Swiss Review 1/2021

Swiss Review / February 2021 / No.1 18 Politics EVEL INE RUTZ You can have six, sometimes eight characters, sometimesmore. A jumble of letters and numbers. If you spend a lot of time on the internet, you will doubtless have to enter countless passwords, not tomention other login data like your name, email address or customer number. It’s the same rigma- role for anyone who wants to pay on- line, although security procedures of- ten vary depending on the website. In 2019, parliament approved new legislation aimed at “clearing the pass- word jungle” and setting out clear rules. The Federal Act on Electronic Identification Services (E-ID Act), whichwill be put to voters on 7March 2021, establishes the basis for elec- tronic IDs. “We want to regulate the way people log in,” said Federal Coun- cillor Karin Keller-Sutter in parlia- ment, adding that people who use on- line services must be confident that statutory parameters are protecting them. What it certainly is not is a dig- ital passport. A way to conduct e-voting E-ID is designed to make it easier and more secure to carry out online trans- actions and use e-government appli- cations, preventing confusion and of- fering protection against hacker attacks. It incorporates three security levels. The highest of these, facial rec- ognition, would be used for sharing particularly sensitive data, e.g. health information or in relation to online tax statements or online voting. In- deed, e-voting could become fully dig- ital through e-ID. In other words, all official voting papers and access data would be available online. Authorities would no longer have to send PINs by post, as was the case during the previ- ous, now-aborted e-voting scheme. E-voting providers as well as voters would, in any event, be free to choose whether to make use of this govern- ment-approved identity scheme. Implementation of the scheme would see the public and private sec- tor work together. The government would check and register people’s identity and identifying characteris- tics. Private companies would issue e-IDs, as would cantonal and munici- pal authorities. Identity providers (IdP) would be responsible for cards, USB sticks and e-ID applications. An independent panel of experts, the Fed- eral E-IDCommittee (Eidcom), would approve and monitor IdPs. Better solutions from the private sector? By allocating responsibilities in this way, the Federal Council and a major- ity in parliament hope to ensure that e-services are workable and consum- er-friendly. They argue that the pri- vate sector has greater customer prox- imity and can respond more flexibly to advances in technology. Karin Keller-Sutter: “Experiences in other countries show that exclusively gov- Controversial alternative to the password jungle The Federal Council and parliament want to introduce an electronic identity (e-ID) scheme that would make it easier and more secure for us to use online services. But the plan is controversial. It will be put to the people on 7 March. Scratch the scratch card to see your PIN, then enter the code manually. You can say a lot of things about recent at- tempts to introduce e-voting to Switzerland, but completely digital is not one of them. A government-controlled electronic identity scheme would change this. Photo: Keystone