Definitions

The MBIE/DIA Pulse of Our Nation report has a very useful glossary of digital inclusion definitions. We encourage our Partners and other organisations interested in digital inclusion to adopt these terms (or you are welcome to suggest others). Please email comments/suggestions to web@diaa.nz

Assisted digital	Describes a range of developments, strategies, and actions aimed at ensuring that no one is left behind in digital economies.
Core digital skills	This defines the minimum skill-set for people to engage online, for managing information, communicating, transacting, problem-solving and staying safe.
Digital ability	Same as digital literacy.
Digital accessibility	Digital accessibility is the ability of a website, mobile application or electronic document to be easily navigated and understood by a wide range of users, including those users who have visual, auditory, motor or cognitive disabilities.
Digital age	The digital age, also called the information age, is defined as the time period starting in the 1970s with the introduction of the personal computer with subsequent technology introduced providing the ability to transfer information freely and quickly. The time period in which we live now where internet and email are available is an example of the digital age.
Digital awareness	Digital awareness relates to people’s individual awareness of their online activity and how that affects their personal and professional life, whether it be today or five years from now.
Digital capability	Digital capability is defined as the skills and/or competencies required for living, learning and working in a digital society.
Digital citizenship	This is about a person’s confidence to use digital technologies to fully participate in society. This means that people must not only have digital access and digital skills, but also the understanding of how good citizenship values apply online.
Digital communication	The ability to communicate and collaborate with others using digital technologies and media.
Digital competence	The confident and appropriate use of digital technologies to engage in society.
Digital divide	Digital divide is a term that refers to the gap between demographic population segments and regions that have access to modern information and communications technology, and those that don’t or have restricted access. This technology can include the telephone, television, personal computers and the internet.
Digital economy	The digital economy is the worldwide network of economic activities enabled by information and communications technologies (ICT). It can also be defined more simply as an economy based on digital technologies.
Digital emotional intelligence	The ability to be empathetic and build good relationships with others online.
Digital empowerment	Digital empowerment is maximising personal potential through digital technology.
Digital engagement	Digital engagement uses digital tools and techniques to find, listen to and mobilise a community around an issue. The Digital Engagement specialist team in DIA ‘provides guidance, tips, and strategic advice across New Zealand government on how to effectively use the online channel’. The scope of their work is to lead, share and encourage best practice on emerging technologies and information to deliver quality online services that are tailored to the public.
Digital equality	Digital equality means universal access of the internet by making it accessible to everyone, irrespective of one’s status in society, be it economical (rich or poor), political (country or abroad), or religious etc.
Digital equity	Digital equity is defined as equal access and opportunity to digital tools, resources, and services to increase digital knowledge, awareness, and skills. This term is often used interchangeably with digital equality (although achieving equity is not always the same as equality).
Digital exclusion	Digital exclusion is part of the overall challenge of exclusion, which typically results in poor health, poor lifelong earnings, marginalisation and social exclusion. It is often used in the same was as “digital divide”.
Digital expertise	This refers to the higher level of digital skills required by people who are expected to use digital technologies as part of their daily work.
Digital fluency	A digitally fluent person can decide when to use specific technologies and is able to apply their digital skills to enhance their learning, their work-readiness or their everyday lives.
Digital footprint	Digital footprint refers to the trail, trace, or “footprint” that a person leaves every time they go online.
Digital gap	Same as ‘digital divide’ above.
Digital identity	The ability to create and manage one’s online identity and reputation. This includes an awareness of one’s online persona and management of the short-term and long-term impact of one’s online presence.
Digital inclusion	A digitally included person is someone who has access to affordable and accessible digital devices and services at a time and place convenient to them, as well as the motivation, skills, and trust to use the internet to pursue and realise meaningful social and economic outcomes.
Digital intelligence	The set of social, emotional and cognitive abilities that enable individuals to face the challenges and adapt to the demands of digital life.
Digital literacy	The ability to effectively and critically locate, evaluate, use and create information with a range of digital technologies. Also referred to as digital information literacy (DIL).
Digital media	Digital media typically refer to the technologies used to access digital content, e.g. smartphones, tablets, computers, TVs
Digital nationhood	Digital nationhood is used to refer to nations that consider themselves to be digitally competent as well as new trans-border ‘nations’ connected by the internet such as Bit Nation or Estonia’s e-Residency.
Digital natives	Digital natives refers to those generations who grow up with digital technologies and are ‘native speakers’ of the language of computers, video games and internet.
Digital participation	To be a ‘digital participant’ means making informed use of digital technology and media in one’s own life. It means recognising how technology and media offer opportunities for people to participate in new kinds of social activities, civic life, learning and work, and it also means recognising that technology and media must be challenged and questioned rather than accepted passively.
Digital proficiency	A digitally proficient person is able to understand, select and use technologies.
Digital readiness	Digital readiness includes: (1) Digital skills, that is, the skills necessary to initiate an online session, surf the internet and share content online; (2) Trust, that is, people’s beliefs about their capacity to determine the trustworthiness of information online and safeguard personal information. These two factors express themselves in the third dimension of digital readiness, namely Use – the degree to which people use digital tools in the course of carrying out online tasks.
Digital rights	The ability to understand and uphold personal and legal rights, including the rights to privacy, intellectual property, freedom of speech and protection from hate speech.
Digital safety	The ability to manage risks online, e.g. cyberbullying, grooming, radicalisation, as well as problematic content, e.g. violence and obscenity, and to avoid and limit these risks.
Digital security	The ability to detect cyber threats, e.g. hacking, scams, malware, phishing attacks, to understand best practices and to use suitable security tools for data protection.
Digital society	A Digital Society is a modern, progressive society that is formed as a result of the adoption and integration of Information and Communication Technologies at home, work, education and recreation.
Digital skills	These are the specific skills needed to engage online, getting connected, managing information, communicating, transacting, creating, problem-solving and staying safe.
Digital transformation	Digital transformation typically refers to the acceleration of business activities, processes, competencies and models to fully leverage the changes and opportunities of digital technologies. Some governments also use the term to refer to whole-of-society changes.
Digital usability	This relates to the ease of use of human-machine interfaces when interacting with digital systems. It also take account of user needs, especially people with disabilities, by ensuring the digital system is digitally accessible.
Digital use	The ability to use digital devices and media, including the skills to manage the devices in order to achieve a healthy balance between life online and offline.
Universal design	The idea that accessibility and usability standards should be blended together in order to create technology that is usable for everyone.