these policies, service-level agreements (SLAs), data transfer and storage arrangements. Vendor oversight and subcontractor monitoring all come under scrutiny. The sheer scale of data to be collected, processed and verified means IT support teams cannot simply react. They must build systems that scale and are resilient and provide transparency.

Data Security & Compliance: Risks, Controls and Best Practices

With increased responsibilities around data collection comes increased risk. Organisations must contend with data-breach implications, regulatory non-compliance fines, and reputational damage. For example, the Online Safety Act gives Ofcom powers to impose significant penalties for non-compliance.

Best practice starts with data-minimisation: only collecting the attributes required for a use-case, and purging data when it is no longer needed. Strong encryption, both at rest and in transit is essential. As is the use of multi-factor authentication for access to sensitive systems. Role-based access control (RBAC) and least-privilege models should be standard. Auditing and logging must capture not only who accessed data, but when, how and why.

Finally, incident response and disaster recovery plans must be tested regularly. Especially given that identity-related data is high risk from both a cyber-threat and compliance perspective. IT support teams must ensure service continuity, data integrity and secure backup strategies are in place. Vendor and third-party risk management is also non-negotiable, given the likelihood of external identity or verification services being involved. Organisations already navigating hybrid architectures on-premise and in the cloud. Must ensure their data protection and governance extends across all environments.

How ICT Solutions Can Support You: Managed Services, Monitoring & Support Models

This evolving regulatory environment presents both challenge and opportunity. This is exactly where ICT Solutions can add value. Our managed IT support services are designed to align with policy demands, particularly in areas of data collection, identity verification and secure public-service delivery.

We partner with organisations to review their existing print, data and identity workflows, highlighting gaps in automated monitoring, user access controls and audit logs. We can implement IAM solutions that manage credentialing and user-verification journeys in accordance with the Digital ID agenda, and integrate monitoring tools to detect anomalies, suspicious access patterns or non-compliance with data-minimisation principles.

Our 24/7 support model ensures that critical services remain operational, safeguarding user verification systems, citizen portals, or document-management platforms from disruption. We help design secure architecture: with end-to-end encryption, resilient backups and disaster-ready infrastructure. So you meet the demands of the Online Safety Act’s “duty of care” and are ready for regulator scrutiny. Our vendor-management frameworks assess third-party verification services, ensuring they meet UK regulatory standards and integrate securely into your environment.

Whether you’re upgrading legacy systems, integrating a new digital-identity service, or embedding data-governance practices across your organisation, ICT Solutions provides the strategic IT support and managed services to meet both today’s mandates and tomorrow’s challenges.

Conclusion

The UK’s trajectory toward expansive data-collection frameworks, through the Online Safety Act and Digital ID Scheme marks a major shift in how public-service providers must approach data, identity and system integrity. For IT support teams, this is a call to action: to embed secure, compliant, auditable systems rather than simply maintain legacy infrastructure. Organisations that align their IT architecture, monitoring and support models with these policies will not only meet their obligations – they will build trust, resilience and agility.To explore how ICT Solutions can help your organisation navigate these changes, contact us today for a customized assessment and roadmap.