eIDAS 2: the countdown to a single European Digital ID Wallet has begun

By 2024, all EU member states must make a Digital Identity Wallet available to every citizen who wants one.

This article outlines the aims and ambitions of this new cross-border EU Digital Identity Wallet (EUDI Wallet) and the benefits it will offer citizens, governments, and enterprises. We'll also explain the eIDAS 2 framework, where responsibility for developing the new wallet lies, and the roadmap ahead.

Let's dig in.
 

eIDAS 2 – realising the vision of a single Digital ID Wallet for Europe 

Many of us are already familiar with using our mobile phones as a convenient means of digital identification. What's more, the ubiquitous smartphone is an increasingly popular tool for proving that we are who we claim to be (the process known as authentication) in everyday tasks such as digital banking. On top of that, we also see more entitlements migrate to our handsets. These can include anything from an airline ticket to proof of our Covid vaccination status. 

It's a dramatic shift away from clumsy, time-consuming, and insecure paper-based techniques.

But across the EU, the development and adoption of an e-ID (electronic ID) accepted in all member states still has a long way to go.

Think about this.

That's not what a single market and equal rights for citizens should look like.

And it's precisely where the eIDAS 2 Regulation comes into play. With eIDAS 2, the EU Commission intends to make cross-border e-ID a reality. In a nutshell, by 2024, every EU member state must make a Digital Identity Wallet available to every citizen who wants one. 

For citizens, governments, and a myriad of different public and private sector service providers, the advent of eIDAS 2 and the EDIW will bring a mix of challenges and opportunities.

Let's dig deeper.

Catching up with a digital world

We need to start with a quick history lesson. In 2014, the original eIDAS Regulation was introduced.

In an increasingly digital world, the EU Commission wanted to ensure that citizens could access electronic services smoothly, securely, and efficiently, regardless of the European country they were in.

With the advent of eIDAS, the EU became the first global region with a legal framework for trusted digital transactions. Over the years, consistent authentication standards have been established, and much infrastructure has been built. 
 

So what is significant about eIDAS 2?

With eIDAS 2, the Commission intends to fully realise its vision of a universal, cross-border e-ID. 

In the words of Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, the goal is a : 

Building on the progress made by the original eIDAS, with eIDAS 2 the Commission is targeting improvement in four key areas:

• The coverage of e-ID schemes
• The acceptance of these schemes by member states
• The use of cross-border authentication
• The user experience of e-ID schemes and services 
   

Introducing the benefits of a Digital ID wallet

Before we explore the benefits of the new EUDI Wallet, let’s define what it is - and what it isn’t. 

Many of us already use an OEM wallet, such as those operated by Apple, Samsung, and Google, to store digital payment cards on our mobile phones.

As the name suggests, the EUDI Wallet will perform a similar role for a variety of different schemes, including not only ID but credentials such as driving licences, health records, and digital travel documents. 

Significantly, the EUDI Wallet is not likely to replace the ID documents (digital and physical) that EU citizens currently use but rather provide a convenient digital version of them. 

At the same time, it is far more than a convenient location on the handset for digital ID, attestations, and entitlements. 

Why’s that? 

The EUDI Wallet will be highly secure.

It will allow us to share only the personal attributes and data we need and want to share with third parties.

It will allow us to identify, authenticate and prove our entitlements. It will facilitate an ever-growing range of services and use cases in the years ahead.

Member countries will be free to pursue their own designs and functionality.

But every wallet will share some common features and be interoperable right across the EU. 

Specifically, the EUDI Wallet will:

• Be fully compliant with existing EU legal frameworks such as the GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) and Cyber Security Act. 
• Feature strong cryptography, offer the highest level of assurance, and meet specific requirements for preventing and managing security breaches.
• Enable selective disclosure of attributes (such as age). The user only needs to share the necessary information for a particular transaction. For example, if you use the wallet to prove your age, you do not need to share other personal details such as date of birth, name, or address. 
• Support a vast range of functions and use cases. The details are still being defined at the time of writing, but these are almost certain to include online identification and signatures. 

But there’s more.

It is not just citizens who stand to benefit from the wallet.

The pandemic has demonstrated the need for governments to digitalise their services even more clearly. In doing so, they can simultaneously improve convenience, security, and efficiency. 

The same applies to private enterprises. A secure, trusted, and EU-wide means of digital identification and authentication opens the door to a new era of seamless service access. Enterprises will be able to enhance the user experience while reducing bureaucracy and overheads.