e-Identification and payment service for public authorities in Fi

Acronym of the case:

VETUMA

Web address of the case:

http://www.suomi.fi/vetuma

Country of the case:

Finland

Posting Date:

15 May 2007

Last Edited Date:

18 December 2009

Author:

Tapani Puisto (Ministry of Finance)

authentification | eIdentification | citizen certificates

Type of initiative

Project or service

Case Abstract

In Finland the main identification sources are citizen certificates placed on the electronic citizen card or on the sim card of the mobile phone and the banks offering their customers the user codes to be used in online banking. There was a need to create a common identification and payment service for those different methods. The VETUMA-service was built for the e-service providers who can make use of the common service whenever they need the user indentification or the payment service.

VETUMA offers a uniform interface for e-services of the government and the municipalities for citizenâ€™s identification with national eID cards, individual pin codes of Finnish e-banks and mobile identification in the services of two Finnish mobile operators. It offers a signing interface by national eID cards or by mobile. VETUMA can be used for citizenâ€™s payments in e-banks or by VISA and MasterCard credit cards. It gives access to Finnish Population Register. The service is owned by Ministry of Finance.

Description of the case

Domain

eGovernment

Topic

eIdentity and eSecurity | eParticipation, eDemocracy and eVoting | Services for Citizens

Sector

Crime, Justice and Law | Culture and Media | Education, Science and Research

Start date - End date

January 2006 (Ongoing)

Date operational

July 2006

Target Users

Administrative | Citizen

Target Users Description

The target group for the VETUMA service is public e-service providers, ministries, agencies and municipalities. The end users of VETUMA are Finnish citizens using e-identification or e-payment in e-services of the public administration in Finland.

Scope

National

Status

Operation

Language(s)

Finnish

Policy Context and Legal Framework

VETUMA service is included in the IT strategy of the Finnish government and is one of its leading projects. It was initiated in the Information Society Programme of the Finnish government. It is widely used in public services both in the state and municipal administration in Finland and had a visible impact in the Finnish eGovernment.

Project Size and Implementation

Type of initiative

IT infrastructures and products

Overall Implementation approach

Public administration

Technology choice

Standards-based technology | Not applicable/not available

Funding source

Public funding national

Project size

Implementation: €49-299,000

Yearly cost:

€49-299,000

Implementation and Management Approach

VETUMA service is managed by Ministry of Finance, in State IT-management unit. There is also a steering group with members from the government, municipalities and Fujitsu. It controls the service production and makes decisions how to develop the service. A follow-up group gathers information about the service and makes proposals to the steering group.

The main partners are:
- VETUMA service provider :Fujitsu Finland.
- All the biggest Finnish banks: Nordea, Sampo, OKO, Aktia, Handelsbanken, Tapiola, Ã…landsbanken.
- Population Register Centre.
- Mobile operators Sonera and Elisa.

Technology solution

VETUMA service includes e-identification by Finnish national eID cards, individual pin codes of the biggest e-banks in Finland and mobile identification of the two biggest Finnish mobile operator's services. It also offers a signing interface by national eID cards or by mobile certificate. VETUMA can be used for citizens payments in e-banks or VISA and Master-Card credit cards. It gives access to Finnish Population Register to fetch basic data of the citizen ready to forms.

Impact, innovation and results

Impact

VETUMA is provided as an ASP-service by Fujitsu Finland which means that the government has had no expenses for building the service. The only expenses for the government are the opening and transaction fees which the e-service providers are committed to pay but which are paid by the government during 2006 â€“ 2008. E-service providers using VETUMA in their services save their costs using uniform VETUMA interface instead of building and updating connections to different interfaces of e-banks, credit card companies, mobile operators etc. VETUMA is also taking care of data security using SSL-protocol in all data communications and customer specific MAC codes for each e-service provider using VETUMA. VETUMA service is just in the beginning of itâ€™s larger utilization and therefore the volumes at the moment are still quite low. Number of public organisations using VETUMA at the moment is about 35. The transaction amount in January 2008 was about 7000 and it seems to be growing significantly as new e-services are joining VETUMA. Almost all of the biggest cities in Finland like Helsinki, Vantaa, Turku, Tampere, Oulu, Espoo and JyvÃ¤skylÃ¤ are already using or beginning to use VETUMA service. In the central government the Finnish National Board of Education is using VETUMA and the Ministry of Justice will be using VETUMA in the near future. Also the University of Helsinki and Tampere University of Technology have joined the VETUMA service. Several other municipal and government organisations have plans to join the VETUMA service.

Innovation:
VETUMA is the first public e-identification and payment service in Finland that has been acquired co-operatively by open request for bids to be used by all public organisations. It also has large amount of different functions for e-identification and e-payment. It has a uniform interface for different e-identification and e-payment services. The government has made contracts with Fujitsu Services Finland, the biggest banks, the two biggest mobile operators and the Population Register Centre. The public e-service providers need only to join these contracts in order to use VETUMA service.

Track record of sharing

For all the parties interested in using the centrally built identification and payment service there are available ready made agreements for joining the common framework agreements with the service provider Fujitsu, the banks, the telephone operators and the Population Register Center.

Additionally there are common interface for the services connected to VETUMA and the common user interface for end-users, citizens. The approach is economic and resources are saved. Whenever new idenfications mechanisms will enter the market, they can be added centrally in one place with only small changes in individual customer services.

All the important information about VETUMA including the forms needed to join VETUMA contracts can be found on the internet address www.suomi.fi/vetuma

Lessons learnt

Lesson 1 - The framework contracts the government has made with Fujitsu, banks etc. help e-government service providers making their own contracts.

Lesson 2 - All the important information about the service, including the contract forms needed to join the service is available on the internet.

Lesson 3 - An ASP-service with invoicing based on opening and transaction fees can save expenses.

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practice e-Identification and payment service for public authorities in Fi