Grussbotschaft von Bundesrat Beat Jans zur Digital Identity unConference Europe (DICE)
Nur die englische Version ist verfügbar.
Zurich, June 18, 2024, the spoken word prevails
Good morning Ms. Kaliya Young and Mr. Säuberli, thank you for your warm introduction.
Ladies and Gentlemen
I was told that this audience is packed with e-ID-experts from all over the world, who are not only here to patiently listen to me and others, but to actually work on pressing issues in the context of decentralized identities by applying the open space technology, under the guidance of Heidi Nobantu and Kaliya Young. I am truly humbled by your commitment and would like to thank you for your dedication.
I was also told that this is the second edition of the Zurich unConference, in the long tradition of the Internet Identity Workshops from California. It is an honor for Switzerland to host this event again and I wish this initiative all the success, also in Asia and Africa.
I was correctly introduced to you as the head of the Federal Department for Justice and Police. But today, I am speaking above all as the sponsor of Switzerland’s e-ID project. Our project is a joint effort that involves people from different ministries and offices. I would like to acknowledge and thank:
• The Federal Chancellery
• The Federal Department of Finance and its offices
• Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications and its offices as well as
• The Digital Public Services Switzerland
These are my partners who share the vision of a digital identity for Switzerland and work hard to make it come true. But that is not the full picture: you are all my partners as well – many of you support the e-ID-project since years, be it as an expert or as a critical voice. Thank you for your engagement!
Decision on technology
Let me address the elephant in the room right away: The decision on technology.
As you may know, Switzerland does not yet have a legal basis for an electronic identity. The first law has been rejected in 2021via a referendum at the ballot. A new version is in deliberation in the parliament. As a matter of fact, the National Council has already approved it and it is now debated in the Council of States.
The law defines the main functionalities of the e-ID and the architecture of the required trust infrastructure. However, it does not prescribe specific DID-methods, VC-formats, cryptography or communication protocols. The law is – as we like to call it – neutral towards technologies.
From a lawmaking point of view, this abstract approach makes a lot of sense, since the law will not need to be adapted because of incremental technological progress. But for you, the people who actually code the whole thing, the law alone is not very helpful. You need specific requirements.
As you probably know better than I, there is more than one way how to implement an e-ID. To identify the technology that fits best the needs of the users, we have conducted an informal consultation. It ended on January 22 of this year. The delay for this consultation was rather short and it was promised that a decision on the technology would be communicated during the first quarter.
We received 97 opinions, quite a few from persons and organizations present today. I would like to thank you for your contributions. Until last week, we have not made any public announcement in that regard. The e-ID-team told me that some of you were getting rather impatient. We fully understand that. Considering the fact, that we plan to launch the e-ID in 2026, there is not much time left.
Last week, the Federal Council has taken note of the results from the aforementioned consultation and I have informed my colleagues on how we plan to move forward in terms of technical implementation. But, let me be clear: a decision has not been taken yet.
While I understand the frustration, that some of you might feel, I would like to ask you for some comprehension of our task as well. Ideally, the decision would have been taken a long time ago. But things are complicated:
• The government has to spend the taxpayer’s money carefully, and rightly so. Due to technological considerations, the e-ID might get more expensive than outlined in the dispatch from last November. Now, «more expensive» is not precise enough. We need reliable figures to evaluate and prioritize the different options.
• As mentioned, there is more than one way on how to implement an e-ID. And new approaches keep popping up. The field of verifiable credentials is young and dynamic. Let me illustrate this with two examples:
• eIDAS 2.0 (the e-ID-law of the EU) has been published recently. However, the implementing acts – the fine print – are not yet available and give ground for quite some speculation.
• Technical innovations such as the concept of parallel signatures, allowing issuers to combine conventional as well as privacy preserving cryptography, are attractive in theory. On the other hand, the maturity of these concepts needs to be assessed more thoroughly.
For these reasons, we are not yet ready to decide on the initial implementation of the e-ID and its trust infrastructure. We take this decision seriously and need more time.
However, a few things seem obvious to me:
Due to the fact, that there is no single technology that satisfies all needs, I assume that our trust infrastructure must accommodate in parallel more than one technology. This provides in particular two advantages:
• The issuer can select from different technologies, depending on the use-case,
• In the future, additional technologies can be integrated into the trust infrastructure more easily. This provides a certain protection of our – substantial – investments.
But obviously, such a multi-stack approach might increase the costs – at least in the short run. In the long run – that is my conviction – multi-stack will actually be more cost-effective than implementing now one technology which might get obsolete rather soon. As next step, we will do an in-depth-analysis of the costs that such a multi-stack-approach would produce. Simultaneously, we will continue our technical investigations.
Before the end of this year, I plan to propose to the Federal Council the initial technical implementation of the e-ID and its trust infrastructure.
Holder binding
As mentioned, the National Council has already approved the e-ID-law. It added to the law the requirement, that during issuance, the e-ID has to be bound to the holder. We deem this appropriate, as it allows us to make the e-ID more secure. We plan to implement the holder binding twofold:
Firstly, the e-ID will be issued only to smartphones with a crypto processor. This is the most feasible way to ensure this legally required binding on a technical level. From an equality point of view, this is unfortunate, as most probably persons with less resources are more likely to use smartphones that we have to exclude. However, it is a trade-off that we have to make.
This not satisfactory measure will be accompanied by an effort to make smartphones in general more trustworthy. For obvious reasons, this is task that Switzerland cannot tackle on its own, vis-à-vis Apple, Samsung etc. For that reason, we have joined forces with the OpenWallet Foundation, which is part of the Linux Foundation. My colleague, Federal Counselor Albert Rösti has announced, only a few days ago at the World Summit on Information Society, that in addition to the OpenWallet Foundation, a OpenWallet Forum shall be created. This Forum shall be hosted by the International Telecommunications Union and allow a multilateral approach to issues such as the regulation of crypto-processors. From a digital sovereignty point of view, it is clear: all smartphones need to be equipped with a crypto-processor and these crypto-processors need to become open hardware. I know that this will not happen overnight, but we have to start working on this, otherwise, our credibility will fade.
My second point on holder binding refers to the wallet: In order to ensure that the binding to the crypto-processors is done in a correct manner, we will, at least at the beginning, allow the e-ID to be issued and held only in the wallet that will be provided by us, the Confederation.
I am aware of the fact that announcement to the contrary have been made in the past. However, again to ensure wide-spread trust in the e-ID we have to impose this restriction.
Let me add two clarifications in that context:
• This restriction will not affect our open-source strategy. The wallet will be open sourced.
• It is only the e-ID, that has to be held in the wallet provided by the Federal government. Third-party wallets can hold other verifiable credentials.
Those of you who know the current version of the e-ID-law know, that these two restrictions are not yet reflected in the law. It is my plan to introduce them via the commission of legal affairs of the State Council.
Electronic provisional driver’s license ePDL (eLFA)
Before concluding, I would like to share a success story with you. About two months ago, in one of the smallest cantons of Switzerland – Appenzell Ausserrhoden – we started a pilot project. In collaboration with the Federal and the Cantonal Roads Offices, we started to issue the electronic provisional driving license as a verifiable credential.
People who are learning to drive and have passed their theory test can now obtain their provisional driving license not only on paper, but also electronically. With this project, we have for the first time the opportunity to test in the «wild» concepts and technologies that will later be used for the e-ID.
This pilot project can already be considered a success. Soon 1000 credentials will be issued. There are hardly any support cases.
This does not mean that everything is perfect: we still need to improve our communication. However, based on these real-life experiences, we will be able to improve the e-ID before it even exists.
Conclusion
Before closing, I would like to thank the all the people and institutions – in particular Trust Square and the sponsors – for making this event possible. We appreciate your initiative.
I also would like to pay tribute to DIDAS, the Digital Identity and Data Sovereignty Association. Its president, its working groups and many of its individual members are since quite some time working whole heartly on establishing an ecosystem of verifiable credentials in Switzerland and beyond.
Thank you for all your efforts.
With this, I declare the Digital Identity unConference Europe officially opened. I hope that this event will provide you with insights and inspiration for your own e-ID projects. I also hope that it will foster fruitful dialogue among all participants. I wish you all a productive and enjoyable experience here in Zurich.
Thank you for your attention.