UK, Australia, Korea top UN e-Government rankings

Britain, Australia and South Korea have the best e-Governments in the world, according to the UN World Rankings released this week. Singapore took fourth place, and was first-placed in ASEAN.

Britain was the first to set up a Government Digital Service, standardising digital services across government. This has resulted in cost reductions of US$2.3 billion (£1.7 billion) by streamlining processes.

For instance, 85% of tax filing is done online, and over 98% of driving tests are booked online. Australia retained second place in 2014.

Over the past two years it has established a Digital Transformation Office to simplify and speed up government e-services. South Korea dropped from first place in 2014 to third this year.

It estimates a move of 750 e-government services to the cloud by end of this year. It aims to shift 60% of such services to the cloud by 2017.

Meanwhile, Finland came in fifth, followed by Sweden, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Denmark, France, Japan, U.S, and Estonia at 13th place.

In Southeast Asia, Malaysia came in at the 60th place; the Philippines at 71st place; Thailand at 77th place; Vietnam at 89th place; and Indonesia at 116th place.