Building trust, clarity, and usability into a new national digital gateway

Challenge

The Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) is developing an all‑of‑government app designed to make it easier for New Zealanders to connect with government digital services and, over time, provide a platform for future digital credentials.

However, topics such as digital identity, data use, and the digitisation of public services can be highly sensitive. DIA needed a deep understanding of how New Zealanders perceive these concepts, what concerns or barriers exist, and how to design and communicate the app in ways that proactively address these concerns.

Our challenge was to uncover the emotional drivers and practical expectations that would give the app the greatest chance of being trusted, understood, and widely adopted.

Approach

Verian partnered closely with DIA and the appointed app design agency on a multi‑phase, iterative programme of research and UX testing.

We began by building deep empathy for New Zealanders’ reactions to digital identity, trust, security and government digital service access. These exploratory insights were used to drive thought‑provoking design discussions and to guide the design direction from the outset, ensuring the user perspective was embedded deeply into the design process.

The app development process was supported by rounds of iterative UX testing. Working hand‑in‑hand with the designers, we tested increasingly refined prototypes to deliver rapid, user‑centred feedback that directly informed design decisions. This included ensuring that the app was easy to understand, prioritised the most important features, and used reassuring language, cues, and flows that built user confidence.

UX interviews were conducted through a platform that enabled observers to watch participant screens in real time as they navigated the prototype. This allowed us to follow each user’s natural journey of exploration, identifying what elements captured attention, which were overlooked, and where confusion or friction emerged.

Through timely probing, we were also able to unpack the emotional journey underpinning the functional one, highlighting moments of reassurance, hesitation, trust, or uncertainty.

Impact

We delivered highly interactive outputs, using video clips and screen recordings from real participants to bring the UX insights to life. These outputs clearly illustrated user reactions, areas of friction, and the design elements that were most effective in building confidence.

Ultimately, our findings translated into a set of actionable recommendations that refined the user experience and strengthened the app’s clarity, usability and sense of security. This programme of work has enabled DIA to progress the app build with confidence and grounded in real user needs and expectations.