By mid-2023, a digital identity will be created and a new way by which Romanian citizens will be identified by digital recognition, Romania’s Minister of Research, Innovation and Digital Transformation Sebastian Burduja told the 15th meeting of the EUROSAI IT Working Group on Tuesday, according to Agerpres.

„There is a need for a digital identity for every citizen to offer digital public services. Because otherwise the state cannot guarantee that I am really the person requesting a certain service. So by the middle of next year, we will have a digital identity and a new way to identify citizens by digital recognition,” said Burduja.

He said that the technology to be used is state-of-the-art and that there are other countries that have experienced every step of the process, but Romania will move straight to facial recognition technology.

Also, by the end of 2023, Romanians will be able to register their vehicles in an electronic format and thus they will no longer have to go to different offices, which will save them time, the minister said.

The second major project is the government cloud, a massive investment of approximately 600 million euros, to be carried out under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR). Burduja said that most of the central administration will be transferred to the cloud, „a safe place for citizens’ data.”

One of the features included in the adopted legislative framework that governs the cloud consists in a mention in the law of the fact that when the state accesses citizens’ data, the citizens involved will be notified in real time. They will find out who accesses their data, when and for what reason, and the legal basis for that access.

Burduja added that the law on interoperability changes the paradigm and tells the state bodies that „they are not the owners of the data, but the citizens are,” and they have to transfer such data to other government bodies.

The third major component is the National Coalition for Digital Skills. Burduja said that in Romania 80% of households have access to the Internet, 13 million Romanians use the Internet every day, but 10 million do not have basic digital skills. He explained that 10 million may use the Internet for entertainment or other purposes, but it is not „a productivity tool.”

He also said that 100 million euros worth of European funds will be used to create a national artificial intelligence hub that will bring together Romanian AI specialists from the country and abroad for advanced IA research, which results will be transferred to technology.

Agerpres