Kela and Louhe Oy enter into collaboration

Kansaneläkelaitos or Kela, the Social Insurance Institution of Finland plays a significant role in implementing the Finnish social security system. Kela manages the basic social security of Finnish residents and many Finns living abroad in various life situations. Kela is responsible for providing digital Kanta services in social and healthcare, which are used by citizens, pharmacies, healthcare, and social services. Kela is an independent public-law institution under the supervision of the Finnish Parliament, and its operations are based on the Act on the Social Insurance Institution of Finland. Kela is also obliged, in accordance with the Emergency Powers Act and certain other regulations concerning Kela, to provide services in all security situations, including exceptional circumstances. According to the strategy updated in 2022, Kela has three interrelated goals: Customer experience based on trust, Impact through data, and Security in everyday life. In line with this strategy, Kela ensures that its services operate securely in all situations every day.

Matti Koskinen, Kela’s Director of Security, explains that the collaboration with Louhe grew out of interest in new and innovative technology.

“To stay on the cutting edge of the security industry, we need to pick tools from the market that can enhance security even further. The collaboration has been smooth and goal-oriented from the beginning,” Koskinen says.

Through this collaboration, we have gained a better understanding of the possibilities of utilizing data.

According to Koskinen, it has been eye-opening that Louhe’s analytical method generates insights into events that a human may not be able to identify among tens of thousands of access control events. Particularly in real-time monitoring, there are significant potential benefits that can help quickly answer questions like “why did this happen” or “what was the sequence of events.”

“By combining data from different sources, we can do things that wouldn’t be as efficient otherwise. These include understanding how and when spaces are used, identifying unusual access events, or developing guidelines, all while saving time,” Koskinen mentions.

New insights from data

“Collaboration with Louhe has led to positive ‘aha moments’ at Kela when we’ve been able to uncover phenomena related to space utilization,” Koskinen notes.

With solutions like these, we gain visibility into things we may not have noticed previously.

As an example, Koskinen explains how optimizing the movement of users within spaces can be achieved by removing unnecessary access-controlled doors.

“identifiedOne way to identify a need to evolve our guidelines is that users try to access doors they don’t have permission for. Space usage may have changed, requiring more up-to-date communication and guidance on changes. This need may not be apparent without data-driven analysis. Similar practical situations can arise when using Louhe’s analysis,” summarizes Koskinen.

Collaboration across organizational boundaries

“The pilot of Louhe technology has initiated discussions at Kela on a broader scale. We can now think more boldly about the benefits of data across organizational boundaries.”

Collaboration between security and other units can lead to cost savings or significant operational improvements.

For instance, real-time monitoring tasks could be carried out following Kela’s 24/7 principles in operations.

Possible benefits to data utilization are also recognized in proactive planning, such as optimizing property services, cleaning services, or space usage planning.

“There are many positive question marks in the air, and we are considering whether we could use security data to provide more precise information to restaurant services about the quantity of meals needed at different times, for example. We have already identified other interesting observations,” Koskinen remarks.

Progress with consideration for staff

Koskinen emphasizes the importance of proceeding step by step with artificial intelligence (AI) to analyze use cases and consider staff perspectives. For example, concerns have arisen regarding the use of camera surveillance for unjust monitoring of employees.

“Open discussions are held with staff to determine where this new technology can be applied and who has access to the information,” Koskinen explains.

Koskinen emphasizes that it is important for security to evolve and that it requires active dialogue between space users and administrators.

The collaboration between Kela and Louhe is currently driven by a focus on security, and after the Louhe deployment, other opportunities for Kela will be evaluated. New development ideas are expected to come from both sides, both from within Kela and from Louhe. Additionally, through the community created by Louhe, new ideas for utilizing data in Kela’s operations can be brought forward.