First Minister opposed to mandatory UK digital ID – and Scotland already has its own ‘ScotAccount’ service 

Scotland’s first minister has said he is opposed to a mandatory UK digital identity scheme – with his government’s own ‘ScotAccount’ online verification service already on track to hit 500,000 users.

John Swinney said last night on X that he thinks people should be able to ‘go about their daily lives without such infringements’ – and did not want to join in with a service provisionally referred to as a ‘BritCard’.

However, it was revealed earlier this year around 9,000 new identities are being created every week on the national ScotAccount platform, which gives one login to people interacting with government services online.

Alistair Hann, chief technology officer at the Scottish Government, shared the news at the annual Transforming Public Services conference in Glasgow in May.

He said: “At this rate, it looks like we’ll easily be half a million by the end of the year; and it’ll be [20]27-28, when we get to about half the Scottish adult population having verified identities. So, it’s getting to big numbers, but also getting quicker.”

The ScotAccount service launched in 2023. Current use cases include for those applying for a level 1 service with Disclosure Scotland – which conducts background checks on people applying for jobs with vulnerable groups – and for witnesses in court cases, and for those involved in bankruptcy proceedings. The service allows for people to login with two-factor authentication and reduces the need to repeat the same processes multiple times.

Another digital service – ScotPayments – went live with the Scottish Public Pensions Agency in January. The system is a scalable payments platform through which public sector organisations in Scotland can make quick and secure payments to payees. And the Scottish Government’s digital directorate has also been instrumental in building a licensing system – e-Pass – that can be configured across multiple different types of licence issued by government, including tobacco and vapes licences, alcohol and food safety.

Such moves have been seen as improving access to online government services, by giving people a single, secure digital identity they can use on multiple websites.

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “The Scottish Government is opposed to the introduction of any card that is compulsory to have, compulsory to carry or that anyone can demand to see, including that of a digital ID.”