News

• IPS's double IT has risks, says commissioner

  Identity commissioner Sir Joseph Pilling has expressed concerns about the Identity and Passport Service's two-stage approach to its core technology

• Agency introduces 'opt out' flood alerts

  The Environment Agency is putting half a million homes on an automatic flood alert service

• European database has 500,000 access points

  The EU has disclosed details of access to the EU's Schengen Information System, which includes police data on Britons

• English Heritage tenders for infrastructure

  The historic monuments and buildings commission will pay up to £25m over five years for IT infrastructure management, support and services

• More news

• Becta tenders for assistive home technology

• Pupil database free of breaches

• Defra tenders for sheep tracking database

• LibDems would close Connecting for Health

• Buying Solutions to subsidise e-auctions

• DNA pioneer criticises government position

• Comment

• A safe strategy

  The government's new ICT strategy is all about saving money, but leaves scope for another on the more controversial issues, writes Mark Say

• England: big enough to fail

  Provincial England's health service suffers from its size when trying to develop informatics, says SA Mathieson

• A failure to learn

  The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) report on the C-Nomis project suggests that parts of the public sector have been very slow to learn the lessons of earlier failures, writes Mark Say

• Living with risk

  Dominic Grieve has introduced a touch more honesty into the debate about privacy and personal information, argues Mark Say