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The Digital Continuity project

The Digital Continuity project

Guidance on Digital Continuity

The Digital Continuity shared service is a flexible package of guidance, tools and services, and standards to ensure government's digital information remains complete, usable and available over time.

The guidance we produce should help you to understand and assess risks to your digital information, understand how to mitigate those risks and take effective action. We're developing it incrementally and will publish it on an ongoing basis. All of the guidance on this page is in draft, and published for consultation. We'd welcome your comments and feedback - email digitalcontinuity@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk

 

Understanding Digital Continuity

An introduction to the wider context

For anyone in government who needs a broad understanding of what managing information risk involves, setting out the wider context for one particular issue - digital continuity.

SIRO guidance on the risk of digital obsolescence

For Senior Information Risk Owners in government to begin taking the first steps to managing obsolescence risks, in line with the Information Assurance Maturity Model's Assessment Framework.

Managing Digital Continuity

The guidance below - Managing Digital Continuity and An overview of the benefits of ensuring digital continuity - are in draft form to allow for consultation. If you have any feedback on the documents, please email: digitalcontinuity@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk.

The guidance explains what you need to do to manage digital continuity, but does not cover how. Further guidance in the coming months will explain how to manage digital continuity.

Managing Digital Continuity

For the Senior Responsible Owner for digital continuity in your organisation, providing an overview of what you need to do to ensure digital continuity, who you need to involve and how you measure success. The guidance includes a four-step approach to managing digital continuity and can be used to inform and educate staff on digital continuity; establish roles and responsibilities and a team for taking forward action; begin preparation for assessing and managing digital continuity risks; and taking the first steps to embedding digital continuity in Information Management and IT change management.

An overview of the benefits of ensuring digital continuity

For anyone in your organisation who needs to make the business case for ensuring digital continuity - for example your Digital Continuity Senior Responsible Owner, your Senior Information Risk Owner, Chief Information Officer, Knowledge and Information Manager, Chief Technology Officer, IT Service Manager and other IT professionals, Information Asset Owner and business change/project/programme managers. This guidance gives an overview of the benefits of ensuring digital continuity and will be followed by more detailed guidance on how these benefits can be realised in your organisation.

Draft guidance on use of the Information Asset Register in ICT services contracts

From version 2.3, the OGC ICT Services Model Agreement includes provision for the active management of the Information Asset Register (IAR).

Within an ICT services environment, the IAR identifies the information assets as distinct configuration items which relate to the technology that enables them and the business outcomes that they are required to support.  With the ICT Services IAR under active management, impacts on the information assets can be more easily assessed at times of change. This ensures that the business outcomes continue to be delivered, both at the time of the change and for the duration of the ICT services contract.

Draft guidance on the development and use of the IAR in the context of the ICT services contract includes:


• How to use the ICT Services IAR in the procurement of ICT services
• How the ICT Services IAR is maintained
• How to use the ICT Services IAR in the change management process


Please note that this guidance is currently only a draft version; further iterations containing more detail and clarification will be made available shortly, following consultation.

If you are about to initiate procurement of ICT services using the OGC Model Agreement and want further information on the Information Asset Register, please contact the project team at digitalcontinuity@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk for advice and support. 


We are actively seeking organisations to collaborate with in developing an ICT Services Information Asset Register in order to test and further refine our guidance. Please get in touch if you would like to work with us.