As Citizens Online moves into a new exciting chapter, by merging with AbilityNet, we would like to celebrate the amazing achievements of the organisation. Since Citizens Online was founded in 2000, the mission has always been to ensure that no-one is left behind in the digital age. This mission remains more vital now than ever, as digital tools have become part of everyday life, yet 1 in 5 adults lack the essential digital skills for life.
Citizens Online have supported over 250,000 people with digital skills and trained over 6000 digital champions. We look forward to joining forces with AbilityNet to reach more digitally excluded people and create stronger impact.
Read about our work and impact in the timeline below, as we ready to join forces with AbilityNet next week! You can read more about our previous work on our webpage.
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2000 – Citizens Online was founded by Tech entrepreneur, Mark Adams.
His vision for Citizens Online was to ensure that the Internet is available to everybody, helping individuals and communities understand and gain the benefits of being online.
2001 – As well as helping those most in need, Citizens Online works to understand the scale of digital exclusion. We conduct research into ‘Corporate responsibility in the IT industry’, Surveyed household internet adoption and worked on the digital divide across London.
2002 – 2009 – The ‘Everybody Online’ project funded by BT supported the least connected and most disadvantaged communities in 25 locations across the UK. Over 150.000 people were supported to get online and the project led to internet connectivity uptake seven times the national average. A toolkit was produced to share best practice from seven years of delivery. .
2003 – Citizens Online led the Alliance for Digital Inclusion, encouraging cross sector collaboration to promote technology to those who didn’t use it. Members included UK Gov, BT, Intel, Microsoft, AOL, T-Mobile, IBM and others.
2006 – Attended EU e-inclusion summit in Lisbon
2007 – Managed the EU e-inclusion awards
2010 -2015 – Our ‘Fix the Web’ grass roots campaign to improve web accessibility, ran for 5 years, funded by Nominet Trust. Web accessibility issues were reported through a site and volunteers fixed them, or liaised with site owners to improve accessibility. Over 1500 websites were reported and over 850 volunteers joined the campaign. Stephen Fry tweeted about the campaign. A short film, ‘- ‘Make Technology Work for Everyone: introducing digital accessibility’ is produced. Fix the Web won an Amaze award in 2015.
2011 – 2014 – ‘Get IT together’, funded by BT delivered digital inclusion support in 15 areas across the UK. The programme supported 2,300 people to find employment using new digital skills. The work resulted in, 4,000 new broadband connections, and 18,000 new internet users. Most importantly, a longitudinal study was produced, evidencing the need for ongoing support to maintain digital inclusion. This study remains the only longitudinal study in the sector, as highlighted in the Digital Poverty Alliance Evidence Review in 2022.
2014 – White Paper Published: The case for a systemic
approach to digital skills. This paper evidences the need to integrate digital inclusion into existing services and facilitate a joined-up approach in local areas. This has always been to the Citizens Online approach, to embed digital inclusion as part of digital transformation, to make the work sustainable.
2014 – We become a member of the Government Digital Services stakeholder group, contributing to evaluation and monitoring
2015 – Won a Digital Leaders Award for Best Product or Service
2015 – 2020 – ‘One Digital’, funded by Big Lottery and local partners in four locations: Highlands and Islands, Gwynedd, Plymouth and
Brighton & Hove.
One Digital helped people to develop the essential digital skills needed to participate in the online world. The ‘golden thread’ of One Digital’s approach is the use of Digital Champions. The programme provided strong evidence for the effectiveness of a partnership based approach to tackling digital exclusion. The programme engaged with over 3,900 organisations, recruited over 4,700 Digital Champions and supported over 61,000 people to learn new digital skills.
2018 – Administered the DCMS Digital Inclusion Fund
2018 – The Citizens Online research team developed the best digital exclusion risk mapping in the sector.
Using 16 data sets from known risk factors that indicate if someone is more likely be digitally excluded, these were were weighted to produce a likelihood scale of digital exclusion.
2019 – Citizens Online is rebranded with a new logo
2020 – Covid-19 pandemic highlights importance of digital inclusion. The Citizens Online freephone national helpline is launched, with National Lottery Funding to support people with digital skills. Demand for the service is high and we have kept the phoneline, long beyond the pandemic. Many people cannot access in person digital skills services as they may have mobility issues or caring responsibilities for example.
2021 – Conducted research with the Centre for Ageing Better to explore the impact of the pandemic on people’s digital skills. The study focussed on people aged 50-70, living on household incomes of under £25K. It found that 87% of people did not know an organisation where they could go to get help with digital skills. Also, 27% of this group were offline at the start of the pandemic.
2022 – Independent evaluation of our digital inclusion work in Gwynedd calculates a social return on investment of £4.44 for every £1 invested.
2023 – Launched our User Panel to further guide our work
2024 – Citizens Online merges with AbilityNet to support more digitally excluded people and create stronger impact.
In 25 years we have: supported 250,000 learners. Trained 6000 Digital Champions.
