Data and resilience drive Vietnam’s digital government

On August 24, the Central Policy and Strategy Commission and the National Cybersecurity Association, as professional co-sponsors, in coordination with Synology Vietnam and IEC Consulting, held a conference in Hanoi titled “Digital Transformation in the Public Sector: Building Sustainable Infrastructure and Ensuring Data Security Towards National Growth Targets.”

The conference took place as the public sector undergoes a “dual” transformation: restructuring the organisational apparatus while simultaneously redesigning operating models on digital platforms. The two-tier local government model is placing greater demands on data-driven governance, particularly at the commune level, where most public services are delivered directly to citizens.

Nguyen Hong Hien, director of the Department of Science and Technology under the Central Policy and Strategy Commission, said science and technology, innovation, and digital transformation have been identified as key drivers of the new growth model. The public sector therefore cannot remain outside this process.

“In particular, the operation of the two-tier local government model since July 2025 has created significant requirements for restructuring data and digital systems. As the organisational structure and administrative boundaries change, data must also be standardised, cleansed, updated, and connected under the new model, while ensuring continuity, consistency, and uninterrupted public services,” said Hien.

“The target by 2030 is to fully digitise records and results of administrative procedures, uniformly use shared digital platforms, and standardise and connect databases so they are ready for AI applications. However, in practice, data remains fragmented, quality is uneven, and interoperability between systems remains limited."

Nguyen Hong Hien, director of the Department of Science and Technology under the Central Policy and Strategy Commission. Photo: IEC Consulting

Jola Le, country manager of Synology, said data protection should be viewed as an ecosystem encompassing data storage, management, backup, recovery, access control, and security monitoring.

One of the solutions introduced at the conference was air-gapping, which enables backup systems to be isolated from the network when they are not required or when abnormal activity is detected, providing an additional layer of protection against the risk of data being encrypted or destroyed.

“Public-sector digital transformation therefore faces a dual requirement: systems must be sufficiently open to connect, share, and utilise data, while also being sufficiently secure to control, protect, and recover data when incidents occur,” said Le.

“In the process of building digital government and data-driven governance, security cannot be an additional layer added at the end. It must be embedded from the design stage of infrastructure, system architecture, and data organisation. This is also a critical condition for sustainable public-sector digital transformation, ensuring the continuity of government operations and essential services for citizens and businesses.”

Photo: IEC Consulting

Notably, Pham Trung Thanh, an expert at the National Cybersecurity Association, warned that the transition from physical infrastructure to cloud environments is forcing many agencies to operate legacy and new systems simultaneously, creating complex architectures while dedicated information security personnel remain limited.

“The risk does not only arise when a system is attacked,” said Thanh. “Hackers can remain hidden inside a system for months, seeking to escalate their privileges before launching an attack. By then, data may have been stolen or encrypted, while systems providing services to citizens could face disruption.This also shows that simply backing up data is no longer sufficient. If backup systems remain connected to the network, attackers may attempt to destroy or encrypt the backup data as well."

Vu Duy Hien, deputy secretary general cum chief of office under the National Cybersecurity Association, said that as data becomes a strategic asset and resource, the requirement is not only to manage and utilise it, but more importantly, to ensure its protection.

“Cybersecurity must be built in from the outset when infrastructure is developed, data is organised, and digital systems are designed,” said Hien. “Alongside prevention capabilities, agencies and organisations need to proactively build detection, response, and recovery capabilities so that essential operations can continue and quickly return to normal when incidents occur. This is a critical aspect of today’s approach to data security. Protecting data is not only about preventing an attack; it must also account for scenarios in which a system has already been compromised, data has been encrypted, or services have been disrupted.”

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