[Webinar] Kenya’s Huduma Namba: Risks, Responses, and the Fight for Genuine Inclusion

This webinar draws on experiences in the response to Kenya’s transition to “Huduma Namba” to establish the need to address exclusion in digital transitions, highlight policy recommendations, and inspire greater use of legal empowerment strategies towards inclusive digital identity in practice.

Discrimination and other forms of exclusion are major obstacles that leave millions without proof of identity or the ability to access basic rights and services. While the privacy concerns of digital identity systems are increasingly known, what has received less attention is the way these initiatives are often built atop exclusionary identification regimes. Our experience suggests that introducing a national digital identity scheme without addressing existing risks exacerbating inequality and administrative obstacles for the most vulnerable – the very people who these identity systems are meant to serve. Yet there is hope – the integration of legal empowerment approaches into digital identity efforts has the potential to ensure more inclusive, more effective identity systems for all.