The citizen portals project: Making online communication more reliable and secure
E-mail has become a means of mass communication used both for private correspondence and for communicating with public authorities and businesses. But e-mail is not appropriate for sending confidential messages, or when one needs proof of delivery or that the message contents have not been altered. Starting in 2010, a new service called De-Mail ("De" as in Deutschland, or Germany) will make it possible to send messages and documents between registered users safely and without fear of manipulation.
What is De-Mail?
De-Mail providers will have to go through an official process of certification to demonstrate that they meet strict requirements for security and data protection. The De-Mail service will also offer secure document storage and user-friendly proof of identity. All De-Mail services will satisfy the high standards for communication between government agencies, business and individual users, making it possible to communicate securely with authentic clients of e-government and e-business, as one will always be able to identify who is behind a particular De-Mail address. This also helps avoid spam.
What makes De-Mail secure?
Before a De-Mail provider is approved, independent third parties check to ensure that it meets the strict security and data protection requirements; checks are continued at regular intervals after approval as well. Security standards are constantly being updated to keep up with the latest developments.
Secure registration procedures and connections (such as SSL, familiar from online banking) and encrypted, closed channels guarantee secure delivery and receipt of De-Mail. All information and messages that a user provides to a De-Mail service for transmission or storage are immediately encrypted by the De-Mail provider and assigned a hash value to prevent alteration.
To prove that a De-Mail message was sent and received, users can request confirmation, which comes with a qualified digital signature and thus serves as reliable confirmation.
What is the De-Safe?
De-Mail will make it possible to send and receive important messages and documents securely via the Internet. These messages and documents naturally will also have to be stored securely, without risk of manipulation over the long term. This is why the De-Mail project also provides for a document safe, where documents are stored in encrypted form, free from the risk of manipulation. By contrast, it is difficult to store documents safely on a home computer, because even USB sticks, CD-ROMs and the like do not protect against the risk of data loss over the long term.
What is De-Ident?
The citizen portals project will also provide an easy option for providing proof of identity. On request, the service provider will create a proof of identity for individual users, which they can then use to register at online shops or to prove they are over 18. This proof of identity contains only those data selected and released by the user; the content is given a qualified digital signature in order to confirm that the data transmitted are accurate.
Part of the High-Tech Strategy
The citizen portals project is part of the High-Tech Strategy for Germany, the programme E-Government 2.0 and the Federal Government’s 12-point plan to make Germany more responsive to public needs which was adopted by the Cabinet in 2007. The lead ministry for the project is the Federal Ministry of the Interior, which is working with a range of public and private organizations and businesses. The first pilot project is scheduled to begin in Friedrichshafen in 2009.
