Digital Legal System Working Group (4th) of the Digital Related System Reform Study Meeting

Overview

Date and Time: May 24, 2024 (Friday) from 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm
Location: Online
Agenda:
1. Opening
2. Proceedings
  1. About official gazettes Denka
  2. Survey and Research on the Review of Legal Affairs
  3. Efforts to promote the use of digitalization, law, etc. in legal affairs and future policies (draft) of review of digital legislation
  4. Questions and Answers and Exchange of
3. Adjournment

Materials

Relevant policies

Administrative Management Bureau (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications)

Minutes

Secretariat (Nakano): , I would like to open the fourth meeting of the "Digital Legislation Working Group."

My name is Nakano from Digital Agency. I will be your coordinator today. Nice to meet you.

From this meeting, Member Miyasaka will be attending the meeting as Member Horiguchi's successor.

Mr. Miyasaka, I believe you are in, so I would like to ask you to say a few words of greeting. Thank you.

Member Miyasaka: Thank you for your explanation, . My name is Miyasaka, CTO of FRAIM Co., Ltd., and I will be participating as a member of the Digital Legislation Working Group from this time.

In short, we have a corporate vision of "reinventing document creation." To be specific, we are a company that provides development and editor services to support the creation of documents that require professionalism, such as contracts.

Speaking for myself, I have been engaged in development in the areas of editor development, machine learning, and deep learning for specialized documents for a long time. Among them, I have particularly long experience in development related to legal affairs. Last year, in the PoC project of Mr. Digital Agency's legal affairs digitalization, I was mainly in charge of the technical side as the general manager of the trustee side, and I worked mainly on that survey and research and development.

I am very sorry to have to join you, but I would like to make a small contribution. I look forward to working with you in the future.

Secretariat (Nakano): , I would like to ask for your continued support from today.

Let's get down to business.

Today's proceedings are as projected on the screen. In addition, we would like to ask for your understanding in advance that we are recording today's meeting to prepare the minutes.

In addition, I heard that Mr. Watanabe is absent today.

Now, I would like to move on to agenda (1). Regarding "official gazettes Electronicization," I would like to hear a report from the official gazettes Electronicization Study Office of the Cabinet Office in about 10 minutes.

Mr. Tanaka of the Cabinet Office, nice to meet you.

Mr. Tanaka: Thank you very much for your valuable opinions and questions, Cabinet Office. Nice to meet you.

Thank you very much for the constant guidance of our members with great knowledge.

With regard to the computerization of official gazettes, the law was enacted in December last year, and I believe that the law was enacted with such momentum, including discussions at the Digital Rincho. First of all, I would like to briefly review the background of this.

This is the background of the digitization of official gazettes. First of all, in the spring of 2022, the business community requested that the original copy of official gazettes be used as a paper medium by custom and that it cannot be reused. In response to this, in June, we decided to identify Issue within the year in the comprehensive review plan.

Here, the necessity of legislative measures was decided by Issue, but as official gazettes is a means of promulgating law, there is a legislative discussion that legislative measures are necessary, and in December, we finally decided to create a law.

Therefore, the Cabinet Office established a system to prepare the bill, and since March 2023, a panel of experts chaired by Mr. Shishido, who was also a member of the Digital Rincho, compiled the bill within a very short period of time, drafted the law in accordance with the policy, approved the bill at the Cabinet meeting at the end of October, and it was enacted in December.

Therefore, in any case, I believe that such a law was created during the discussions in which the policy was compiled in the Digital Rincho.

Next, I would like to explain the points of the law. In the materials, I will focus on four important points stipulated in the Act on the Issuance of official gazettes. In particular, in relation to digitalization for legal work, first of all, regarding the method of issuing official gazettes in (1), the law stipulates the matters to be published in the official gazettes, takes measures to ensure the authenticity of electronic data of the matters to be published, such as electronic signatures, and then issues the official gazettes by publishing it on a website that can be viewed by the public.

In fact, it is characterized by the fact that official gazettes itself is not defined in this law. Instead, it is specified in the law what kind of things are handled by official gazettes. The interpretation of the provisions of the law is that official gazettes is an electromagnetic record that records the matters posted in official gazettes, and electromagnetic records that record the same information are treated as the same ones for those recorded on the server of the Cabinet Office, which is the issuer, and those downloaded from the website by the people. How to ensure that this is the same information is to ensure the authenticity of the E-Certificate related to electronic signatures, etc., written with * marks. Therefore, based on the premise that electromagnetic records that record the same information are the same, official gazettes is treated as an authentic official gazettes for those stored on the server of the Cabinet Office, which is the issuer, and those downloaded from the website by the people.

When the official gazettes is issued, as indicated by the arrow next to it, the official gazettes is usually issued at 8:30 am when it is uploaded to the website. I believe that this operation will continue, but for example, as a special edition, it will be issued when the Special Emergency disaster response Headquarters is established in relation to disasters on January 1 of this year, or in other special cases.

In particular, in part (ii), with regard to law, which is related to legal work, as you have informed, law, which has been published in paper official gazettes, has been positioned as an original copy, but as I mentioned earlier, official gazettes is an electromagnetic record that records the matters published in official gazettes. Therefore, the original copy of law is set up so that the original copy of law, which is published in official gazettes, is the original copy. Therefore, I believe that the fact that the original copy of law can be continuously used as an original copy in various ways has established a theoretical basis for promoting the use of the original copy in the future.

In addition, it is also provided by law that the time of the promulgation of law is the time when official gazettes, in which law is listed, is uploaded. In the first place, there has been no statutory basis for the promulgation of law in official gazettes for a long time, but this law provides that the promulgation of law in official gazettes is a statutory law, and there are explicit provisions on when the promulgation of law was carried out. law will be promulgated at the time when official gazettes, in which law is listed, is uploaded, which means that the prerequisites for the enforcement of law have been met.

In terms of practical convenience, it has not always been clear when the official gazettes was promulgated, but for example, the time when the ordinance was issued, that is, the time when it was promulgated, including exceptional circumstances such as special editions, will be posted on the website in the future. In that sense, I believe it will be clear when the ordinance will be applied in the case of enforcement on the date of promulgation.

In addition, as a supplementary note, in (iii), in consideration of people who cannot use the Internet, it is also stipulated that measures such as making a Issue in writing or visiting a facility to view the official gazettes be taken. In any case, since the official gazettes was issued when it was uploaded to the website, I believe that the theoretical positioning was given that the pre-requisite that the law be applied to all citizens has been satisfied at that time, which is a kind of well-known fictitious system.

In addition, with regard to the long-term disclosure of (iv), the Internet version of official gazettes is to be disclosed for 90 days, and while we are advancing initiatives based on the policies of the Digital Policy Consultation, we have extended the period from 30 days to 90 days. For the time being, we plan to continue this for 90 days, but some law and other information that should be widely disclosed will be permanently disclosed on our website.

In addition, after the elapse of the said period, we have taken legal measures to transfer the official gazettes Digital Data to the National Archives of Japan. In fact, the official gazettes that has been issued so far has never been transferred to the National Archives of Japan after issuance. The reason for this is that under the Public Records Management Act, official gazettes is legally exempted from the application of administrative documents, and ordinary administrative documents created by us are transferred to the National Archives of Japan, whereas official gazettes has been excluded until now. However, in the Act on the Issuance of official gazettes, it is stipulated that official gazettes will be transferred as a special provision under the Public Records Management Act, and it is positioned as a legal measure that the National Archives of Japan will permanently store it under the Public Records Management Act.

Finally, regarding efforts after the enforcement of the Act. First of all, as shown in the dotted line frame of the "Basic Concept of official gazettes Digitization" below, a certain concept has been organized by the Expert Council, and first of all, we have implemented the development of legislation for the digitization of official gazettes.

In addition, since official gazettes is a means of promulgating the law, it is of utmost importance to issue the Code in a stable manner. Therefore, we believe that it is important to take all possible measures to ensure that the Code is issued in a stable manner, and to make efforts to improve the convenience of the Code in step with the renewal of the system.

As indicated by the green line above, the most important part is that electronic signatures will be the foundation. New technologies will be introduced in accordance with the progress of such technologies, and privacy information will be included in the official gazettes. For example, information such as the name and address of the bankrupt will be included in the public notice of insolvency. To prevent the spread of such information, we are currently taking measures such as limiting the period of time and creating images, but we will continue to collect information and gradually introduce more effective methods. As for long-term storage, we will continue to use various media, including PDF.

With regard to (ii), as we have been discussing in this working group in particular, we believe that machine-readable data is more important than anything else. Since the theoretical position that official gazettes provided by machine-readable data is the original has been established by law this time, we would like to contribute to the development of law base registry by introducing such data when practical preparations are made.

Although it was a rush, the explanation is all.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you, Mr. Tanaka.

It is truly a very symbolic initiative to digitize official gazettes, which has been issued in paper form since the Meiji Era.

Regarding this agenda, we would like to set aside 15 to 20 minutes for Q & A and exchange of opinions. If you have any questions or opinions, please raise your hand.

First, Mr. Fujiwara, please.

FUJIWARA Member: I'm FUJIWARA. Thank you very much for your time today.

Personally, I am excited that this is a very good initiative, but I would like to make one comment. It will be a short-term or long-term Issue, so I would like to give you my opinion.

Based on the technological innovation that is still being presented, there is the prevention of the spread of privacy information, and I understand that this is quite a point or a difficult issue. However, I personally think that it is probably difficult to completely prevent the spread of privacy information as long as the same thing is issued, and I think that it is better to consider, for example, a method of identifying people without their addresses or names, or a change in what is issued. Therefore, I think that it is probably difficult to completely prevent the spread of privacy information unless we change the original law, not the official gazettes, which has become too big. Therefore, I would like to make one comment.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Thank you, Dr. Tsunoda.

Tsunoda Member: .

I would appreciate it if you could tell us your thoughts on the timing of the transfer of authority for the transfer of official gazettes's records to the National Archives of Japan, or rather, the records themselves can be placed on one of the servers.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Then, Mr. Yasuno, nice to meet you.

Yasuno Member: Thank you, .

One point is the same as what Mr. Fujihara said, but in terms of preventing the spread of privacy information, from an engineer's point of view, although imaging is a bit difficult, I doubt that it will fundamentally contribute to the spread of privacy information. As Mr. Fujihara said earlier, I think it would be better to change the method of disclosure in the first place, or to take measures to prevent problematic ways of use, such as creating a bankruptcy map, and to put regulation on the way of use.

One more question is that it will be posted on the website. If there is any discussion about where to place the server hosting the website and how to make it redundant, I would like to know about it. If it is still to be decided, there is no problem at all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Mr. Tanaka, how do you feel about the questions and comments you have just received?

Mr. Tanaka: Thank you very much for your valuable opinions and questions, .

First of all, I would like to summarize some points about privacy. Two professors pointed out that the information to be disclosed will be reviewed in the first place. For example, the fact that the address is listed in the Notice of Naturalization was a topic of discussion in the Diet. In this regard, there are cases in which the same name is actually listed in official gazettes due to the fact that it is impossible to identify a specific person without listing the address, and I believe this is a difficult issue. On the other hand, I believe that the review of the matters to be published will be discussed and advanced by the ministries and agencies responsible for the system, and the Cabinet Office, as the issuer of official gazettes, would like to consult with such organizations.

In addition, as for measures against some people who use nuclear weapons in a bad way, I am aware that there are measures such as recommendations and orders from Personal Information Protection Commission as a legal system, but I would like to advance various efforts in terms of implementation.

In particular, with regard to imaging, as you pointed out earlier, it is not necessarily sufficient, but for example, it contributes to the fact that it is not displayed when searching with an ordinary web browser, or for example, it does not appear when the name of a bankrupt is entered, and I believe it also has the aspect of suppressing the processing of information and the use of information for purposes other than the original purpose to a certain extent. However, as I stated earlier, I believe that we will continue to introduce new technologies.

In addition, with regard to the transfer of the National Archives of Japan, which Mr. Tsunoda asked about, in fact, the detailed operation has not yet been decided, but as a legal provision, after the Prime Minister issues the official gazettes, the server of the Cabinet Office, which is used to issue the official gazettes, is called the official gazettes File by law, and the data recorded in the Cabinet Office File is transferred to the National Archives of Japan, so the data in the Cabinet Office File is replaced with a certain media or transferred to the server of the National Archives of Japan using the system, and I believe that the transfer of the data to the server of the National Archives of Japan will result in the administrator being the National Archives of Japan.

We are currently making adjustments as to whether the transfer method will be more systematic, whether it will be via media for the time being, and how often it will be conducted, partly because of the operation of the National Archives.

Lastly, with regard to server redundancy, under the Act on Issuance in official gazettes, it is assumed that the issuer in official gazettes is the Prime Minister, but until now the National Printing Bureau has been distributing the "Internet version of official gazettes" without any delay, and we would like to continue to use that infrastructure to a certain extent. Regarding the distribution of the "Internet version of official gazettes" by the Printing Bureau, there are two bases in Tokyo and Saitama, and in that sense, I wonder if redundancy is in place. In other words, even if one of them cannot be distributed, it will be replaced instantly, and if Tokyo cannot be distributed, it will be distributed in Saitama, and I hear that the data is synchronized, and in that sense, I wonder if redundancy is in place.

In addition, although it is different from redundancy as you pointed out, if the system is down at all, for example, in the case of a major disaster, a written official gazettes will be issued under the law. Although this does not mean that the electronic system is redundant, I believe that the system of issuing a official gazettes has a certain degree of redundancy.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Including the explanation just now, if you have any further questions or opinions, please raise your hand.

Next, Mr. Yoneda, please.

Member .

One is just an idea, but regarding the problem of people coming to collect data for the purpose of using it in an undesirable way, I thought it would be one way to include the proper registration of information about the person who collected it and who came to see it. Now, when you look at the digital archive of the National Diet Library, you can't see it unless you become a member, and you can't get it unless you provide a personal data. So, I thought it would be one way to put such a cushion on the parts that are still masked, so I thought it would be good if you could consider such a thing.

Also, as you mentioned earlier, there is a timing issue, and I think there will be a part where an editor for the process of editing not only the official gazettes part but also the law part itself will be included, but there are parts where it seems that the rough schedule is not sufficiently shared, so I think that will be considered in the future, but I think it would be better to set goals at an earlier stage so that we can work on them. There are some problems when we give our opinions, so please help us.

Secretariat (Nakano): Yoneda.

Going forward, Mr. Yagita, how are you?

Yagita Member: Thank you very much. I'm Yagita.

On page 3 of the slide you gave me this time, I believe there is a long-term disclosure. Looking at this, I understand that when there is probably one official gazettes file, some law and other matters specified by Cabinet Office Ordinance are permanently disclosed on the website, but some are matters that should be considered for privacy, so the disclosure period may be limited.

If so, from a technical point of view, I would like to ask you to carefully consider what kind of data structures should be used from a technical point of view in the future. My opinion is that this will result in fewer manual errors and fewer man-hours if you carefully consider what kind of data structures should be used from a technical point of view in the future. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation, for example, by manually creating a PDF in which only the parts that should be considered for privacy are masked. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation, for example, by manually creating a PDF in which only the parts that should be considered for privacy are masked. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I am not sure if the tagging is done in a way that corresponds to the actual situation. I official gazettes official gazettes official gazettes

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Then, Mr. Tanaka, I would like to hear your questions and opinions. Thank you very much.

Mr. Tanaka First of all, in relation to privacy proposed by Mr. Yoneda, I believe that the fact that it is possible to prevent information to some extent if it is registered will have a deterrent effect. In considering the summary of the Advisory Council, we have considered specific methods for measures related to privacy, including such a proposal, and I believe that we will continue to advance such consideration.

One concern that was raised in the opposite direction was that official gazettes has been able to be viewed freely without registering anything, so if users are required to register information when downloading it, it will take some time and effort to register. In that sense, we would like to carefully assess the impact on users.

In addition, if it is implemented, I believe that how the administration will manage the information collected will be an issue. In any case, I believe that such an idea requires continued research.

Regarding the long-term disclosure data structures that you asked about at the end, as you pointed out, one file in official gazettes is divided into matters that will not be disclosed for 90 days and matters that will be disclosed. When the file is created, for matters that will be closed in 90 days, a code is assigned to each publication matter in advance, and they are managed by that code. In addition, all matters that will be closed in 90 days are subject to imaging, and matters that will be disclosed for 90 days or more are composed of text in a PDF file.

At that time, one issue is how dense the code will be set. For example, if it was a law, there was only one code called law, so there was no choice but to set one of them uniformly. However, we would like to make the code distribution more flexible by setting it in more detail, for example, in the public notice, or by dividing the code more finely. For example, even in some public notices of the same type, some of them will be released after the 90th, and the other will be closed after the 90th because personal data is listed.

In addition, with regard to the establishment of the code, we are currently making inquiries to all ministries and agencies about which matters will be assigned to 90 days or permanent, so I would like to fully manage the assignment of the code going forward.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

In addition to the explanation just now, do you have any additional questions or opinions?

I saw earlier that Mr. Yagita also chatted with us and that Mr. Yoneda and Mr. Yagita also put a "Like" mark. Then, I would like to ask your questions and opinions no later than now.

Regarding the schedule for the computerization of official gazettes, as Mr. Yoneda pointed out, the law itself has an enforcement date of less than one year and six months. As Mr. Tanaka explained, since the law is technically neutral, new technologies will be introduced even after the enforcement, and efforts will be made to cooperate with digitalization's efforts in legal affairs, which I will explain later. I would like to explain the schedule and other matters again.

Thank you, Mr. Tanaka.

Next, I would like to move on to agenda (2). Regarding the "Survey and Research on the Review of Legal Affairs," I would like to have an explanation from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Regional Administrative Bureau in about 25 minutes.

Then, I would like to thank the people of the Administrative Management Bureau for your cooperation.

Mr. Takahara: Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Administrative Office.

We would like to share the screen.

Thank you for taking this opportunity to make a report today. In relation to the legal work of digitalization, since the age of digital consultation, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Regional Administrative Bureau has been working on the legal work of public authorities in cooperation with Digital Agency, particularly focusing on the review of business operations, including flows outside the system, from the standpoint of coordinating the operation of digitalization.

This time, we would like to respond in the form of reporting the contents of the investigation and research requested to Ascoe Partners and Gyosei from the Administrative Management Bureau.

As a premise, I would like to introduce the content of the report that was compiled for Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. Please understand in advance that based on this report, the Government of Japan will discuss with Digital Agency what to do going forward.

The background and Issue are the same as the previous content, so I will omit them.

As for the content of the survey and research, mainly in terms of business, in particular, regarding tables, diagrams, and formats that are difficult to convert into structural data in law, and the issue of revised provisions that are difficult to handle by machines when updating data, Mr. Ascoe Partners, who is familiar with data structures and such, and Mr. Gyosei, who is a publisher of the law Collection, who is familiar with the content of law and the handling of law data, conducted the survey and research this time.

In conducting such a survey and research, we are working from about three perspectives. The first is visibility, which is physically easy for humans to see, but since it is law, we recognize that it is also important to ensure that its meaning is accurately and unmistakably understood by the people.

In addition, it says workability, and when the law Amendment is implemented, the number of man-hours and the difficulty of work to prepare materials will be particularly important for administrative officers, but I would like to keep this as a perspective. In addition, updating the law Database to reflect the amended law Database or providing the law Database will naturally require digital aspects, so I believe data maintenance business operators or business operators who utilize the Database will also be necessary, and I would also like to evaluate workability from such a perspective. Issue

Although there is some overlap, we are considering whether it is easy to use the law database because of machine readability, or whether it is possible to machine-generate the revised law or machine-reflect it in the law database as a characteristic.

As for the content, I would like to report from Mr. Onemori of Ascoe Partners and Mr. Deguchi of Gyosei, so from here on, I would like to ask Mr. Onemori of Ascoe Partners.

Mr. Onemori: I am Onemori of Ascoe Partners.

I would like to report on the structural data conversion of the law structure.

First of all, regarding page 5, I would like to omit the outline of the content of this survey and research today due to time constraints. Please take a look at it.

Next, on page 6, in this survey and research, we extracted Issue in particular from the table, categorized them, and examined how they could be done.

This list also includes the secondary use of data, so detailed proposals are also included. For details, the Administrative Management Bureau will disclose a detailed report later, so please check it. (* Survey and research by the Administrative Management Bureau (Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications) )

With regard to the content of today's report, first of all, I would like to make three proposals regarding the review of the notation rules.

First of all, I would like to make one point. Regarding the purpose of the Issue typology, for example, when indicating the relationship of many to one, it can be seen that in the table, it is expressed using "{}" or ruled lines. In this regard, the meaning can be understood in terms of visibility, but it is difficult to understand the relationship in terms of machine readability.

Therefore, as a review proposal, we propose that, for example, symbols should not be used, or where the same value is entered, it should be expressed by combining the columns, or the value should be entered in all the columns without omission.

Second, there are cases in which abbreviations are used for the values in the table. For example, depending on the content, there are cases in which the direction of the information indicated by the abbreviation is determined in the form of "the same right." For example, even if it is "the same right" in official gazettes, in the case of law Search in e-Gov or digital, when it is written horizontally, there is a viewpoint as to whether the direction indicated by the "right" is correct. Therefore, as a review proposal regarding this, we have proposed that it would be desirable to express "the same right," "the same as above," or "the same as above" in the table by combining the columns or specifying them without omitting the wording. However, there is a possibility that the notation will be complicated if not omitted, so it will be necessary to consider such cases.

My third question is about the citation of the table at the time of the creation of the bill. I believe that this will be expressed by cutting it out in a picture, but I have heard that this is quite a burden from the viewpoint of workability in the first place. In addition, it is difficult to read it in terms of visibility, and it is extremely difficult to utilize it in terms of machine readability, which was mentioned as a type of Issue.

On the other hand, as a proposal for improvement, for example, (1) the quotation point is specified by a row or column in the table. Or, if such a method is difficult, a new line is inserted before the quotation. We are proposing such a method. We believe that this can be expected to significantly improve workability in particular.

Next, I would like to report on our review of the XML schema for tables. This time, we are considering the law Standard XML Schema and the e-LAWS DTD.

Since the current law standard XML schema has already been applied to the law database, we believe that a major change in the schema at this timing will have a considerable impact on the law database itself, and we are considering a partial redefinition without making a fundamental change to the current schema.

In addition, regarding the reviewed draft of the XML schema, we have created prototype data based on the results of the revision of the notation rules, and have verified and evaluated it.

Page 12 is listed for your reference. It is the elements and attributes related to the table defined in the e-LAWS DTD. I will not explain this.

Next, on page 13, I would like to propose two examples of reviewing the XML schema.

The first is the process of table joining. As a typology of Issue, when a table is created, it is expressed in the form of joining tables and joining matrices in quite a few cases. As for visibility, of course, people can understand the meaning of joining, but in the case of machine-readable data, it is possible that it is impossible to immediately understand the meaning of the data when it is acquired. Therefore, as a proposal for review, we are trying to define a "value" to show how the values described in the table are related to the attribute representing the joining of the XML schema.

For example, we added the "spantype" attribute to the "TableColumn" element, and its values are fill and first. As written there, the same data is entered into all the combined cells for fill, and the data is entered into the first cell of the combined cell for first. By assigning such correspondence, we tried to make it easier to understand the meaning of the combined data.

We made a prototype and evaluated it. In terms of visibility, it basically enables a display close to official gazettes, and in terms of machine readability, it makes it easier to understand the meaning of the combined data. In addition, in terms of workability, there is probably almost no impact at the stage of creating law, but since various attributes and values are added, it will be a slight burden on business operators in data maintenance.

Next, I would like to talk about the processing of the hierarchical structure. In this case, I think that in the table, the created person may have expressed the hierarchy by, for example, indenting. In the actual law XML data, there are places where the same hierarchy is expressed without a different hierarchical structure. Therefore, I believe that there is a possibility that the data may be acquired in the same flat state without a hierarchy.

Therefore, in order to make this clearer, we have made an attempt to add an "UnOrderedList" element that does not have an ordering rule and express it using an "UnOrderedList" element and a "List" element.

As you can see at the bottom, visibility is naturally close to official gazettes, but in terms of machine readability, the hierarchical structure of the database becomes clearer. Regarding workability, although it will not be a workload at the stage of preparing the law proposal, it will be a slight burden at the stage of data maintenance because new elements and attributes will be added.

On page 16, there are some cases in this survey that are difficult to structure. As an example, if there are multiple diagonal lines in a cell, the items are expressed by dividing them with diagonal lines.

In this case, in official gazettes, when a so-called person sees it, the meaning can be understood as visibility, but on a machine-readable surface, it is very difficult to understand how to divide the diagonal line.

For example, the law table is considered to be extremely accurate and up-to-date information, and it will be necessary to create data centered on the table in the future. In light of this, I believe it will be difficult to respond at the stage of developing the law data, and I have proposed that at the stage of planning the law, it will be necessary to fundamentally review the table by dividing it or creating a normalized table.

It will be on page 17. So far, I have been talking about the table, but this part describes the outline of the Issue types of the figure and form and the results of the examination.

First of all, regarding the figure, I organized the types of image data, but there were many types that could only be expressed in image data and seemed to be difficult to structure in the first place. Regarding the forms, we are not considering the structuring of the forms themselves, but rather, with the progress of online administrative procedures, we are classifying those that may be obstructive, such as forms and online application forms.

Regarding the direction of review, first of all, regarding figures and forms, if tables are simply "figures," or if they can be structured, it is considered that they should be structured, but if they are more difficult to structure than image data, for example, illustrations, I think that images are better in the first place.

On the other hand, from the perspective of workability and data utilization at the law planning stage, I believe that it is possible to make better use of figures and formats by considering assigning text data or metadata or assigning IDs to figures and formats that may be subject to some revisions.

Next, I would like to explain the review of the revised regulations.

Mr. Deguchi: Mr. Yasuno Next, I would like to report on the survey and research related to the review of the amended provisions.

As you explained at the beginning, in creating the amended law, we are classifying the law in the amended method, which will be the Issue for systemization, in terms of the creation of the amended law and the work to integrate the amended law into the current Issue.

As I explained earlier, in anticipation of the computerization of official gazettes, which is currently being implemented, and the development of the functions of the legal affairs system, we have mainly considered a review plan for the standardization of the revised comparative table of Cabinet Orders and Regulations, so-called the new and old comparative table.

As a method of implementation, we have categorized the types of law that were promulgated in the last five years or so. We have categorized the types of data maintenance that could not make a good fit for the revised law based on the revised comparison table.

In addition, among the revised provisions, in particular, the revision comparison table of the Ministerial Ordinance and Rules had different notation patterns depending on the Cabinet Office and Ministries, so the content of the survey was that the review items (points of contention) for standardization were organized after comparative analysis.

As for Issue, I would like to explain mainly the events that have occurred.

As is often the case in law, it is known that there are problems such as that it is difficult to separate the date of enforcement in the case of a comparative table for revision when multiple dates of enforcement are set, that it is difficult to determine the order in which to integrate them, that the application of adjustment provisions and the reflection of official gazettes Proper and Incorrect have an impact on other laws, that it is difficult to understand where official gazettes Proper and Incorrect are applicable, that the provisions for revision are not integrated in the first place, and that when the revision is made as shown in the table, the provisions for revision are integrated, but there are doubts about whether they are integrated as intended by the person who actually made them.

Once again, the "revised balance sheet" I am referring to here has generally been referred to as the "new / old balance sheet." However, the "new / old balance sheet" will be confused with the "new / old balance sheet" included in the five piece set of the bill. Therefore, what we are investigating here is an explanation of the investigation and analysis of the new / old balance sheet, which will be promulgated in official gazettes as a bill to revise the Ministerial Ordinance and Rules.

First of all, we lent out manuals and other materials from each ministry and agency, and analyzed their respective tendencies. As indicators for comparative analysis, as shown on the left side of the table, we first conducted a survey on the tendency of how to write the text, the problem of the arrangement of the revision comparison table, the arrangement of the revision comparison table, how to express the characters and the parts other than the subject of the revision, how to attach the collateral line representing the revision part, and how to express the revision.

In relation to this, of course, it does not mean that any ministry or agency or any manual is excellent or not excellent, but as a person who produces data for the law Amendment, I understand that there are several patterns, so at this time, I conducted detailed examination of the content in order to determine what kind of trends there are and whether I could make a proposal that would lead to efficiency.

Among them, there are 18 items listed here as proposals for how to create a revision comparison table. In particular, I would like to explain the items in yellow. With regard to the so-called two stage rocket and multi-stage rocket methods, I would like to mainly explain how to describe them when there are multiple enforcement dates, and how to indicate the terms subject to revision in the first place.

First, regarding the adoption of the multi-stage rocket method, as shown in the table on the left, the two stage rocket method can be adopted. For example, the first and second tables are divided according to the date of revision. In addition, in principle, the two stage rocket method is used exceptionally as a separate ministerial ordinance. In the case of the two stage rocket method, the revised statement method is used instead of the revised table method, and in principle, the multi-stage implementation is not carried out. In this way, the way of efforts differs depending on each ministry.

In this regard, our proposal is that the two stage rocket method can be carried out in the revised comparative table, but (ii) as in the case of the revised text method, the articles will be divided into articles for each enforcement date, and the articles will be changed so that the difference in the enforcement date can be clearly understood, such as from April 1 for Article XX and from October 1 for Article XX.

In addition, this is how to indicate the words subject to revision in the revision comparison table. The current status of differences among ministries and agencies is shown in the table on the left, but this is a general example in which collateral lines, double collateral lines, and broken lines are used in many cases.

Some ministries and agencies adopt a pattern in which they use a collateral line and a double collateral line instead of a broken line. Some ministries and agencies use only a collateral line.

Regarding this, as one of the opinions of those of us who are engaged in law data maintenance, if there are various lines such as double collateral lines, broken lines, and solid lines, when trying to update law by mechanically specifying the revision point, the readability of the machine will inevitably deteriorate. Therefore, if possible, it is desirable not to use various patterns, so I wrote this as a review proposal of the creation method.

I have written several ways of notation in the form of (I) to (v). However, without using double collateral lines and broken lines, with regard to the full revision and advance / decline indicated by double collateral lines, for example, by drawing collateral lines in all of the articles, I have proposed that all information be organized by ordinary collateral lines.

In addition, it is a partial amendment of a partial amendment, and although it is a great advice to those who will create a bill, it is a so-called partial amendment of a partial amendment, in which law, which was partially amended, will be further partially amended.

With regard to these, in the case of the partially amended law, there are cases in which partial amendments to the provisions of the partially amended Ministerial Ordinance that are amended by the amendment comparison table method are made by the amendment statement method, and the amendment comparison table and the amendment statement are used together in the form of a full revision of the table. With regard to this, our proposal for the review is that it is basically the best to amend some partial amendments by the amendment statement method. We have made three proposals by taking the method of full revision of the table or partial revision of the table.

This is just an example, but as I stated in my opening remarks, in terms of visibility, workability, and machine readability, official gazettes recognizes that the Comparative Table of Amendments is highly visible and excellent for the general public. On the other hand, I would like to propose 18 items. On the other hand, I would like to propose that the Comparative Table of Amendments be improved so that the amendments can be grasped without errors. In addition, if the law Draft is converted into data in the future, it can be read correctly mechanically, and the workability of the government offices who actually make it will be improved.

With that, I would like to make a report on the investigation report of the revised provisions.
Mr. Takahara: .

I would like to reiterate that this report was conducted by Mr. Ascoe Partners and Mr. Gyosei from the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Administration and Management Bureau. For example, I believe that it will be necessary to consult with the competent authorities in law and the Cabinet Legislation Bureau about whether or not visibility can be expressed without doubt. Although it has been demonstrated that the system is machine-readable, it will naturally be necessary to have a validation with Mr. Digital Agency and the National Printing Bureau about whether or not it will fall into the actual operation. In addition, if it is applied to the system, I believe that there will be consultations on the development schedule and resources. Based on this research, I would like to continue to work toward the digitalization of legal affairs while consulting with Mr. Digital Agency. Thank you.

I will return you to the moderator.

Secretariat (Nakano): , and to Mr. Ascoe Partners and Mr. Gyosei.

Then, I would like to set up a time for Q & A and exchange of opinions for about 25 minutes, until around 4:20 p.m. If you have any questions or opinions, please raise your hand.

Then, Mr. Tsunoda, please.

Tsunoda Member: I asked you to consider it in detail, and in particular, about the revision of the law, various things are being considered, including places where I have been worried so far, so I asked you while thinking that it is moving in a very good direction. One point that is somewhat related to a wide range of matters is that in the review of the law schema, for example, on page 13, there are talks about fill and first, and after that, there are talks about diagonal lines. When I heard this, the table was not originally written in the form of a sentence. Of course, there are characters in the table, but it is necessary to read the meaning as if reading between the lines as a whole, and it is written on the premise that the reader will pick up the nuance. It is like the words are written hidden. In that case, I think it is important what is actually really intended there. This time, the word "normalization" is also used, but I would like you to think about normalization at the level of internal data.

Therefore, regarding the way of showing the visible part, for example, skewing, combining cells, omitting, or not omitting, I would like to clearly separate the meaning and semantics of the data from the meaning and semantics of what data values are actually intended. In software development, there is a way of thinking that separates the three sides of the model of data structures, the view of the view, and the control such as algorithms, but similarly, in official gazettes, for example, the way of showing as a printed matter or displaying on a web page, I would like to separate the meaning of the table from the meaning of the table, and consider normalizing in the meaning, that is, the model.

For example, if the diagonal line in the table is normalized, for example, as a table of an image of a relational database, one record can be mathematically expressed internally as a tuple. If that is the case, we can discuss it strictly mathematically. Based on this, we should first normalize the table as design, and then proceed to the proposal or improvement of the table part of the XML schema. This point is related to machine readability, so if we enter from the expression side, depending on various expression patterns, if normalization is not performed, various interpretations and versions will appear. Therefore, I would like you to consider normalization in the true sense first.

Other points have been investigated and examined quite a lot, and I have been studying this field for a long time, so this time I listened to it with great interest, like a study group. However, I thought that if I did not stick to the story in this table, I would be in trouble later, so I made a statement.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): , thank you for your very technical point.

First of all, I would like to hear the opinions of those who are raising their hands now, so Member Miyasaka, please.

Member Miyasaka: Thank you for your explanation, .

Thank you for your explanation. I learned a lot.

I would appreciate it if I could make one comment and one question.

First of all, I would like to make a comment. I would like to ask about the table. Last year, I heard stories from people who were actually engaged in various revision work at the PoC in Digital Agency. I often heard stories about the difficulty of creating the format of the table itself. The expression of the line across the page does not work well in Word, but it can be done by Ichitaro Yamazaki, so it is like using Ichitaro Yamazaki. However, young people are not used to Ichitaro Yamazaki.

In that sense, of course, machine readability is definitely an important perspective, but from the perspective of operability, I thought it would be a good opportunity to review the table in terms of the relationship with the editing software on site and the points where workers are struggling. I thought many people would be very happy if such points were included in the perspective. This is a comment.

I have one question. It is about the revised comparison table. In last year's PoC, at that time, it was called the "new / old comparison table". When I thought about automatic output and the Ministerial Ordinance, I thought that what I thought would be a problem was that the rules were not unified.

Therefore, from the perspective of systematic automatic output, it is very important to unify the rules. From such a perspective, we could not conduct a survey to this extent, but I felt that classifying differences by actual ministries and agencies in this way was a very meaningful initiative, and I learned a lot.

I would like to ask a question. When the rules are actually unified, I think each ministries and agencies has its own preferences. In light of this, I would like to know if there are any barriers that can be seen at this point in time when the rules are actually introduced to ministries and agencies and put into operation.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Thank you, Dr. Yoneda.

Member .

I think it is related to similar points, but I am a simple-minded person, so when I saw this report, I did not know for whom it was made. The various topics listed here seem to be mixed in terms of specifications, such as the part that asks the user or the person who actually inputs and drafts the plan to write it according to these rules, the part that can be processed mechanically, the part that will be made into the specifications of the system to be created or the system to be used by the competent agency in the future, the part that will be made to look good, and the part that will contribute to the general user side in terms of how the output will look like. I thought it would be helpful or easier to understand if the proposal written here is divided into the part that will depend on the next specification, for example, for ordering, and the part that will force everyone across ministries and agencies to do this, or ask for cooperation. I thought it would be helpful if I could receive a report in that direction or additional information in the future.

In the end, we can't listen to everyone's requests, so some of you have to follow them. However, that part has been made easier with this kind of support, and it would be good if we could finally make it more convenient, so we would like to consider it with the aim of doing so, and we would like to ask for your cooperation.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you for your valuable opinions.

To the people of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, what are your questions?

Mr. Takahara: First, I would like to answer from Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, and then I would like to explain if there is any additional information.

First of all, Dr. Tsunoda said that the table should be considered after proper normalization, and that it is better to consider the data after normalization rather than entering it from the display. I believe that is exactly what you pointed out, and I would like to carefully consider that as well. Thank you very much.

First of all, I would like to thank Mr. Miyasaka for looking at the difficult points of the field and the editing software. Thank you very much for your comments based on the actual feelings of Mr. Miyasaka, who was working on it last year, and I thought it would be a great learning.

I would like to ask about the obstacles to introducing the Comparative Table for Revision to ministries and agencies and putting it into practice. For example, since the Comparative Table for Revision does not cover all matters, there are cases where a revised text is better. For example, if a revised text can be made concise and quick, it should be made into a revised text. I think it is necessary for you to understand to what extent we will allow the different uses of the revised text and how we will change our way of doing things. I think these points will be particularly important.

Dr. Yoneda gave me a question about who this report is for, but I am sorry that the structure of the report is difficult to understand. Basically, it is a summary of the reports from business operators to Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications. As I mentioned earlier, there will be a phase in which we will discuss system requirements with Mr. Digital Agency and the National Printing Bureau, or hear the opinions of each ministry and the Cabinet Legislation Bureau as the competent government agency or the examining government agency in law. Or, I think it is possible to think of a phase in which we will present policies for data utilization to the people. So, I would like to continue to make efforts so that we can provide appropriate explanations depending on the phase.

How about a supplement?

Mr. Onemori: I am Onemori of Ascoe Partners. Thank you for your comment.

As Dr. Tsunoda said, it was discussed internally when we were conducting research and study that we should consider the appearance and the actual data separately. So, we would like to consider various things, including your comments. Thank you very much.

Mr. Deguchi: Mr. Yasuno Gyosei.

In the comments given by Mr. Miyasaka, exactly the problems of software and operability were mentioned in Mr. Yoneda's question. This time, we discussed with Mr. Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications how to improve work efficiency for those who are actually creating laws as much as possible. I think we could include such a perspective.

As for how to proceed going forward, it is as Mr. Takahara said. We would like to consult with each ministry and agency on how to achieve both the efficiency of your work and the readability of machines by general users. We would like to make our proposals useful.

Mr. Yoneda, Mr. Miyasaka, Mr. Tsunoda, thank you very much for your various comments.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

I would also like to make a comment, but I think that the visibility, workability, and machine readability of page 3 of the materials may be partially trade-offs in some cases. Regarding the fact that it is easier to understand if you look at it as a table, it is impossible for a machine to read it. I have pointed out that even with the latest AI technology, it is difficult to read the law table. In the future development, for example, there is a problem of how much can be dealt with by the system, and there is a question of which part will be standardized in the future.

On the other hand, the table in law that has already been promulgated is the one that is specified in the form in which it was promulgated, so I think there is a problem of how to think about it. I think there are various difficult points about how to proceed, but thank you very much for conducting the survey and making proposals.

Based on the explanation by the people of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, do you have any additional questions or comments on this agenda?

Mr. Yasuno, please go ahead.

Yasuno Member: Thank you, .

I would like to ask a simple question. On pages 19 and 20, you indicate how many cases there were where mechanical integration was not possible. I find these figures very interesting.

On page 20, you show the reasons why mechanical integration was not possible, for example, the reason why the inquiry occurred. If you can find out what kind of inquiries there were and how many, I feel that we can prioritize which cases should be dealt with first and which cases do not need to be dealt with because there are not so many cases in the future system development. In that sense, I would like to ask you if the actual numbers are counted on page 20. If there were cases where the actual numbers were not counted, there were quite a few here, and there were few here, I would be happy to ask you.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

How is everything, Mr. Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications?

Mr. Deguchi: Mr. Yasuno , thank you very much.

What I have just reported here is a summary. Of course, I have actual numbers for the classification of cases. So, I would like to report on those cases from time to time, and as you pointed out, I would like to refer to the most critical part of them, or where to start.

Thank you for pointing it out.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you very much. I would appreciate it if you could provide me with any information after the meeting.

Do you have any other questions or comments?

Then, Mr. Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, I would like to leave this agenda item for now. I am sorry to have you stay, but you may return to ask questions after the next agenda (3), which I will explain. If you have any questions, please ask during the Q & A session.

Next, I would like to start by explaining Agenda (3) "Efforts to promote the use of digitalization, law, etc. in legal affairs, and review of digital legislation's future policies (draft)."

I will share the screen.

First of all, regarding the "Efforts to Promote the Utilization of Information on digitalization, law, etc. in Legal Affairs," this is the background of the discussions so far. Today, the fourth working session will be held on May 24, and based on the discussions here, I would like to explain the content of today's agenda and discuss it at the Digital System Reform Review Meeting next week on May 27.

Next, first of all, regarding the materials of the Digital Rincho in June 2022, which is the provision system of the digital original copy of the law Database, Mr. Yoneda pointed out at the last working session that it is extremely valuable to sort out how far our efforts are progressing and what the current picture is like.

In this regard, I believe that there have been various developments and changes in the situation since June 2022. First of all, generative AI's products using the Large-Scale Current Model (LLM) have been announced one after another, and since they are not quantitative data but language data, there are private sector companies that are proposing applications to the law field and combinations with law data. In the law API Hackathon, which is written below, there are ideas that are close to Phase 5 in our Digital Legal Roadmap, such as automating examinations by combining law data with existing, for example, housing and building-related data, as pointed out by Yagita members. The situation is changing significantly.

Secondly, from the perspective of a digital original, the "law" database of the e-Gov law Search has changed its maintenance flow to become an extremely reliable database that can be updated in real time, and this database has been designated as a base registry in the public notice.

In addition, as explained by the Prime Minister's Office today, the Act on the Issuance of official gazettes was enacted, which clearly states the promulgation of law by official gazettes as a law, and the content of official gazettes, including the original official gazettes and law Database, can be made available on the website rather than in paper form, which is why digitalization was made.

In addition, as you are deliberating in the current Diet session, a bill on base registry has been submitted, and it provides for the strengthening of the system to effectively implement the development of a database by the national government, the promotion of data connections, and the development of databases and systems.

Therefore, it is for the development and provision of the base registry (digital original copy) of law Data. The story of law itself has changed slightly to that the original copy is actually digitalization, so I wrote it as "base registry of law Data."

As for law, as I just explained, official gazettes has been digitized, and the electronic version posted on the web will become the original copy of official gazettes, or the digital original copy.

As for the Articles of Incorporation, as a general rule, the law is updated and published on the same day as it is promulgated, and we would like to respond by improving the functions of the e-Gov law Search and law API, which are part of the past, so that they can be referred to when dealing with past incidents and the background of the revision.

In addition, as Dr. Yoneda pointed out earlier that it is necessary to show the schedule, we are now aiming at the integration of electronic official gazettes and e-LAWS/e-Gov law Search, the submission of official gazettes manuscripts and legal drafts in a data format that is easy to check and reuse using digital technology, and the consistent management of law.

This is a diagram. Up until now, law data maintenance has various databases, mainly on the paper on the left. In some cases, we have to make handwritten corrections on the paper so that separate data does not come to the Parliament and publish it in official gazettes. This is the workflow. As you can see on page 4, we have not yet reached the point where we can go around and around in one database, but in the future, we will use this editor to electronically edit the text of the law proposal. When it is submitted to the Parliament, it will continue to be printed material, but it will be reused to create the data of the Proclamation law, which will be promulgated in electronic official gazettes. We will reuse and integrate it, and of course we will receive digital support, but the integrated text will be created, and it will be published on the e-Gov law Search, and we will promote the creation of private service and more advanced services through the law API. Electronic official gazettes is not yet under law, but I think we are approaching this picture.

In addition, it has been pointed out for some time that there is no notification database in the first place, but we would like to work on this as well. At present, in Issue, unlike laws, government ordinances, ministerial ordinances, etc., there is no unified database that provides the latest and accurate data for notifications. When searching for notifications, there are Issue where multiple similar PDFs are found or where the latest one is not known, and it is difficult to understand the whole picture of the rules including law.

Typical public notices include those that specify the standards for education courses at schools nationwide, such as the Courses of Study, those that specify the actual content of laws, such as the public notice that specifies the details of the security standards for road transport vehicles, those that specify the form of application forms and attached documents and other necessary matters concerning applications as prescribed in the Ordinance for Enforcement of the Radio Act, and those that specify procedural parts. In addition, it has been pointed out that there are public notices that have a legal nature in the consideration of the digitization of official gazettes, which the Cabinet Office explained earlier.

On the other hand, there is no structured format such as the law Standard XML Schema in the notification. In last year's survey and demonstration projects, which was also conducted by Miyasaka members, it was confirmed that about 65% of the private sector law Database is expected to be structured in the law Standard XML Schema, but other notifications cannot be handled.

Therefore, this is our future policies. First of all, we would like to conduct the following studies in this fiscal year's survey and demonstration projects. We are currently considering the following contents: we will consider an XML schema such as notifications, we will create a prototype editor function that edits and links the XML data of the official gazettes manuscripts including the notifications, and we will consider data management measures such as notifications. development.

Based on these efforts and the efforts to digitize official gazettes, Digital Agency, the Ministry of Justice, and the relevant ministries and agencies will cooperate to first develop the Notice, which has been partially revised in the first place, so it is not possible to know to what extent the Notice will be developed even if we look only at the most recent official gazettes. Therefore, we will sort out the scope of the development and the format of the information to be disclosed. Above all, we have limited resources, so we will develop the system, etc., and aim to start providing the Notice of base registry by the end of fiscal 2026.

This is a summary of the contents I have talked about so far. In order to promote the utilization of legal affairs digitalization and law data, we will review the work flow of legal affairs. As Mr. Yoneda pointed out earlier, there will be parts to be addressed in the specifications and parts to be reviewed in the work flow. Therefore, we will improve the law editing function and the law API while reviewing the parts that should be reviewed in the work flow. As Mr. Yoneda pointed out last time, there is a possibility that knowledge will be lost. Therefore, we will conduct development of the legal affairs knowledge-sharing tool. As I pointed out last time by the members of the working group, we will prioritize development and implementation sequentially. We will also conduct surveys and demonstrations for medium-term Issue. We will also prototype the legal affairs support tool and promote services using law data in development.

In this regard, I have drawn the picture on the previous page, and we will aim to shift to a data-centered workflow, and make efforts in anticipation of the mid - to long-term vision and effects. We will make efforts that are not ad hoc. On the other hand, I believe that it is necessary to prioritize and make the work smaller, and aim to improve convenience at an early stage. Therefore, I would like to propose that we make this one policy and advance our efforts over the next year. This is what I have shown you.

Next, I would like to explain the future direction of review of digital legislation.

With regard to review of digital legislation, since the extraordinary Diet session in 2022, we have been confirming the conformity of the new law with the digital principles, and have been confirming the conformity of regulations on paper and in-person processes with the digital principles, which may be related to regulation, which designates media such as provision and floppy disk.

The revision of the Basic Act on the Formation of digital society was passed during the ordinary session of the Diet last year, and with the revision of Priority plan, it has been positioned as a national policy.

Since last year, we have started to confirm the provisions that specify administrative procedures for which information systems are expected to be developed. However, we would like to promote regulations on paper and in-person processes in operation, which is related to systems and systems, as well as checking digitalization in the articles, and we are implementing such new initiatives.

In addition, we are also making efforts to make it easier for regulations on paper and in-person processes to conduct inspections by making the local government Inspection Tool Alpha Version available to the people of Japan and local regulations on paper and in-person processes.

With regard to the direction of review of digital legislation's current and future initiatives, the regulations on paper and in-person processes Review of the current approximately 10,000 provision in law is scheduled to be completed by June this year. In addition, various technical validation are being implemented toward the regulations on paper and in-person processes Review.

In addition, some of the bills inspected in review of digital legislation have already been implemented, and necessary improvements are being made in low-level law.

I skipped a few slides, but as you can see on page 13, we have been examining 93 bills and 142 provision so far, and we are currently preparing for the regular Diet session to be announced.

Therefore, I would like to confirm the actual status of the regulations on paper and in-person processes Review and other reviews to date and their operation after implementation. As future response policies, we will strengthen the functions of the design so that the development and operation of the review of digital legislation and information systems will be examined from the policy planning and drafting stage. In addition, we will ensure the consistency of systems, operations and systems through reviews according to each phase such as the budget request stage and the execution stage in government information systems projects.

Based on this Omnibus Act, each ministries and agencies shall conduct an inspection by appropriately utilizing the Technology Map and Technology Catalog based on the Guidelines. At the same time, each law shall conduct an inspection so that the design of not only the articles but also the business and systems will be conducted in view of the operation in conformity with the Digital Principles from the planning stage of the Digital Agency, etc., and shall submit the results thereof to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government.

Digital Agency has repeatedly pointed out in this working session that support for each ministries and agencies and local local government is necessary based on the results of the review of regulations on paper and in-person processes and the technical demonstration for that purpose. Therefore, we will further promote digitalization in the operation of law, including business and systems, including local local government, and we are currently improving the function of the regulations on paper and in-person processes Inspection Tool, and we will provide further support by development and deploying it. We will also publicize the results of the inspection and promote digitalization at the execution stage.

Although it was a rush, I would like to provide you with about 25 minutes for a question and answer session and an exchange of views regarding agenda (3).

If you have any questions or comments, please let us know.

Mr. Yagita, please.

Yagita Member: Thank you very much. I'm Yagita.

Thank you very much for summarizing it in a very easy way.

I would like to comment on only one point, which is the notification on pages 8 and 9 of this document.

I believe this is an extremely important initiative. My company provides services like legal Google, so I have the opportunity to hear from many law firms and corporate legal clients about their needs for research on legal information.

To put it briefly, there is a very strong need to be able to see the notice in some form. As it is on page 8, I have heard that there are many cases where it is impossible to examine the legality of a business without actually seeing the notice.

For example, I think that there is Compgacha, which was popular in the past, but when I try to consider what exactly corresponds to Compgacha in making a new game, even if I look at the contents of the Premiums and Representations Act, it says that such restrictions will be made by public notice, and when I actually see the public notice, the concept of card matching comes up, and it says that such premiums should not be offered. If you do not read the public notice, you may not know whether the business you are going to do is legal or not. Therefore, I think it is good if all the public notices are made into a database.

If I were to say this from the perspective of a citizen in a country ruled by law, I would say that not all of the notifications, but at least some of the notifications have some legal provisions, so-called legal nature, so in that sense, I think it would be good if all the notifications were made into a database. However, as you have mentioned here, there is currently no unified database that provides the latest information. Perhaps some of the notifications are of very high priority, so I think it would be good to create a database from here and add them gradually. In any case, I would like to say that as a citizen, I think it is very wonderful to be able to develop the notification information in the form of base registry. Thank you very much.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Thank you for pointing out your very reassuring support.

First of all, I would like to ask your opinions and questions, Mr. Miyasaka.

Member Miyasaka: Thank you for your explanation, . We are very much looking forward to this initiative.

I have only two questions.

First of all, regarding the first question, I would be grateful if you could tell us about the additions or differences from last year regarding the XML schema review such as the Notice, which will be a continuation of the previous PoC.

As Mr. Nakano mentioned earlier after the explanation by the Prime Minister, I believe there are discussions on, for example, the viewing period for public notices in the digitization of official gazettes, and if there is any place that is considering the relationship with such places, I would be happy if you could tell me about it. This is my first question.

This is my second point. I think it is very important to prioritize and make them smaller and improve convenience at an early stage, as stated in the materials. It is exactly what private sector companies are always aware of when they create services.

Amidst this, although I may not be able to hear about it now because it is still at the early stage of the project, I would like to ask what areas you regard as priority law items at this point in time while working on the review of the workflow of legal affairs and the development of development editing functions.

In addition, in terms of the law editing function, for example, I understand that the development of the editor is very complicated and takes a long time. In this context, I would appreciate if you could tell us about any ideas to improve convenience at an early stage.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

Next, Mr. Fujiwara, please.

FUJIWARA Member: I'm FUJIWARA. Thank you very much.

This is similar to what Mr. Yagita said earlier, but there are many times when we want to see the Notice when we are working, so I am glad. I have one thought, and it is a comment like my impression. It is generally said that there are some Notices that are legal and some that are not. If we try to make all of them, there are so many, and in fact, I feel that there may be some Notices that do not need to be listed on the base registry. I understand that it has not been decided yet, but I was a little concerned about whether it is a direction to select to some extent or whether it will be considered after it is listed.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

At this stage, I would like to comment on the opinions and questions from the three professors.

First of all, Mr. Yagita, Mr. Fujihara, and Mr. Miyasaka, I am aware that you pointed out that it is very useful to make a data maintenance. In addition, I would like to thank you very much for pointing out that it is very meaningful to develop a system that includes legal norms for Japanese nationals.

You pointed out whether we will start with some or select some. As mentioned in today's explanation on official gazettes digitization, the official gazettes Act has not yet been enforced. On the other hand, when I look at the text of the law, it is divided into matters such as promulgation and others, so I would like to consider it based on what kind of operation it will be. In addition, I wrote that we will start with the development of the system, etc., which is of course the case for any organization, but there are limits to resources, so it is effective. In the first place, we are developing data on law, etc., so whether or not it is legal or normative is only one idea, but it may be necessary to consider it, and I do not know what kind of selection range it will be in the first place, but there is a flow of official gazettes digitization, so I think that if we do not select based on certain standards, the people of Japan will be confused as to why it is posted or not posted, so if we are going to develop it as base registry, I would like to start developing it after creating certain standards.

On the other hand, the criteria are still under consideration. In any case, we would like to proceed steadily based on your valuable opinions and support.

Another question from Mr. Miyasaka was about what we are currently considering as the additional content and priorities for last year. The actual situation is that we are working on the matter with the business operators.

On the other hand, regarding the Notice, what we are writing in the specifications is that we will create a prototype of the editor and other functions to edit and cooperate with the XML data of the official gazettes manuscripts, the implementation Plan and the demonstration of cooperation with the National Printing Bureau and others on the XML cooperation of the official gazettes manuscripts including the Notice, and the measures to manage the Notice and other data are listed as the Issue to be examined. Based on these examinations, we will consider what to do with the XML schema. I believe that we were in range of this last year, of course, but official gazettes will be computerized, and we are aware that the System development of the National Printing Bureau is also conducting a demonstration separately. We will be at the stage where such examinations will proceed, and we would like to dig deeper there.

Regarding priorities, as you discussed in last year's PoC, it says that we should prioritize and make them smaller and improve convenience at an early stage. As I explained in the previous working session, some of them have technical Issue, some are highly difficult, and some need was not recognized in last year's PoC. We will be in trouble if resources are exhausted, so we are prioritizing them and considering which to start with. I would like to report on this at this working session later, and I would be very grateful if you could give us your comments on this point.

These are my answers and comments for now. Of course, if your answers are insufficient, I would like to ask you questions again. Please raise your hand, Mr. Tsunoda.

Tsunoda Member: I have two points, one is a comment and the other is a question.

The first point is about the public notice. Today, you all paid attention to the issue of public notice, and I have been talking about public notice since before, so I am very glad that I was able to attract your attention.

As a person who has been studying notifications and forms for many years, when creating the internal database of this notification, there are parts that are not tables but have the same concept as tables, and they are sometimes written in the form of articles or paragraphs in the form of ordinary laws. However, among the forms of notifications that I have examined, there were some organizations that presented many notifications in the form of filling in the blanks without borders.

Then, although it is in a tabular form, how to normalize the contents and how to standardize it are the same as in the table earlier. The data structures that are the major premise of the display schema are shared by all of you, and the basic elements of the table that have been described in the most detail should not be in such a difficult form, so I think it is necessary to consider design as such a standard first. It may take a lot of time and effort to design the view to see how to summarize it in an easy-to-see manner, and various ideas may be necessary to consider operability, but I think it is possible to design the basic data structure, so if we do not proceed after design, when we start design the schema, all the tables will be displayed, and we may have to postpone it again, and the brakes may be suddenly applied, so I thought I had to be careful about this, so I made a comment.

I would also like to ask another question. It is the same as what I asked earlier in my visit to official gazettes. I would like to ask about what laws and rules will be used to trigger the transfer of physical data, rather than just the transfer of management or physical data, in terms of what will be archived and when it will be transferred to the National Archives of Japan or archived. I would like to leave that to the administrators, and if it is okay for the viewers, users, and the people to not care about it at all, it may not be necessary to make such a clear decision. If not, I would like to ask about how it will be decided, whether it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, and if it has been decided, base registry

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you for your valuable suggestions and questions.

Next, Mr. Yoneda, please.

Member .

First of all, thank you very much for answering my request, or rather for summarizing what I said because I wanted to know the whole picture of where we have come now.

As far as I can see, I think it can be evaluated that it has already been a revolutionary change or progress for the country, or rather, for law, which has achieved the goal over the past two years, to properly prepare and provide the results to the people. I have just realized that we are entering a phase in which we will make this even more thorough. I would like to strongly appeal to the outside world that we have been able to do so. At the very least, I think it is an epoch-making thing that the e-Gov law Search has become available in real time. It is not only that we have been able to use it within the government agencies, but also that all the people of Japan have become able to use it with trust. I would like to make a big appeal to the outside world that we have been able to do so.

In addition, I would like to ask some questions and ideas. One is that I am an amateur so I may be careless about how to classify legal normativity, but I wonder if it can be classified by something exactly like AI, and I wonder if it can be a clue to creating standards. I would appreciate if you could cooperate with related companies and engineers.

Legal normativity may be the same in sociology of law, philosophy of law, and positive law, but it is a quite important point, and judgments tend to be abstract, but everyone is interested in it. There is a research evaluation that if there is such mechanical support and it can be sorted well and created, the meaning of legal normativity itself will become clear. I would like you to actively work on such a thing.

The other is, as Dr. Tsunoda mentioned at the end, what will happen to the cooperation for the storage part? It seems that the notifications so far exist in pieces, and things that go in go in, and things that don't go in don't go in. How will this be stored and made visible? For now, is it an image of creating a separate database for the notification part and the law part that has been done so far, or is it one database? I think it should be one database, but I would like you to aim for whether the standardization method of the law XML Schema at that time can be unified.

In addition, I believe that I can only say this within the Working Group. To be honest, when a major change occurs within the system of Digital Agency itself, including the Secretariat, as you just mentioned, I would like to see the entire country invest its resources in this system.

I heard that there was a huge amount of analog work to be done for the revision of the Comprehensive Measures Act, and I think it was a very heavy burden. It is unlikely that it will be over once, and there will always be several waves, so I would like you to consider expanding the lineup for that. I believe that this is a big wave, and if we do not do it all at once, there will be areas where progress will not be made at a level that will leave a root of trouble in the future. I would like you to widely convey to the top that there were such opinions.

For example, when the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Korea created a database, it was very sluggish, and when it received support from international organizations, it hired a lot of law graduates to create the database at once as a measure against the unemployed. I think it is worth investing national funds at once, or it will not be possible unless it is done there. I would like to tell you that there were such opinions.

That's all.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

As for the very reassuring point that I would like you to convey, I believe that it has been conveyed to my boss, who is also attending this meeting, but I will convey it to my boss.

In addition, Mr. Tsunoda's comment is that when making a notification, there may be a large number of images. In particular, regarding the form and the table, as you pointed out, it is necessary to structure the data. As you pointed out in the survey by Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications today, I think there are many places where we do not have enough expertise. I would like you to give us guidance. Thank you very much.

Next, when the notification is to be made in base registry, how will it be transferred to the National Printing Bureau or the National Diet Library? In this regard, the national notification is basically posted in official gazettes, so as for the data in official gazettes, as the Cabinet explained earlier, it is to be stored in the National Archives of Japan. As for the data in the Articles of Incorporation, we are making all of the XML data available to the public at any time, but I am very sorry to say that there are some parts that I cannot answer here, so I would like to check a little.

Next, I would like to explain the whole picture. It is Mr. Yoneda's revolution, and I would like to make an appeal to the outside world. So, I would like to publish the contents of last year's survey and demonstration on our website. So far, we have held law API Hackathon and law × Digital events, and quite a number of people have participated in them. It is the same as the computerization of official gazettes, but in the past, it was pointed out that we did not know that the publication was made in common law in textbooks, and that it was also made in electronic form as a law. It is true that there are still some parts that are not known, so I would like to make an appeal. Above all, appealing to experts has more impact than our appeal, so I would like to ask for your support in this regard.

Also, in terms of legal normativity, we have not had many ideas about whether AI can be used, so I would like to confirm to what extent it can be used.

In addition, we will make a final decision on how to store the information, whether it will be stored in one database or divided into two databases, after considering what kind of information will be included in the notification and what kind of information will be targeted. At this point, of course, as you pointed out, we are considering making it into one database if possible so that it will not be divided into, for example, the e-Gov law Search and the e-Gov Notification Search. We will make a final decision on the direction of the search as we proceed with consideration.

Last but not least, my fourth question. As I said in advance, when we actually implement the measures in the Notification, we already know that a considerable amount of work will be required. In addition, this system development is also being carried out simultaneously. We are also updating the database of the e-Gov law Search on a daily basis. Of course, we have to prioritize our efforts due to limited resources, but I would like to ensure the system. Thank you very much for your valuable comments.

Then, I think there are some places that are not enough, so I would like to ask additional questions. Mr. Yasuno, please.

Yasuno Member: Thank you, .

I would like to make one comment and one request.

First of all, in my first comment, as you all said, when I look at the summary of what has happened over the past few years, I believe that various things have been progressing, and I once again felt today that it is a great progress.

On the other hand, although I do not mean that it has been late until now, I believe that prototyping, tool creation, and system development will become full-scale in the future.

Regarding the second request, I think that it is difficult to decide the specifications in advance at the time of prototyping. What I am saying is that I hope that we do not fall into the bad middle between development, where the specifications are decided firmly, and private sector, where development is done by prototyping and iteration.

If we decide the specifications properly, we have a plan, and we have actually made this much from it. So, while it is easy to understand the achievement level and the difference, if we push out the prototyping aspect, there is no problem even if it is different from the plan. So, I don't know how to put it into words, it will be easier to proceed.

There are two. One is that I think it is easier to make something that can be actually used if we proceed while prototyping. So, I would like to give as much discretion as possible while handing over authority to people who are development in the field or people close to the user.

Second, I don't think there is no need for a process of reflection, and I thought this at first, but this was different, so I modified my hypothesis like this. Such learning is properly left and output. I think it would be very good if you could guarantee these two. It was a request.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you for your valuable comments. There were words of support saying that we are making great progress. On the other hand, I do not believe that I have the same resolution as Mr. Yasuno, who is engaged in full-scale system development, but my honest impression is that I understand what you are saying very well.

This system development does not mean that the deliverables will be delivered together at the end of the fiscal year. Instead, we are working on a method in which the period is divided into certain periods, for example, at the end of June in this fiscal year, what has been completed up to that point is regarded as one cycle for the time being, and efforts are reviewed in the next cycle. As far as I can see, this is the method used by development, which is rare in Japan.

As you said, while creating a cycle that reflects the feedback from actually making a prototype, I would like to speak with Mr. Yasuno separately so that we will not be unable to do anything if the deadline is delayed. I would like to have some time. In that sense, we ourselves are also engaged in trial and error, so I would like to hear your opinions. Thank you for your valuable comments.

The time has passed, so it looked like Mr. Yoneda raised his hand for a moment. Is it okay?

Member : In order to avoid the bad pattern that Mr. Yasuno just mentioned, there will inevitably come a point in time when we have to decide to do it in its completed form. In other words, there will definitely come a point in time when we have to create a support system to this extent and sort out what we are going to do by ourselves. I would like to reaffirm once again that we must be aware of our rough schedule to provide concrete things.

As Mr. Tsunoda said and Mr. Nakano said earlier, I am very worried about the problem of preservation, and if I have everything in digital form that I used to have in paper form, the way I do things, my habits, and the people in charge will change, so I would like you to clarify the communication relationship.

In addition, I believe that there are many amendments to the law Act that have a great impact on local government, so I will be aware of them and provide information. You said that you are providing the regulations on paper and in-person processes Inspection Tool α version, but I would like you to provide such a tool to local government as much as possible. At the end, I received a report that I happened to be able to conclude a paragraph. Thank you very much.

Secretariat (Nakano): Thank you for your valuable comments. The deadline for development, the issue of preservation, and the relationship with local government are all very important points, and we are aware of them, but I think there are some that are not enough, so I would like to hear your continued comments.

Then, I am very sorry that it has passed the time. With that, today's proceedings are over. If you do not have any objection, I will prepare the minutes of today's proceedings, have them checked by all of you, and make all of the public materials public.

In conclusion, Mr. Hasui, I would like to ask for your greetings.

Mr. Hasui: My name is Hasui . I am from Digital Agency.

I would like to once again express my gratitude to the members of the ministries and agencies Committee who participated in our meeting today for explaining the status of our efforts to date regarding legal affairs in digitalization and other areas, and for their various proposals, open-minded discussions, and strong expectations regarding our future policies.

Based on the points pointed out in the previous working session, we will continue to prioritize development and demonstration while reviewing the business flow, and aim to improve convenience at an early stage. In that case, we would like to fully refer to the cooperation with Electronic official gazettes and the survey and research of Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications that you discussed today.

In addition, we would like to thank you for your continued high expectations for the realization of base registry.

This will significantly expand the data that has been subject to maintenance. As you have discussed including the system, I would like to steadily advance consideration while sorting out the scope of data to be maintained that is commensurate with the system.

In addition, although you have pointed out various systems, we will take them seriously. Although there is a shortage of personnel in all areas, we will make efforts to allocate personnel in this area. We would like to ask for your continued support.

In addition, from the policy planning and formulation stage, we would like to be able to consider the development and operation of business design and information systems. In regard to review of digital legislation, we are strongly aware that we must firmly consider systems, business, and systems as a whole based on the perspective of BPR, rather than revising only the systems and putting them in the system, especially for prioritization in planning. From this perspective, we would like to further strengthen the operation of review of digital legislation.

Although it is simple, I would like to ask for your continued guidance. I look forward to working with you in the future. Thank you very much for your time today.

Secretariat (Nakano): .

This concludes the 4th Working Group. Thank you very much for joining us today. We look forward to your continued support.