The Minister of Telecommunications and E-Commerce pledged to improve Bermuda's state of e-readiness a day after it received an overall ranking of 20th in an Economist Intelligence Unit/IBM global survey.

"While there is much cause for celebration, there is no time to rest on our laurels and our efforts at refining our product, assessing our workforce needs, and gearing up for an even higher state of e-readiness will continue," said Minister Michael Scott.

Bermuda will improve upon its regulatory and policy environment starting with bringing forward the Child Protection Act, amendments to the Electronic Transactions Act, and the Data Protection Act, he said. A benchmarking exercise aimed at establishing levels of Internet penetration, infrastructure, business usage and other technology related data is also underway.

The Ministry is also conducting a study aimed at identifying technology workforce requirements, challenges and opportunities to find ways to meet high demand for experienced IT specialists.