EU Digital Wallet

General
1

New thread :slight_smile:

With software, the EU is on a loser's trail. With a ratio of, probably,
99% lawyers and political scientists and 1% engineers working at the EU
commission (*) the result cannot be different.

To be fair to the EU, they actually do invest in projects and consortia,
which are expected to get the technical job done. How much and is it
enough? I'm not sure.
This podcast for example gives a glimpse of the work that is going on in
the field of digital identity:

eIDAS 2.0 & the EU Digital Identity Wallet (Part 2)

The digital wallet is a major joke. A solution for a non-existant problem.
I know that my statements are strong, so I'll put some meat on the bones.

Take first a look at this:

European Digital Identity - European Commission

This is false advertising. Everything they claim to do with the DW can be
done without it.

Dear Gianguido!

With all due respect, I disagree with you about the DW.
Thanks for the link above. I find it a bit surprising that the EU had such
a clear vision 4-5 years ago (when that strategy was compiled).

The digital wallet would not change anything.

Even worse is the example in the drawing. A smiling youngster who, thanks
to his smartphone, gets a bank loan.

The essential point in getting bank loans is to be clean and creditworthy.
Have a job, possibly a house, and so on. Otherwise you forget about the
loan. The most important step is the verification by credit assessment
companies, in Italy CRIF, in Germany Schufa and so on. If they disagree,
again, no loan will ever be granted.

A digital wallet alone is not sufficient.

The digital wallet is a way for the EU Commission to make believe that
they are serious about digital matters, when they are not.

I agree that at first sight that page/document may seem like a propaganda,
with promises that are too good to be true, but it is actually based on
real concepts, technology, standards, tools etc. that are being actively
developed worldwide. The key concept is Decentralized Identity (or
Self-Sovereign Identity). Then there are Verifiable Credentials (which are
a W3C standard), and many other standards and technologies that are
combined together. A digital wallet is an important piece of this picture,
maybe the most important one, since it is the interface between the users
and the rest of the system.

It is difficult for me to explain SSI in a short message. I can't also say
"trust me that it is a serious thing", because who am I that you should
take my word for it. But there are serious organizations working on it
right now, for example ToIP (Trust over IP):

Back to the wonderful digital wallet, I use PDF scans of my documents and

that's it. If necessary, I can sign them digitally with my ID card. The
newest documents, from the national population register, are already
digital and signed. Nothing more is required. No digital wallet, for sure.

In fact, as a EU citizen I would support an immediate stop to this way of
throwing away public money. First, they should make eIDAS work, then we can
see further.

My understanding is that eIDAS 2.0 (including the digital wallet) is an
improvement over eIDAS 1.0, which is intended to make it more interoperable
and easier to use.
Will they be able to make the DW work by the end of 2024? Maybe not, but it
seems like they are working in the right direction.

By the way, this is an innovative work and they (the EU) are directly on a
competition race with Apple (and maybe other big companies) that are trying
to develop such digital wallets.
I don't want to inflict any pains on you, but to my limited knowledge,
Russia is far behind in this race :slight_smile:

Dashamir

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2

Dear Dashamir!

Thank you for your reply. Don't worry, I believe everything that you
write.

My point is a different one.

What is all this matter for? What practical problems shall the DW
solve, that cannot be solved otherwise today? Is the cost ever repaid?

Most of the talk on the DW is concentrated on the technology, not on
practical applications. And most of all, not on the changes in
administration, organisation, IT outside the wallet but that are
necessary for the wallet to work.

After ca. 45 professional years, most of which also in IT, my
conclusion is simple. Simple ideas and concepts work, complicated ones
don't.

Simple ideas do not even need to be implemented with IT.

The standard machine-readable passport format is a huge improvement
over the previous ones. Nobody made much noise about it, just one
concept, one standard and it works worldwide. The EU was NOT involved
in its design.

On the contrary, the EU left free hands in the definition of national
eID documents, so that they are not mutually compatible. I have three
IDs (Italy, Germany, Estonia) with three readers, three software, three
procedures... Europe at its best!

The IBAN banking code is a EU standard. It works because it's simple,
everybody understands it. The worst thing that can happen with it is to
write an IBAN code manually in a form. But most of the time it's done
automatically with copy and paste. A smartphone would actually make
life more complicated, if one works on a desktop.

Concerning Russia, you are not inflicting any pain with your comment.
They are behind in this race, and it's good so. They have a digital
administration system working much better than Italy's, and much much
better than Germany's. They don't need to change it. It began in 2010.
Russia doesn't even have eID because you can login online with
user/password or with help of an app. They kept it simple. Banking
access and Government ID are mutually compatible. Russia has also its
internal credit card payment system, which the EU doesn't have.

Finally, for all things that are part of normal life for an European/
Italian such as, in my case, taxation, social security, health and so
on there is some support online, but most stuff is still done on paper
or PDF documents. A DW does not help the fact that the number of
doctors is decreasing and it is more and more difficult to go for a
visit. In the partially automated online health documentation service
all my documents are called "report". They didn't even put in the doc
name, is it the last blood test or the eyesight control? As long as
idiots are in charge of such procedures and do not figure out down-to-
earth application details no DW will ever help improve the service.

My conclusion is simple. The DW is the new trend, everybody is jumping
on the wagon. Who cares about its practical utility?

Gianguido

P.S. I'd like to make another example about the absurdity of the New
Digital Europe. 40 years ago there was Interrail. A small booklet with
the owner's name on it, written by pen. With it during one month you
could just board any train anywhere in Europe, without limits. Some
yougsters traveled all the way from Morocco to Finland over Irland and
Hungary, others concentrated on one or two countries. It doesn't
matter, it worked.

With the first privatizations of rail service Interrail was dropped.

Now it has been reintroduced again. It's an app where you must choose
some days within a certain period, some countries but not others, some
trains but not others. The concept has become much more complicated and
the sense of freedom is gone. No app, no boarding on the train.

Most likely, the energy expenditure for running the apps, the servers,
the comlinks etc. is also higher than for the production of a small
booklet of low-quality, recycled paper.

Please, give me the old booklet back!!!

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3

What is all this matter for? What practical problems shall the DW solve,
that cannot be solved otherwise today? Is the cost ever repaid?

DW is only one part of the solution. If everything works right, then:
- usernames and passwords will become obsolete
- people will not need "Facebook Login" and "Google Login" to identify
themselves
- people will have better privacy and control over their data
- paper documents will become obsolete (finally, after so many years of
living in a pseudo-digital era)
- etc. (I cannot list all of them, but it seems like there will be a
fundamental change)

I am not sure about the costs, but using digital documents (or verifiable
credentials, as they are called) should be cheaper than using paper
documents.

Most of the talk on the DW is concentrated on the technology, not on

practical applications. And most of all, not on the changes in
administration, organisation, IT outside the wallet but that are necessary
for the wallet to work.

DW is part of the technical solution. The ToIP foundation discusses also
the so called "governance" issues. They have a clear idea that the trust
problem on the Internet cannot be solved only by technical means.

After ca. 45 professional years, most of which also in IT, my conclusion is

simple. Simple ideas and concepts work, complicated ones don't.

Simple ideas do not even need to be implemented with IT.

I cannot refute this, but there is also the saying: "Make things as simple
as possible, but not simpler."

The standard machine-readable passport format is a huge improvement over

the previous ones. Nobody made much noise about it, just one concept, one
standard and it works worldwide. The EU was NOT involved in its design.

On the contrary, the EU left free hands in the definition of national eID
documents, so that they are not mutually compatible. I have three IDs
(Italy, Germany, Estonia) with three readers, three software, three
procedures... Europe at its best!

My understanding is that The EU Digital Wallet (as part of eIDAS 2.0) is
supposed to be the remedy for this lack of interoperability. (Maybe we can
add this to the list of the benefits above.)

The IBAN banking code is a EU standard. It works because it's simple,

everybody understands it. The worst thing that can happen with it is to
write an IBAN code manually in a form. But most of the time it's done
automatically with copy and paste. A smartphone would actually make life
more complicated, if one works on a desktop.

A DW is supposed to work on a desktop as well, not only on a smartphone.
So, if one does not want to use a smartphone, they can still use a digital
wallet.

Concerning Russia, you are not inflicting any pain with your comment. They

are behind in this race, and it's good so. They have a digital
administration system working much better than Italy's, and much much
better than Germany's. They don't need to change it. It began in 2010.
Russia doesn't even have eID because you can login online with
user/password or with help of an app. They kept it simple. Banking access
and Government ID are mutually compatible. Russia has also its internal
credit card payment system, which the EU doesn't have.

Finally, for all things that are part of normal life for an European/
Italian such as, in my case, taxation, social security, health and so on
there is some support online, but most stuff is still done on paper or PDF
documents. A DW does not help the fact that the number of doctors is
decreasing and it is more and more difficult to go for a visit. In the
partially automated online health documentation service all my documents
are called "report". They didn't even put in the doc name, is it the last
blood test or the eyesight control? As long as idiots are in charge of such
procedures and do not figure out down-to-earth application details no DW
will ever help improve the service.

You are fed up with the EU, I am fed up with Albania and its government,
Americans are fed up with the US, (Russians maybe are happy with Putin, I
don't know). We can't blame DW for this.

My conclusion is simple. The DW is the new trend, everybody is jumping on

the wagon. Who cares about its practical utility?

This could be true, but I hope it is not.

Dashamir

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4

Dear Dashamir!

In order not to overload the com channel and the patience of all
participants to the Forums in Trento and Bolzano, why don't we organize
a public debate? Open to everybody? Organizers could be linuxtrent and
Lugbz, it is possible to rent space for the public presentation. Maybe
even for free. In Bolzano there is a suitable space in the Rathaus.
Otherwise Walthershaus also organizes public information events. If
they charge anything, costs are quite low anyway.

Allow me to counter-comment your comments, then you may counter-
counter-comment and so on.

- usernames and passwords will become obsolete

this is exactly what we were told with the introduction of eID and
SPID, and now we discover that it's not true??

- people will not need "Facebook Login" and "Google Login" to identify
themselves

fine with me, I never used them

- people will have better privacy and control over their data

what does "better" mean? In comparison to what? Does it mean that eID,
SPID and GDPR were for the cat? (expression freely overtaken from
German)

Personal data control is also an interesting argument when more than
half the population is on Facebook. According to this article a new
trend is to make a shot of a boarding pass and post it on Facebook, so
that everybody can see where are you traveling to. But from the
boarding pass can be extracted much personal information, including
email and contact phone from the QR-code, which is of interest for
criminals. Do we need "better" protection when a large share of the
population behaves like this?

- paper documents will become obsolete (finally, after so many years of
living in a pseudo-digital era)

the real technological change was the invention of PDF. It is possible
to keep everything needed in PDF. But, for example, 80-90% of the times
I need to contact the Public Administration, in its different forms,
they ask for paper. Which they then scan into PDFs, of course. It's
called "job security".

- My understanding is that The EU Digital Wallet (as part of eIDAS 2.0)
is supposed to be the remedy for this lack of interoperability. (Maybe
we can add this to the list of the benefits above.)

The EU should analyze well what has gone wrong with eIDAS 1.0 and try
to fix it before embarking on a new, and costlier, adventure

Personal addition

Before embarking on the super-hype-extra technological path we should
make zero-cost decisions, with a large impact. A practical example
follows.

I have traveled quite extensively around the world, mainly Asia. A
clean passport is an absolute must, otherwise you run in trouble at
border points. In several countries it is necessary to have a notarized
local translation of a passport, which of course takes time to do,
costs money etc.

An EU passport contains its information in all the EU official
languages. Of these, only four are also used outside the EU: English,
French, Spanish, Portuguese. All remaining languages are absolutely
useless in a passport, because they are not spoken outside the EU and
passports are not necessary within the EU. But they must be placed
there anyway, so the fonts become absolutely unreadable.

I will believe in the EU when EU passports will be printed in the UN
official languages, that is, including Russian, Chinese and Arabic and
excluding all useless languages, for the sake of space and rationality.
The UN languages are the important ones worldwide, not Latvian or
Maltese. A document to be received at least on demand, for people
traveling to China or through the Arab world. How much do they care
about Gaelic in the Sahel, for example?

Such a reform would be at ZERO cost and have an enormous positive
impact on the lives of real travelers.

This European bureaucratic absurdity leads to (not always) funny
paradoxes.

- In a country, Italy, that is already so advanced with the DW, the
waiting line for a new regular passport now takes one year. In Milan,
reported yesterday on the Corriere. It's not because of the many
languages in the booklet, I know, but the workflow at the Questura.

- I one met an Englishman in Russia who went through an absurd torture.
If you live there you must have a notarized translation of your
passport to be able to show to the police. This guy, at that time with
an EU passport, had an argument with the police and they asked him to
get a notarized translation of the full passport, including Estonian
and Slovenian. Which means a couple dozens identical documents (in
Russian), but obscene costs and difficulties to find the official
translators.

Had the passport been written also in Russian instead of Lithuanian,
the problem would have not occurred.

THIS is the world we live in. Did passport designers ever cross an
uncomfortable border, not Belgium-Holland but Niger-Chad or Uganda-
Kenya, for example? We have overpaid consultants who never boarded a
train and design all the QR-code based ticketing system. Other overpaid
consultants in the health department who give us only half-functional
access to our data. In South Tyrol there are different, mutually
incompatible medical data systems so that the data exchange takes place
- manually. Even the public transport card systems are entirely
different in Trentino and South Tyrol, not to mention the rest of Italy
(in the regions where they do have an integrated system, to start
with). And we hope that the DW will ever work?

Google, Apple and consultants such as Deloitte and PWC will make lots
of money out of DW. This is also one of the reasons behind the
intensive advertising of the last months. EU taxpayers will get little
value for money, if anything at all.

Gianguido

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5

In order not to overload the com channel and the patience of all
participants to the Forums in Trento and Bolzano, why don't we organize a
public debate? Open to everybody? Organizers could be linuxtrent and Lugbz,
it is possible to rent space for the public presentation. Maybe even for
free. In Bolzano there is a suitable space in the Rathaus. Otherwise
Walthershaus also organizes public information events. If they charge
anything, costs are quite low anyway.

You are right, we are overloading (and mabe abusing a bit) the mailing
lists. So, I agree to stop this discussion.
It is not easy for me to participate in the public debate that you propose
because I don't live in Italy.
Even if it was easy, I wouldn't dare to be your opponent, because I am sure
that you can win any kind of debate against me. You are well versed and
eloquent, and I am not. I can't speak Italian and I can barely speak
English (my English is unbearable, I can write decent English only thanks
to autocorrect tools and translation tools).
So, in short, I am almost certain that I would lose the debate badly, and
as a matter of fact I also don't have any incentives for winning it (for
example I don't represent the EU or something like this).
For the time being let's just be friends and let's agree to disagree.

Personal addition

Before embarking on the super-hype-extra technological path we should make
zero-cost decisions, with a large impact. A practical example follows.

I have traveled quite extensively around the world, mainly Asia. A clean
passport is an absolute must, otherwise you run in trouble at border
points. In several countries it is necessary to have a notarized local
translation of a passport, which of course takes time to do, costs money
etc.

An EU passport contains its information in all the EU official languages.
Of these, only four are also used outside the EU: English, French, Spanish,
Portuguese. All remaining languages are absolutely useless in a passport,
because they are not spoken outside the EU and passports are not necessary
within the EU. But they must be placed there anyway, so the fonts become
absolutely unreadable.

I will believe in the EU when EU passports will be printed in the UN
official languages, that is, including Russian, Chinese and Arabic and
excluding all useless languages, for the sake of space and rationality. The
UN languages are the important ones worldwide, not Latvian or Maltese. A
document to be received at least on demand, for people traveling to China
or through the Arab world. How much do they care about Gaelic in the Sahel,
for example?

Such a reform would be at ZERO cost and have an enormous positive impact
on the lives of real travelers.

This European bureaucratic absurdity leads to (not always) funny paradoxes.

- In a country, Italy, that is already so advanced with the DW, the
waiting line for a new regular passport now takes one year. In Milan,
reported yesterday on the Corriere. It's not because of the many languages
in the booklet, I know, but the workflow at the Questura.

- I one met an Englishman in Russia who went through an absurd torture. If
you live there you must have a notarized translation of your passport to be
able to show to the police. This guy, at that time with an EU passport, had
an argument with the police and they asked him to get a notarized
translation of the full passport, including Estonian and Slovenian. Which
means a couple dozens identical documents (in Russian), but obscene costs
and difficulties to find the official translators.

Had the passport been written also in Russian instead of Lithuanian, the
problem would have not occurred.

THIS is the world we live in. Did passport designers ever cross an
uncomfortable border, not Belgium-Holland but Niger-Chad or Uganda-Kenya,
for example? We have overpaid consultants who never boarded a train and
design all the QR-code based ticketing system. Other overpaid consultants
in the health department who give us only half-functional access to our
data. In South Tyrol there are different, mutually incompatible medical
data systems so that the data exchange takes place - manually. Even the
public transport card systems are entirely different in Trentino and South
Tyrol, not to mention the rest of Italy (in the regions where they do have
an integrated system, to start with). And we hope that the DW will ever
work?

You are so good at presenting such real-life examples. And maybe you are
also right about the "European bureaucratic absurdity" and "overpaid
consultants" (I cannot confirm or deny it due to my lack of experience). I
can only say that I have similar complaints about the governmental IT
solutions in Albania.
My opinion is that if the DW has any chances of improving things, we should
fight to make it work, instead of just hoping that it will work.

Best regards,
Dashamir

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6

> In order not to overload the com channel and the patience of all
> participants to the Forums in Trento and Bolzano, why don't we
> organize a public debate? Open to everybody? Organizers could be
> linuxtrent and Lugbz, it is possible to rent space for the public
> presentation. Maybe even for free. In Bolzano there is a suitable
> space in the Rathaus. Otherwise Walthershaus also organizes public
> information events. If they charge anything, costs are quite low
> anyway.

You are right, we are overloading (and mabe abusing a bit) the
mailing lists. So, I agree to stop this discussion.
For the time being let's just be friends and let's agree to disagree.
And maybe you are also right about the "European bureaucratic
absurdity" and "overpaid consultants" (I cannot confirm or deny it
due to my lack of experience). I can only say that I have similar
complaints about the governmental IT solutions in Albania.

Under this aspect, Albania is probably on the right path to join the
EU.

My opinion is that if the DW has any chances of improving things, we
should fight to make it work, instead of just hoping that it will
work.

Best regards,
Dashamir

Thank you, Dashamir, and of course there isn't anything personal here.
In any case, with or without tools your English is excellent.

In the debate, in fact, if it takes place somebody should be invited
who represents the EU or an institution that is pushing for the DW. But
before that we need to have an internal workshop in Trento and Bolzano
about digital IDs.

Best,
Gianguido

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7

hi dashamir and hi gianguido ! (traduzione deepl segue)

thank you very much for your engagement in debate !!

In your exchange of views, IMHO, emerged implicitly two different
approaches:

-- Dashamir expresses the hope, that Society and Poltics in Europe will
be able to find answers in defending the right of privacy and
data-sovereignity of citizens building a roadmap towards democratic
digitalization

-- Gianguido expresses the request of not overloading daily life with
profit-oriented digitalization, based on his vast personal experience
(/not being ///a "technical digital-wizard"/ , as he explained at the
assembly LUGBZ before being elected board-member /) -

That is how i felt while reading your contributions

i must say i like very much dashamir when he says:

/*For the time being let's just be friends and let's agree to disagree.*/

Finally: i would like very much to have your opinion - *perhaps in
occasion of SFSCon 2023* - on a very spicy topic described in this
statement as the 18th SDG
(

)

greetings
anton
--------------deepl-translation follows---------
ciao dashamir e ciao gianguido!

grazie mille per il vostro impegno nel dibattito!!!

Nel vostro scambio di opinioni, IMHO, sono emersi implicitamente due
approcci diversi:

-- Dashamir esprime la speranza che la societĂ  e la politica in Europa
siano in grado di trovare risposte nella difesa del diritto alla privacy
e alla sovranitĂ  dei dati dei cittadini costruendo una roadmap verso la
digitalizzazione democratica

-- Gianguido esprime la richiesta di non sovraccaricare la vita
quotidiana con una digitalizzazione orientata al profitto, sulla base
della sua vasta esperienza personale (non essendo un tecnico digitale
professionista - come ha detto alllĂĄssemblea LUGBZ prima di essere
eletto nel nuovo direttivo ).

È quello che ho provato leggendo i vostri contributi

Devo dire che mi piace molto dashamir quando dice:

*Per il momento restiamo amici e accettiamo di non essere d'accordo.*

Infine: mi piacerebbe molto avere la vostra opinione - *forse in
occasione del SFScon2023* - su un argomento molto scottante descritto in
questa dichiarazione come il 18° SDG
(

)

saluti
anton

Tradotto con www.DeepL.com/Translator (versione gratuita)

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