Best Practices in E-Governance: A Comparative Study Based on the Rutgers University Worldwide Digital Governance Survey - Information and Communication Technologies in Public Administration - page 34

2.4.2 Rutgers E-Governance Index

For our survey, we used the Rutgers E-Governance Index to evaluate the official
websites of these municipalities in terms of information and services provided. This
index utilizes 104 measures belonging to five distinct categorical areas, including
privacy/security, usability, content, services, and citizen and social engagement.
Table 2.2 contains the measures in the index.
With the increase in e-government usage, “concerns regarding the extent
to which 'information security' and 'user privacy' can be ensured are raised”
(Lambrinoudakis, Gritzalis, Dridi, & Pernul, 2003, p. 1873). Protection to users'

table 2.2 e-Governance Performance Measures

E-Governance
Category

Key
Concepts

Raw
Score

Weighted
Score

Key Words

Privacy/Security 19 27 20 Privacy policies,

authentication, encryption,
data management, cookies

Usability 20 32 20 User-friendly design,

branding, length of
homepage, targeted
audience links or channels,
and site search capabilities

Content 26 63 20 Access to current accurate

information, public
documents, reports,
publications, and
multimedia materials

Services 21 61 20 Transactional services—

purchase or register,
interaction between
citizens, businesses, and
government

Citizen and
social
engagement

18 48 20 Online civic engagement/

policy deliberation, social
media applications,
citizen-based performance
measurement

Total 104 231 100

Source: Holzer, M., & Manoharan, A. (2012). Digital governance in municipalities
worldwide (2011-2012) . Newark, NJ: E-Governance Institute, Rutgers
University.