Six years for one administration is almost over, and the Philippines has a new administration coming in, and they're starting to name the cabinet members. I was waiting for the Department of Information and Communications Technology (DICT) secretary, and the name was revealed yesterday. This is welcome news to most, but I guess we will see what the incoming DICT head will do to elevate the country's ICT landscape. That being said, we hope that the new DICT head will fix a lot of what needs to be fixed before embarking on new projects that dovetail on the currently popular digital transformation trend.

Personally, I wish that the DICT head will get the Philippine National Public Key Infrastructure (PNPKI) country certificate authority (CA), that signs all digital certificates used for digitally signing documents and transactions (for example, these were used by COMELEC for the vote counting machines, as well as our teachers!), globally recognized once and for all! Nobody wants to receive a PNPKI-signed email or document with a warning that says it is not to be trusted because the CA that signed the certificate is not globally recognized. If you are the one who signed it, you will need to reassure the recipient that it is legitimate, and ask them to install the PNPKI CA certificates. Hassle, right? Anyway, I wish that the DICT head will make this a priority - specially with the digital transformation wave currently happening.

Next is to enforce net neutrality. What is net neutrality? Simply put, ISPs must be neutral, i.e., it should not discriminate on kind of user, type of service or traffic that passes through their network. What the telcos, Smart and Globe, are doing is anti-net neutral by providing preferential treatment (affordable packages or even free) for traffic going to the likes of Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, as examples, and not providing the same kind of packages for all Philippine academic institutions and Philippine government websites, for starters. All online sites and services must be treated the same way, i.e., ISPs must be neutral! I am hoping that the new DICT head would ensure net neutrality is enforced (by NTC maybe? Which, BTW, needs a new head with fresh ideas!).

Another issue that needs to be prioritize by the DICT head is that of ICT personnel plantilla positions. The DICT should work with the Civil Service Commission (CSC) and the Department of Budget and Management (DBM) to properly define ICT positions in government, with the proper salary grades. It is well known that different government agencies use their creativity to classify important ICT positions, and to somehow work out a way to match it to salary grades that come close to what these positions deserve. Yes, there are old IT Officer (ITO) positions defined, but you cannot find a network administrator, ICT security officer, or even a systems administrator plantilla item, at least as of my last look. I remember during the time of Dr. Emmanuel "Boying" Lallana at the Commission on Information and Communications Technology (CICT), he was working on this very thing. I wonder what happened to it, but the incoming DICT head should find this crucial if he were to lead the country's digital transformation journey.

Finally, the DICT head must protect the online privacy of every Filipino citizen. He must protect encryption, and never allow *any and all* kinds of efforts to weaken it and have backdoors. Whilst the arguments to weaken encryption often fall under the guise of law enforcement and anti-terrorism, the DICT head must protect the majority of the Filipinos' right to privacy, and not be swayed by this one-sided and extremely invasive argument by law enforcement agencies. Never allow criminals and terrorists to dictate the violation of the entire populations' right to privacy, because when you do, they won already!

Whilst I am sure the list of what we need the DICT head to fix is long, I am hoping that these four issues I have mentioned above will be on top of that list. If this administration intends to change the Philippines for the better for *all* Filipinos, and not just a handful, then I hope that they would listen, too.