WELCOME EDITORIAL


Kevin O’Sullivan 0131 357 4472


kevin@futurescot.com


COMMERCIAL Vincenzo Veglia Head of Sales 0131 357 4475


vincenzo@futurescot.com Harry Dickinson


Business Development 0131 357 4473


HEAD OF EVENTS Vincenzo Veglia 0131 357 4475


vincenzo@futurescot.com


PUBLISHER Hamish Miller 0131 357 4470


hamish@futurescot.com


FUTURESCOT EDINBURGH


42 St Mary’s Street, Edinburgh EH1 1SX 0131 357 4470


www.futurescot.com


DESIGN & PRODUCTION Palmer Watson


www.palmerwatson.com TYPOGRAPHY


Acta by Dino Dos Santos DSType Foundry www.dstype.com


Flama by Mario Feliciano www.felicianotypefoundry.com FutureScot is an


independent publication by Canongate Communica- tions distributed in The


Times Scotland. All rights reserved. Neither this


publication or part of it may be stored, reproduced or


transmitted, electronically, photocopied or recorded


without prior permission of the Publisher. FutureScot


is published and exclusively distributed in The Times Scotland. We verify


information to the best of


our ability but do not accept responsibility for any loss


for reliance on any content published.


For daily tech news, events, and weekly newsletter go towww.futurescot.com FUTURESCOT | AUTUMN 2019 | 3


CONTENTS


4 AI strategy launch 5 Social Security Scotland 7 Te Data Lab 8 Kate Forbes on digital skills 9 A nation of ‘tech users’ 10 Tech in primary care 14 AI in health and care 16 Building services around the citizen


18 Cover story: data ethics & AI 20 Geovation Scotland 22 IoT in the public sector 24 Digital evidence & data sharing


26 Transforming policing 28 AI in policing 29 Law Society of Scotland 30 Service Design 32 Tech for good 34 Highlands & Islands Enterprise


“‘We need to use new tools and machine learning and artificial intelligence to


be able to make sense of this data and drive new insights’”


Former Science Minister


Lord Drayson COMMERCIAL


FutureScot’s young and aspirational readership of 60,000 business leaders and innovators (The Times Scotland) is supplemented by direct distribution to politicians, civil servants, academia, and the wider technology sectors. If you would like to see your organisation or client featured in FutureScot magazine, or on Futurescot.com please contact us now.


EVENTS


For more information on attending FutureScot Conferences please refer to the Events page on FutureScot. com or mail vincenzo@ futurescot.com. Call 0131 357 4475


Making our own predictions


In an age of AI – where machine learning algorithms can predict outcomes more quickly and with a greater degree of accuracy than humans – it is heartening to know that a speculative attempt made by us mere mortals in December last year to forecast the dominant digital topics of 2019 were not entirely without foundation. When putting together a list of the people and


technologies likely to hold the public’s attention, with the assistance of an eminent panel of Scottish technologists, it is pleasing to report back that our 12 panelists made the bold statement that artificial intelligence was going to become the ‘breakthrough’ technology of 2019. It’s a little premature to say that we were right, but I’m going to at least make the claim that we were justified


in taking a punt on a technology that is really starting to cut through into the mainstream. Witness the Scottish Government’s launch of


a new process to develop a national AI strategy and the University of Edinburgh’s appointment of a Silicon Valley Professor of data ethics and AI, both covered in this edition, and one can argue that AI – which is not exactly new, but has come to the fore with improved computing power – is now reaching a point of maturity which could see it soon being embraced by the public sector as much as it has already taken root in our everyday transactions with services online. And Prof. Shannon Vallor, who takes up her role early next year, reckons Scotland could really take a lead on all things AI, avoiding some of the mistakes made by the tech giants in her homeland. l


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36