Page 32 - ARUBA TODAY

A32 FEATURE
Saturday 29 december 2018

No more paperwork: Estonia edges toward digital government

By DANICA KIRKA Information and communi-
Associated Press cations accounted for 5.9
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — In percent of the economy
the Estonian capital of Tal- last year.
linn, three-day-old Oskar The government hopes to
Lunde sleeps soundly in his increase that figure with an
hospital cot, snuggled into “e-residency” program that
a lime green blanket deco- lets entrepreneurs around
rated with red butterflies. the world register their busi-
Across the room, his father nesses in Estonia and gain
turns on a laptop. a foothold in the European
“Now we will register our Union. More than 51,000
child,” Andrejs Lunde says people from 167 countries
with gravity as he inserts his have applied at a cost of
ID card into the card read- 100 euros ($114) each.
er. His wife, Olga, looks on The advances in digitiza-
proudly. tion are the result of long-
And just like that, Oskar is term thinking.
Estonia’s newest citizen. No When Estonia declared in-
paper. No fuss. dependence in 1991, the
This Baltic nation of 1.3 mil- economy was so back-
lion people is engaged in ward in this former Soviet
an ambitious project to republic it had to be rebuilt
make government admin- This photo taken on Thursday, Nov. 15 2018, shows an exhibition in Tallinn presenting Estonia’s from scratch. The leader-
istration completely digital digital achievements. ship looked for an industry
to reduce bureaucracy, Associated Press where the country could
increase transparency and zens while staying out of cure online voting systems ally have to have transpar- compete. They decided
boost economic growth. the way. in the United States, for ex- ency,” he said. “And that’s on information technology
As more countries shift their “In an ideal world, in the ample. why people have access to and the internet, a field
services online, Estonia’s case of an invisible govern- “It made sure that state ac- their own data. And that’s that was as new as Estonia,
experiment offers a glimpse ment, when a new child is countability is part of the why they can actually see said former President Too-
of how interacting with the born neither of the parents process,” he said. if the government has used mas Hendrik Ilves.
state might be for future would ever have to apply Estonians largely seem to their own data.” When the cash-strapped
generations. for anything: to get ma- have embraced the sys- The platform is underpinned country needed to re-
Need a prescription? It’s ternity leave, to get child tem despite global con- by software called X-Road, place a 1930s phone sys-
online. Need someone at support from the munici- cerns about data hacks. a decentralized data ex- tem, Finland offered a late
City Hall? No lines there — pality, to get a kindergar- At a demonstration show- change system that links 1970s analog system free
or even at the Department ten place, to put the name casing the digital system, databases. Outgoing data of charge. But Ilves argued
of Motor Vehicles! On the to the child,” he said. “All project manager Indrek is digitally signed and en- that the government should
school front, parents can of those different services Onnik stood beside a huge crypted, and all incoming decline the offer and invest
see whether their children’s would be delivered auto- screen illustrating his pro- data is authenticated and in digital technology.
homework was done on matically.” file. He showed off his high logged. “The only way we could
time. Siva Vaidhyanathan, direc- school grades from a de- The government, fearing do really well was to go
Estonia has created one tor of the Center for Media cade ago and his diving attempts to compromise digital,” Ilves said, speak-
platform that supports elec- and Citizenship at the Uni- license records. If he had a its borders by neighboring ing from Stanford University,
tronic authentication and versity of Virginia, says oth- dog, its vaccination record Russia, also has a backup where he is a distinguished
digital signatures to enable er countries have a lot to would appear there, too. plan to restore digital ser- visiting fellow at the Hoover
paperless communications learn. Estonia took time to Citizens can monitor their vices in the event of inva- Institution. “We stood a
across both the private and build security and privacy data and see if any gov- sion or severe cyberat- chance of competing
public sectors. into its model, in contrast ernment or private institu- tacks: data “embassies” in there.”
There are still a few things with failed efforts by private tion accesses it. countries like Luxembourg. Ilves, who grew up in the
that you can’t do elec- companies to provide se- “To generate trust, you re- Like a regular embassy, the United States and was in-
tronically in Estonia: marry, servers are considered Es- troduced to computers
divorce or transfer property tonian territory and would in junior high, proposed
— and that’s only because give the government a getting kids started early.
the government has decid- chance to boot up else- The government started
ed it was important to turn where if needed. building computer labs in
up in person for some big Making life simpler for citi- schools. Banks supported
life events. zens has economic ben- the move, as it reduced
This spring, government efits in a country otherwise the need for branches in
aims to go even further. known for unforgiving win- rural villages. More than 99
If Oskar had been born a ters and old growth forests. percent of Estonia’s bank-
few months later, he would The project, which began ing transactions now take
have been registered auto- in 1997, laid the ground- place online.
matically, with his parents work for Estonia’s boom- Whether Estonia’s system
receiving an email wel- ing tech sector. Skype, the can be used in larger coun-
coming him into the nation. video-calling service Mi- tries is an open question,
Marten Kaevats, Estonia’s crosoft bought for $8.5 bil- said Zvika Krieger, head
national digital adviser, In this photo taken on Friday, Nov. 16 2018 in Tallinn, Estonia, a lion in 2011, is Estonia’s most of technology policy and
says the goal is a govern- card shows all the details to register the birth of new baby Oskar famous high-tech export, partnerships at the World
ment that supports its citi- Lunde. but the impact is broader. Economic Forum.q
Associated Press