Glossary of key terms

To help with some of the key terms and concepts of the Digital Strategy we have put together a glossary of key terms. If you have further questions these can be directed to the Digital Development team:

comments@digitalstrategy.govt.nz

ADSL
Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line. A technology for delivering a high bit rate link to customers over ordinary copper wire. Data rates can reach 8Mbps from the exchange to the customer and 640bps in the other direction.

Authentication
Determines a user's identity, as well as determining what a user is authorised to access, such as secure electronic information held in financial databases. The most common form of authentication is user name and password, although this also provides the lowest level of security. For further explanation see www.e.govt.nz

Bandwidth
The data transfer capacity of a telecommunications channel, usually expressed in terms of the number of bits per second that can be transmitted (a bit being one unit of information). Narrow bandwidth would correspond to a dial-up modem with 2400 to 56,000 bits per second while broadband can extend to more than 10,000 times this rate.

Broadband
High-speed data transmission capability. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) defines broadband as a transmission speed in excess of 256,000 bits per second in both directions. The term is commonly used to refer to Internet access via cable modems, DSL (JetStream, for example) and increasingly, wireless technologies (WiFi).

CAB
The Citizens' Advice Bureaux, staffed by volunteers, provide New Zealanders with information to address problems and questions they may have. Further information available at www.cab.org.nz

Creative Commons
According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia The Creative Commons is a non-profit organization devoted to expanding the range of creative work available for others to legally build upon and share. Further information available on the Wikipedia website here.

Community
There are a number of ways of defining communities and together they make up the interconnected systems of society. Some approaches include:

geographic communities, such as suburbs or towns that are often referred to as "the local communities",
communities of interest, identity, or circumstance, such as the business and its various industry sectors and the research communities,
the non-profit and voluntary sectors, which are also known as the community sector;
ethnic and cultural communities,
communities of interest such as those for hobbies, sports or politics,
communities of circumstance, such as youth, parenthood, senior citizens or the disabled.

Connectivity
The ability to use an electronic network to send and receive information between any locations, devices or business services.

Digital divide
The term "digital divide" was coined in the 1990s to describe the perceived growing gap between those who have access to and the skills to use ICT and those who, for socio-economic and/or geographical reasons, have limited or no access. There was a particular concern that ICT would exacerbate existing inequalities. A number of areas of specific concern were identified both here and abroad, namely that people could be disadvantaged by their geographic location, age, gender, culture and/or economic status.

Digital literacy
The ability to use digital technology, communication tools or networks to locate, evaluate, use and create information.

Disruptive technology
This term was coined by Clayton M. Christensen to describe a new, low-cost, often simpler technology that displaces an existing sustaining technology. Disruptive technologies are usually initially inferior to the technology that they displace, but their low cost creates a market that induces technological and economic network effects that provide the incentive to enhance them to match and surpass the previous technology. They create new industries, but eventually change the world. Examples include the internal combustion engine, transistors and the Internet.
Source: "Disruptive Technology" at Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.

E-crime
Electronic crime covers offences where a computer or other ICT is used as a tool to commit an offence, is the target of an offence or is used as a storage device in an offence.
Source: New Zealand Police: Services: E-Crime Unit.

e-GIF
The E-government Interoperability Framework is a significant tool to enable agencies to work together electronically in a spirit of collaboration. It allows agencies to focus on the business of integrating their services for people without having to decide on competing technology standards. In the e-government context, interoperability relates specifically to the electronic systems that support business processes between agencies and between government and people and business. It does not mean that a central agency will dictate common systems and processes. Interoperability can be achieved by the application of a framework of policies, standards and guidelines that leave decisions about specific hardware and software solutions open for individual agencies or clusters of agencies to resolve.
Source: E-government Unit, New Zealand E-government Interoperability Framework (NZ e-GIF) - Version 2 - 4. About Interoperability.

E-health
Involves the electronic enablement of the health and disability support services in order to:

empower individuals and their families to manage their own health and participation better;
improve the co-ordination and integration of care delivery to individuals; and
allow population health initiatives such as mapping notifiable diseases to occur in a timely fashion.

Source: Ministry of Health, Advice to the Incoming Minister of Health.

E-learning
Learning that is facilitated by the use of digital tools and content. Typically, it involves some form of interactivity, which may include online interaction between the learner and their teacher or peers.

Electronic Rights Management Information (ERMI)
A set of systems for identifying content, protecting copyright and tracking the usage of electronic information.
Source: Ministry of Education, Interim Tertiary e-Learning Framework 2004.

GDP
Gross domestic product is a measure of the size of the economy of a particular territory. It is defined as the total value of all goods and services produced within that territory during a specified period (most commonly, per year).
Source: "Gross Domestic Product" at Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.

GIF
The Growth and Innovation Framework was released in February 2002 to set out the government's sustainable economic growth objectives. The framework laid out what the government and the private sector must do to achieve higher sustainable economic growth.
Source: Ministry of Economic Development, Growth and Innovation Framework.

ICT sector
In New Zealand, the ICT sector is an agglomeration of the communications sector, including telecommunications providers, and the information technology sector, which ranges from small software development firms to multi-national hardware and software producers.
Source: Ministry of Economic Development, Growth and Innovation Framework.

ICT Taskforce
The ICT Taskforce was established in response to the government's Growth and Innovation Framework. It has four related goals, which are to enhance the existing innovation framework, develop skills and talent, increase global connectedness and focus effort for maximum gain. The Taskforce comprised a tightly focused group of New Zealand ICT business leaders with relevant commercial experience. It reported into the growth potential of New Zealand ICT and identified the collective private sector and government contributions needed to achieve this potential.
Source: ICT Taskforce, Breaking through the Barriers Published June 2003.

Information
This term has many meanings depending on the context. For example, it is often related to such concepts as meaning, knowledge, communication, truth, representation, and mental stimulus. See also Information Society.
Source: "Information" at Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.

Information literacy
The life-long ability to locate, evaluate, use and create information.

Information Society
A term for a society in which the creation, distribution and manipulation of information has become the most significant economic and cultural activity. An Information Society may be contrasted with societies in which the economic underpinning is primarily industrial or agrarian. The machine tools of the Information Society are computers and telecommunications, rather than lathes or ploughs.
Source: Information Society - A Whatis Definition

Innovation
The creation, development and implementation of a new product, process or service, with the aim of improving efficiency, effectiveness or competitive advantage. Innovation may apply to products, services, manufacturing processes, managerial processes or the design of an organisation. It is most often viewed at a product or process level, where product innovation satisfies a customer's needs and process innovation improves efficiency and effectiveness. Innovation is linked to creativity and the creation of new ideas, and involves taking those new ideas and turning them into reality through invention, research and new product development.

Intellectual property
Very broadly means the legal rights that result from intellectual activity in the industrial, scientific, literary and artistic fields. Countries have laws to protect intellectual property, for two main reasons: to give statutory expression to the moral and economic rights of creators in their creations and the rights of the public in access to those creations; and to promote, as a deliberate act of government policy, creativity and the dissemination and application of its results, and encourage the fair trading that contributes to economic and social development.
Intellectual property is traditionally divided into two branches: industrial property and copyright. Industrial property includes inventions (patents), trademarks, industrial designs and geographic indications of source and copyright includes literary and artistic works.
Source: WIPO Intellectual Property Handbook: Policy, Law and Use.

Inter-modal competition
Refers to competition between dissimilar technologies, such as ADSL and wireless technologies. Intra-modal competition refers to competition between similar technologies.

Interoperability
The ability of two or more systems or components to exchange information and to use the information that has been exchanged.
Source: Software Engineering Institute, Interoperability - Definition.

IP
The Internet Protocol is a network-layer protocol that contains addressing information and some control information that enables packets of data to be routed between hosts on the Internet.
Source: Cisco Systems Inc., Internet Protocols (IP).

Knowledge
Is built up from interaction with the world, and is organised and stored in each individual's mind. It is also stored on an organisational level within the minds of employees and in paper and electronic records. Two forms of knowledge can be distinguished: tacit, or implicit knowledge, which is held in a person's mind and is instinctively known without being formulated into words; and explicit knowledge, which has been communicated to others and is held in written documents and procedures. Organisations are increasingly recognising the value of knowledge, and many employees are now recognised as knowledge workers.

Knowledge society
A society that creates, shares and uses knowledge for the prosperity and well-being of its people.

Mbps
Millions of bits per second or megabits per second, a measure of bandwidth or the total information flow over a given time, over a telecommunications medium. Depending on the medium and the transmission method, bandwidth is also sometimes measured in the Kbps (thousands of bits or kilobits per second) range or the Gbps (billions of bits or gigabits per second) range.

Microprocessor
A complex microcircuit (integrated circuit) or set of such chips that carries out the functions of the processor of an information technology system; that is, it contains a control unit (and clock), an arithmetic and logic unit, and the necessary registers and links to main store and to peripherals.

Next Generation Internet
Next Generation Internet is a term used by governments, corporations and educators to describe the future network and the work underway to develop it. The future Internet will be so pervasive, reliable and transparent that it will be taken for granted. It will be a seamless part of life much like electricity or plumbing. However, getting to this will involve exploring technologies and network capacities that are in advance of offerings from commercial providers in terms of bandwidths, communications protocols and services.

OECD
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development comprises 30 member countries sharing a commitment to democratic government and the market economy. Its work covers economic and social issues, from macroeconomics to trade, education, development and science and innovation.
Source: OECD, About OECD.

Phishing
“Phishing” is a form of Internet fraud that aims to steal valuable information such as credit cards, social security numbers, user IDs and passwords. A fake website is created that is similar to that of a legitimate organisation, typically a financial institution such as a bank or insurance company. An email is sent requesting that the recipient access the fake website (which will usually be a replica of a trusted site) and enter their personal details, including security access codes. The page looks genuine, because it is easy to fake a valid web site. Any HTML page on the web can be modified to suit a phishing scheme.

Phishing e-mails are often sent to large lists of people, expecting that some percentage of the recipients will actually have an account with the real organisation. The term comes from "fishing," where bait is used to catch a fish. In phishing, e-mail is the bait.

Radio frequency
A location or band on the radio frequency spectrum, such as 800, 900 or 1800Mhz.

RFID
Radio frequency identification first appeared in tracking and access applications during the 1980s. These wireless systems allow for non-contact reading and are effective in manufacturing and other hostile environments where barcode labels may not survive. RFID has established itself in a wide range of markets including livestock identification and automated vehicle identification systems because of its ability to track moving objects.
Source: AIM - The Global Trade Association for Automatic Identification: Technologies: RFID.

SMEs
Small and medium-sized enterprises. There is no official definition of an SME in New Zealand but it is usually taken to be a firm of up to 50 full-time equivalent employees (FTEs). SMEs in other countries tend to be much larger than those found in New Zealand (up to several hundred FTEs). New Zealand SMEs are typically individually owned and managed, with few if any specialist managerial staff, and are not part of a larger business enterprise. Firms with fewer than 50 employees constitute 99% of New Zealand enterprises, and account for approximately 49% of total output.

Spam
Unsolicited bulk email that is largely commercial in nature.

WSIS
The World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) was held in two phases. The first phase took place in Geneva in December 2003 and the second phase will take place in Tunis in November 2005. The objective of the first phase was to develop and foster a clear statement of political will and take concrete steps to establish the foundations for an Information Society for all, reflecting all the different interests at stake. The second phase involves a process of monitoring and evaluation of the progress of feasible actions outlined in Geneva and a concrete set of deliverables that must be achieved by the time the Summit meets again in Tunis in November 2005.
Source: World Summit on the Information Society: About WSIS.