Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether other companies have been involved in the GovCoin contract to undertake trials on the use of blockchain technology for the welfare and benefits system; and whether any claimant information was shared with (a) those other companies and (b) GovCoin during the period of that contract.

In 2016, DWP ran a proof of concept pilot to explore GovCoin’s (DISC) capability. No other companies were involved in the pilot and no benefit or personal data was shared with GovCoin (DISC) on claimants.