Pictfor

Throughout the pandemic, PICTFOR has continued to operate as a forum for discussion between Parliamentarians, industry, academics and other stakeholders on strategic issues facing the tech sector, and we are grateful for your continued interest and support.

As the largest and most active APPG, PICTFOR is finding innovative ways to continue providing a forum for the internet, communications and technology sectors and interested parliamentarians to communicate on pressing topics.

We will be keeping you and all our other members updated on our activities in regular newsletters to further promote and engage with the tech sector as the country continues to open up.

Upcoming Events
PICTFOR have worked closely with the Houses of Parliament events team and plan to start hosting in-person events this Autumn with a ‘Welcome Back’ reception and the Annual Dinner from September. We anticipate that these events may have capacity limits and all attendants will be on a first come first served basis, with the potential to have a cap on numbers per organisation.

1. PICTFOR’s Welcome Back Reception (in partnership with the Digital Skills APPG)

Tuesday 21 September 16:00-18:00
Terrace Pavilion, House of Commons – you can register your interest to attend here.

Hosted by PICTFOR Co-Chair, Darren Jones MP

2. PICTFOR Annual Dinner

We are excited to announce that Minister for Digital Infrastructure, Matt Warman MP will be speaking at our Annual Dinner, alongside Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Bridget Phillipson MP.

Wednesday 24 November, 19:00-22:30
Cholmondeley Room and Terrace – you can register your interest to attend here. 

Speakers:
Matt Warman MP, Digital Infrastructure Minister
Bridget Philipson MP, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury

We have a busy autumn of events, you can find a full programme of events for 2021 on our website here.

On Wednesday 14 July, PICTFOR hosted our Annual Diversity and Inclusion Rally, focused on Pro-tech, Pro-innovation Pro-diversity: How can greater accountability help the sector and the world?

We were delighted to hear from Shadow Science, Research and Digital Minister, Chi Onwurah MP and the President of CBI, Lord Bilimoria. We then began our rally, hearing insights on diversity and inclusion from speakers across the tech community. These speakers included Charlie Brooks, Co-founder of iampro, Sally Freeman, Co-founder of DevelopHER, Professor Sue Black OBE, Principal Investigator at TechUPWomen, Ashleigh Monagle, Digital Inclusion Lead at OpenUK, Professor Dorothy Monekosso, CTO at More Life UK, Jennifer Calland, TechUPWomen Alumna, Nicola Martin, Head Of Quality at Adarga, Claire Hughes, Co-Founder of Pluto, Amber Rosier, Senior Manager at Deloitte, Muma Sinkala, TechUPWomen Alumna and Charlene Hunter, Founder of Coding Black Females.

If you wish to catch-up on the event, you can view a full recording and minutes here.

On Tuesday 20 July, PICTFOR hosted their seventh event of the Year, focused on how the tech sector can further support the net zero agenda and tackle the climate emergency as part of the UK’s Net Zero Week.

We were delighted to hear from Chair of the Parliamentary Renewable and Sustainable Energy Group (PRASEG), Bim Afolami MP (via pre-recorded video), Secretariat for PRASEG, Dom Goggins, Shadow Green New Deal and Energy Minister, Dr Alan Whitehead MP, CEO of OpenUK, Amanda Brock and Director of Communications at Smart Energy GB, Rob Cheesewright. Darren Jones MP, PICTFOR’s Co-Chair and Vice-Chair of PRASEG, chaired the event.

If you wish to catch-up on the event, you can view a full recording and minutes here.

We are delighted to announce that the Coalition for a Digital Economy (Coadec) has joined PICTFOR. Coadec are a non-profit founded by tech entrepreneurs that campaigns for policies to support digital startups in the UK. You can find out more details at their website here.

Age Verification Providers Association

• The Age Verification Providers Association has added six new members based in the USA so it now represents 25 global suppliers of age assurance technology.
• The AVPA continues to focus on its role designing pan-European infrastructure for AV and parental consent as part of the www.euCONSENT.eu project, whose Advisory Board met for the first time under the chairmanship of John Carr OBE.
• The first phase of the project has been delivered and will be presented at the first global conference on online age verification and parental consent, to be held as a hybrid event in Athens on 9 September. Further information can be found here.
• Domestically, the AVPA are looking forward to engaging with the new joint committee conducting  pre-legislative scrutiny of the Online Safety Bill to improve its provisions and have been engaged with the Children’s Commissioner’s as she prepares recommendations for interim measures to  protect kids online should the Bill take longer than expected to complete the legislative process.
• More immediately, the industry has noticed a significant increase in enquiries ahead of the end of the 12 month grace period on 2 September, when the ICO’s Age Appropriate Design Code comes into force.

• McKesson UK’s Chief Executive Toby Anderson has written a thought leadership piece, titled ‘An omnichannel approach to healthcare enhances patient choice’, where he shares his thoughts on the COVID-19 pandemic and why the future for healthcare is an omni-channel approach. You can read more here. 

• UCL has an event that may be of interest to PICTFOR members on ‘The UK Computer Misuse Act 1990 and its application to cases of technology-facilitated abuse’. This event is part of the University’s Gender and IoT efforts. Further information can be found here.
• The Research Institute for Sociotechnical Cyber Security (RISCS), which is based at UCL, has published a new report exploring the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on cyber security of organisations, created as part of the RISCS Fellowship in Leadership and Culture. The RISCS team interviewed cyber security leaders from a wide range of industries to understand the effects of the transition to remote working and its continuation over an extended period of time. The report is available here.