Europe’s digital ID wallet — Easy for users or a data privacy nightmare?
On March 15, the European Parliament voted 418 to 103 (with 24 abstentions) in favor of negotiating a mandate for talks with the European Union member states about revising the new European Digital Identity (eID) framework and creating the “European Digital Identity Wallet,” also known as EUDI Wallet or EU wallet.
Citizen’s IDs, health cards, certificates and many other documents could soon be digitally stored in a smartphone application for EU citizens.
According to an official statement from the European Parliament, the system would allow citizens to identify and authenticate themselves online without relying on big commercial providers like Apple, Google, Amazon or Facebook.
The new eID framework will purportedly give EU citizens digital access to key public services across the EU. Citizens will remain in “full control of their data” and be able to “decide for themselves what information to share and with whom.”
European lawmakers have set an ambitious goal for this new wallet, aiming to bring it to 80% of the population by 2030. This could be achieved by mandating that the wallet be supported by e-government services and companies that have a legal requirement to identify their customers through Know Your Customer checks. It could require major online platforms like Google or Facebook to offer the EU wallet to log in to their services, with soft law and delegated acts that could require small and medium-sized enterprises to support the wallet.
Negotiations with the European Council on implementation would be the next step, but digital transformation and data protection experts have doubts and differing opinions about implementing the wallet.
The EU wallet — like the current electronic ID cards in Germany and other
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