A Secure Wireless Data Access Service for the Government of Canada

This chapter examines work conducted by Public Works and Government Services Canada, a department of the Government of Canada (GoC), to assess the potential for a Secure Wireless Data Access Service (SWDAS) that is envisaged to be provided as a common service to departments and agencies of the GoC. The main focus of the work has been on Wi-Fi, especially the IEEE 802.11b standard, and its application. Areas examined include technology, security, spectrum management, user surveys, applications, business, ?nance, service trial, future trends, and recommendations for the implementation of Wi-Fi in government. It is demonstrated that the application of Wi-Fi technology in the GoC would be bene?cial for the government workforce from both a ?nancial and a technological perspective.

The State of Mobile Government in Turkey

This chapter presents the current state and future prospects of, and policy issues related to the mobile (m-) government in Turkey at both national and local government levels with a special emphasis to mobile phones. To this end, ?rst, the historical development and major actors of Turkey’s mobile technology market are examined. Following this framework, the current state of government information and services provided by the help of mobile technologies (m-government) is analyzed. Third, several issues related to m-government policy such as health problems that are thought to be caused by mobile phone use and the proximity of mobile phone masts to housing units; the risky behavior of talking via mobile phones while driving and the problems caused by this reckless behavior; problems related to stolen and unregistered mobile phones; and ?nally, the blurring of public and private spheres because of mobile phone use in public places are discussed. Proposed and enacted national legislation on these topics are summarized and discussed. The ?nal section evaluates the future prospects of m-government and integration of electronic government and mobile goverment efforts in Turkey. This section also assesses the possibility of using m-government as a tool for bridging the digital divide in Turkey.

M-Government Initiatives at the Local Level

This chapter introduces the concept of m-government and its implications for both citizens and public institutions. Although m-government is currently in an initial phase of development, its potential in the relationship between the public sector and the citizen is obvious because of, for example, the large number of mobile phone users among the public. In addition, the development of m-government initiatives generates a good number of bene?ts for the public sector that operates it as well as for the public, who experience improved accessibility to electronic public services. Because of this, this chapter analyses m-government initiatives developed by the Zaragoza City Council (Spain) in order to describe its bene?ts, implications for the relationship between the City Council and the citizen, and the future perspectives of these initiatives. We have speci?cally chosen a country like Spain due to the fact that mobile telephone usage is widespread and, at the same time, local government level has been chosen as the citizen participates more in the relationship with the public sector when it is at the local level.

Mobile E-Health

Health care is an industry with a diverse set of stakeholders: governments, private health care providers, medical practitioners (physicians, nurses, researchers, etc.), home health care providers and workers, and last but not least, clients/patients and their families. Overlapping and interacting environments include hospitals, clinics, long-term care facilities, primary care providers, homes, and so forth, involving acute, emergency, chronic, primary, and outpatient care. Patient transitions between these environments are often unnecessarily dif?cult due to an inability by providers to access pre-existing patient records. Mobile/wireless solutions can play an important role in supporting health care by providing applications that access health care records and reduce paperwork for clinical physicians, nurses, and other workers, community health care practitioners and their patients, or mobile chronically ill patients such as diabetics. This chapter makes the case for mobile health care and its solutions in the non-acute community health care environment, where critical issues include usability, adoption, interoperability, change management, risk mitigation, security and privacy, and return on investment. A proposed community health care application demonstrates how these issues are addressed.

Usability Driven Open Platform for Mobile Government (USE-ME.GOV)

This chapter introduces the USE-ME.GOV project that supports and encourages the authorities with the access to new e-government services at any time and anywhere through the use of mobile communications and Semantic Web technologies. The USE-ME.GOV system addresses openness, interoperability, usability, and security scienti?c goals, and throughout the chapter the methodology and main outcomes are described.

mCity

This chapter presents the mCity Project, a project owned by the City of Stockholm, aiming at creating user-friendly mobile services in collaboration with businesses. Starting from the end-users’ perspective, mCity focuses on how to satisfy existing needs in the community, initiating test pilots within a wide range of areas, from health care and education, to tourism and business. The lesson learned is that user focus creates involvement among end users and leads to the development of sustainable systems that are actually used after they have been implemented. This is naturally vital input not only to municipalities and governments but also for the IT/telecom industry at large. Using the knowledge from mCity, the authors suggest a new, broader de?nition of “m-government” which focuses on mobile people rather than mobile technology.

Introducing Mobile Government

This chapter introduces the mobile government concept and creates a context for discussing various applications, services, and the relevant technologies. The context presented also includes the introduction of ideas on the characteristics of mobile government and some major issues that justify the necessity of the mobile government and identify the potential that it possesses. This chapter should serve as a foundation for the discussions on the further chapters.

An Evaluation of U.S. City Government Wireless Networks for Mobile Internet Access

The purpose of this chapter is to provide guidelines for city governments considering implementing large-scale wireless networks to provide Internet access for their citizens and businesses. Case studies of cities in the United States that have implemented wireless networks will be evaluated in the context of opportunities and potential challenges. Some key considerations discussed in this chapter involve free versus fee-based models, security considerations, con?icts with local telecommunications companies, and network support. Opportunities to bene?t police and emergency services are examined in terms of potential bene?ts as well as considerations of security in mission critical situations. Strategy guidelines will be presented as a means for providing structure to this decision-making process.

Multi-Channel Delivery of E-Services in the Light of M-Government Challenge

During the last decade, users have become accustomed to new means of service delivery in the private sector. Nowadays, users expect the same level of variety from the public sector: they want their interactions to be convenient, and they prefer to be online rather than in-line. New developments in ICT along with the growth of mobile communication allow the involved sectors to meet these challenges by re-engineering their front-end and back-end of?ce. They have developed new ways of interaction through a variety of channels allowing users to consume their services anytime, anywhere, and anyhow, restructure services that accommodate their users’ needs, and re-organize processes within and between separate administrative bodies. This chapter will examine the interaction requirements regarding a friendlier and more effective multi-channel services environment, the mobility challenges, and their apt implementation in the governmental sector placing emphasis on the technological constraints of an m-government open interoperable multi-service delivery infrastructure and the impact of its single-point of access functionality across the borders of the new digitally integrated Pan-European reality.

Mobile Supported Patient Care

Community health care seems to many governments to be an ideal arena for mobile technological support. Community health care professionals work within the community, visiting people within their own homes or at local health centres. Mobile technologies offer much potential to support these professionals in provision of patient and care information, access to other professionals and services, and overall improvement of patient care. However, there are several challenges to be met before the full bene?ts can be achieved. At a system level, community health care has many tensions, particularly between national direction and associated funding, and between local needs and practicalities. In addition, technology is not always used and applied as initially expected. This chapter explores some of these tensions by examining an example of community health care support in the South of England.