The Blockchain for Good Alliance and the United Nations Development Programme have agreed to run a two-year cybersecurity programme for public-sector and development organizations using digital technologies, including blockchain-based systems. The initiative will focus on practical areas such as data protection, secure digital payments and the resilience of public digital services, rather than setting new rules for cryptocurrency markets or wallet users.
The agreement was signed in Singapore during the Cybersecurity, Trust and Digital Safety Launch Summit held at the UNDP Global Centre for Technology, Innovation and Sustainable Development. Edward Vrkić, UNDP resident representative to Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei Darussalam, signed for UNDP alongside Helen Liu, founder of the Blockchain for Good Alliance.
UNDP’s Alternative Finance Lab will implement the programme with the alliance. The partners said the work will bring cybersecurity expertise into UNDP’s existing blockchain education efforts, including the SDG Blockchain Accelerator and the Government Blockchain Academy.
The structure places cybersecurity training alongside programmes already designed to help public institutions assess and deploy blockchain applications. That approach reflects how digital systems used for government identity services, benefit payments, aid distribution and public records increasingly depend on secure handling of data, credentials and transactions.
Training will target UNDP offices and government counterparts
The two-year programme is expected to include dedicated sessions for UNDP country offices and relevant government counterparts that choose to participate. Its curriculum will cover the protection of sensitive information, the security of digital-payment systems and safeguards for online public services.
For development agencies and governments, those areas are closely connected. A digital payment channel may reduce the time and cost required to send aid or social benefits, for example, but it can also create new targets for account takeover, identity fraud or payment diversion if its authentication and monitoring systems are weak.
Blockchain systems can add traceability to records and transactions, yet their use does not remove the need for cybersecurity controls. Public bodies operating such systems must still protect private keys, user credentials, databases, application interfaces and the devices through which citizens and officials access services. Training that addresses those operational risks could be more immediately useful than a general discussion of blockchain adoption.
The initiative also comes as artificial intelligence tools increase the scale and sophistication of fraud attempts. AI-generated phishing messages, impersonation campaigns and fabricated documents can place pressure on institutions that have digitized services but have not developed equivalent capacity to detect attacks or respond to compromised accounts.
The partners framed the programme around responsible digital technology use in development settings. That leaves room for country offices and government participants to apply the training to their own systems and legal environments, rather than imposing a single model across jurisdictions with different data-protection rules, payment infrastructure and digital identity frameworks.
Singapore discussion examined trust in digital public systems
The signing was followed by a panel on digital trust and cybersecurity in development. Vrkić and Liu were joined by Robert Pašičko, lead of the UNDP Alternative Finance Lab, and Mykolas Majauskas, global head of policy at Bybit. Glenn Tan, director of global affairs at the Blockchain for Good Alliance, moderated the session.
Participants discussed cybersecurity as a development concern rather than solely a technical issue. That framing captures the potential damage caused when digital systems fail: disrupted benefit payments, exposure of personal information, weakened confidence in online public services and added barriers for people who depend on those services.
The discussion also compared Singapore’s regulatory approach with other regions and considered how frontline operators, public institutions and private-sector organizations can share operational knowledge. Singapore has positioned itself as a regional centre for financial technology and digital-asset businesses while maintaining licensing, anti-money-laundering and consumer-protection requirements through the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
The agreement itself does not create a regulatory framework for cryptocurrency trading or establish rules governing personal wallet ownership. Its stated purpose is capacity building for development and public-sector actors, with an emphasis on safely deploying digital tools that may include blockchain technology.
Partnership extends existing UNDP blockchain work
The programme expands an existing relationship between UNDP and the Blockchain for Good Alliance. The alliance is already a strategic partner of the UNDP SDG Blockchain Accelerator, which is entering its third cohort.
The accelerator is designed to support projects applying blockchain and related technologies to Sustainable Development Goal challenges. Bringing cybersecurity material into that setting could help project teams assess security requirements earlier, before tools reach public users or are integrated with government data and payment systems.
The Blockchain for Good Alliance also belongs to UNDP’s Blockchain Advisory Group, a forum convened by the agency to examine how blockchain tools may support sustainable development and strengthen digital public infrastructure.
That relationship gives the new programme a route into existing training networks rather than requiring UNDP country teams to build a separate cybersecurity initiative from scratch. The test will be whether the sessions translate into durable operational practices, such as stronger access controls, incident-response procedures, secure payment workflows and clearer governance over data.
For public institutions, cybersecurity capacity often depends as much on people and procedures as on technology. A secure system requires staff who can recognize fraud attempts, administrators who can manage access rights, and agencies that know how to respond when a service is disrupted. The UNDP and Blockchain for Good Alliance programme is aimed at that practical layer of digital development.
Explore how public institutions secure blockchain systems in development by reading our blockchain security fundamentals guide today.
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