Digital transformation – The driving force for innovation and development of the judicial sector

NDO - In the digital age, digital transformation is no longer a trend but an inevitable requirement for the justice sector. With high political determination and drastic participation, digital transformation here is gradually becoming a strong push to contribute to innovation in management methods and building a professional, modern, and honest justice system.

The series of articles "Digital transformation - Driving force for innovation and development of the judicial sector" will delve into the analysis of the digital transformation journey of the Ministry of Justice; from the Party and State's guidelines and policies to the implementation practices in units and localities. Thereby, readers will clearly see the results achieved, the limitations and challenges that still exist. On that basis, solutions will be proposed to promote digital transformation to become a driving force for sustainable development of the Ministry of Justice; contributing to the building of a digital government, digital economy , digital society and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

Lesson 1: The judicial sector proactively makes breakthroughs in digital transformation

In the context that the whole country is entering a period of accelerating digital transformation, the Ministry of Justice has been actively implementing many solutions to concretize the major policies of the Party and State on digital transformation, gradually building a modern, transparent digital justice system, effectively serving people and businesses.

Big policy - Decisive action

The 13th National Party Congress has clearly identified digital transformation as one of the three important pillars of the country's development process: Digital Government - Digital Economy - Digital Society. In particular, the judicial sector is oriented to develop in the direction of professionalism, openness, transparency and strong application of digital technology .

This spirit continues to be concretized through a series of important documents such as: Resolution No. 52-NQ/TW and Resolution No. 57-NQ/TW of the Politburo ; Resolution 27-NQ/TW on building a rule-of-law state, and the National Digital Transformation Program to 2025, with a vision to 2030 (Decision 749/QD-TTg).

General Secretary To Lam speaks at the program celebrating the 79th anniversary of National Day of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (September 2, 1945 - September 2, 2024). (Photo: VNA)

On the occasion of the 79th anniversary of the National Day of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, General Secretary To Lam wrote a very important article on digital transformation with the title "Digital transformation - an important driving force for developing productive forces, perfecting production relations, bringing the country into a new era". This is a call for the entire Party, the entire people, ministries, branches, and localities, including the Ministry of Justice, to be determined to successfully carry out digital transformation, creating a breakthrough in socio-economic development, bringing the country into a new era - the era of the Vietnamese people's rise.

Recently, on April 30, 2025, the Politburo issued Resolution 66-NQ/TW on innovation in law-making and enforcement to meet the requirements of national development in the new era, which sets out the following tasks: Strengthening digital transformation, applying artificial intelligence and big data in law-making and enforcement. Accordingly, prioritizing resources to build and develop information technology infrastructure, big data, applying digital technology and artificial intelligence to serve innovation and modernization of law-making and law-enforcement, ensuring "correctness, sufficiency, cleanliness, liveness", connectivity, ease of exploitation, ease of use, information security and state secrets. Timely and adequately allocate funds to build and immediately implement the Project on building a big database on law and the Project on applying artificial intelligence in the work of building, checking and reviewing legal documents.

Resolution 66-NQ/TW of the Politburo sets out the task of: Strengthening digital transformation, applying artificial intelligence, big data in law-making and enforcement. Accordingly, prioritizing resources to build and develop information technology infrastructure, big data, applying digital technology, artificial intelligence to serve innovation and modernization of law-making and enforcement, ensuring "correctness, sufficiency, cleanliness, liveness", connectivity, ease of exploitation, ease of use, information security and state secrets.

In that context, the Ministry of Justice clearly identified digital transformation as an important task contributing to improving the effectiveness and efficiency of state management of the Ministry of Justice and improving the quality of public services in the sector.

Legal forum on digital transformation in the Judiciary sector. (Photo: TH).

To implement the above policies, the Ministry of Justice has issued the Digital Transformation Plan for the Justice Sector for the period 2021-2025, with a vision to 2030, which identifies three main pillars: transforming awareness, transforming management models, and transforming data infrastructure and technology.

Accordingly, leadership and direction have been implemented early and fully; many information technology applications have been built and deployed to effectively serve the direction and operation of the Ministry's leaders; serve the professional and technical work of civil servants in the industry and provide online public services.

Up to now, all administrative procedures under the management of the Ministry of Justice have been uploaded to the National Public Service Portal, essential public services under the management of the judicial sector such as birth registration, marriage, death registration, and issuance of judicial records are also provided by 63 localities nationwide through the public service portal. The national electronic civil status database is gradually taking shape.

Some notable results include: Building and operating the National Electronic Civil Status Database, connecting with the National Population Database. Deploying online public service portals in many areas such as issuing Judicial Records, civil status registration, authentication, etc. Applying technology in the dissemination, education of law and legal aid, helping people in remote areas to easily access legal information. Promoting the connection and sharing of data between the Justice sector and relevant ministries and branches, contributing to the formation of a service-oriented administrative system.

People come to register for secured transactions at the Hanoi City Center for Registration of Transactions and Assets. (Photo: HUONG NGUYEN)

Many localities have proactively taken the lead in digital transformation such as Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City, Quang Ninh, Binh Duong, etc., with pilot models of notarization and authentication; "Online Justice", "Smart Electronic One-Stop Shop", bringing clear benefits to people and businesses.

The judiciary is also one of the leading units in providing online public services at levels 3 and 4. Many procedures such as birth registration, death registration, issuance of judicial records, registration of secured transactions, etc. have been performed completely online, contributing to saving time and costs for people and businesses.

The electronic connection of two administrative procedures related to birth registration and death registration has been carried out stably and smoothly, with an increasing number of records. Up to now, 63/63 localities have completed and officially implemented according to Decree 63/2024/ND-CP of the Government. The use of electronic copies of Birth Certificates and Death Certificates in the connection of administrative procedures has shortened the implementation time, created convenience for people, and reduced the working time of civil servants working in civil status, civil servants in related sectors when handling administrative procedure connection records.

Notably, the internal management and operation of the industry has also been strongly digitized through the use of electronic document management systems, online meetings, digital signatures, and digital platforms in work processing.

In addition, the Ministry of Justice promotes communication and dissemination of legal education on digital platforms such as social networks, websites, mobile applications, etc. to help people access the law easily and flexibly, especially in remote areas.

Conference on digital transformation of the Judiciary sector and the role of the leader. (Photo: PHUONG MAI)

Currently, the infrastructure serving the digital transformation activities of the Ministry of Justice is deployed centrally and uniformly at the Ministry's Electronic Data Center, gradually meeting the requirements for deploying information technology applications nationwide.

These results have contributed to simplifying and facilitating people and businesses to exercise their rights, reducing administrative procedures, hassles, time and costs for people and businesses; making an important contribution to the process of building a digital government, promoting the development of the digital economy and digital society in Vietnam.

People-centered, service efficiency as a measure

These are only initial results, digital transformation in the judicial sector is a long-term process, requiring synchronization in terms of institutions, technology and people. Challenges such as: the technological context develops very quickly, constantly changes; uneven technological infrastructure, lack of technology human resources in the legal field, or awareness of digital transformation of units and officers in some places, at some times still cannot keep up with the requirements; the fear of innovation among some officers is still a barrier.

Training to improve knowledge about digital transformation and skills in applying information technology to meet the digital transformation requirements of the Ministry of Justice. (Photo: HOANG THU)

In addition, the current drafting of legal documents does not have supporting software, so it is difficult to avoid errors, especially technical errors such as citing incorrect provisions due to provisions that have been edited during the drafting process. In fact, recently, reviewing, comparing, and checking documents in the legal system with more than 60,000 documents still in effect (nearly 9,000 documents at the central level and 50,000 documents at the local level) has been a huge challenge for officials in charge of checking and reviewing legal documents.

However, with high political determination and consistent direction from the central to the grassroots levels, the judiciary is gradually removing these “bottlenecks”. In particular, the spirit of “taking people as the center and service efficiency as the measure” is becoming the guiding principle in all digital transformation activities.

Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh requested attention to investing resources to strongly implement digital transformation, applying digital platforms and artificial intelligence in law-making and enforcement. (Photo: PHUONG MAI)

In many recent articles and instructions, Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh has emphasized: Building and enforcing laws in the new era requires open thinking, new approaches, and is suitable for Vietnam's reality. Accordingly, it is necessary to pay attention to investing resources to strongly implement digital transformation, apply digital platforms, artificial intelligence in the work of building and enforcing laws and building specialized databases to connect, interconnect, and enrich the National Population Database.

It can be seen that digital transformation is opening up great opportunities for the judiciary to improve service quality, reform administrative procedures, and make state management activities transparent.

In the context of digital transformation taking place strongly in all fields, the Ministry of Justice needs to continue to promote its role as the leading agency in building and perfecting legal institutions on digital transformation, while taking the lead in implementing digital justice in a synchronous, substantive and effective manner. This is a strategic task, both urgent and long-term, requiring high political determination and synchronous participation of the entire judicial sector.

Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW dated November 9, 2022 of the 13th Party Central Committee on continuing to build and perfect the socialist rule-of-law state of Vietnam in the new period has identified one of the tasks and solutions as: "Continuing to innovate and perfect the law-making process, ensuring professionalism, science, timeliness, feasibility, and efficiency" and "modernizing methods and means of law-making and law enforcement".

Source: https://nhandan.vn/chuyen-doi-so-dong-luc-doi-moi-phat-trien-nganh-tu-phap-post882977.html