In 2023, a proposed change to the law would allow any EU government to perform man-in-the-middle attacks and spy on all internet messages, including encrypted communications.[3] The proposal was condemned by groups of cyber security researchers, NGOs, and civil society, as a threat to human rights, privacy, and dignity.[4][5][6]
Description
eIDAS oversees electronic identification and trust services for electronic transactions in the European Union's internal market. It regulates electronic signatures, electronic transactions, involved bodies, and their embedding processes to provide a safe way for users to conduct business online like electronic funds transfer or transactions with public services. Both the signatory and the recipient can have more convenience and security. Instead of relying on traditional methods, such as mail or facsimile, or appearing in person to submit paper-based documents, they may now perform transactions across borders, like "1-Click" technology.[2][7]
The regulation came into effect in July 2015, as a means to facilitate secure and seamless electronic transactions within the European Union. Member states are required to recognise electronic signatures that meet the standards of eIDAS.[2][9]
Timeline
The law was established in EU Regulation 910/2014 of 23 July 2014 on electronic identification and repealed 1999/93/EC from 13 December 1999.[1][2]
It entered into force on 17 September 2014 and applies from 1 July 2016 except for certain articles, which are listed in its Article 52.[10] All organizations delivering public digital services in an EU member state must recognize electronic identification from all EU member states from September 29, 2018. It applied to all countries in the European Single Market.[11][12]
Vision
eIDAS is a result of the European Commission's focus on Europe's Digital Agenda. With the commission's oversight, eIDAS was implemented to spur digital growth within the EU.[13]
The intent of eIDAS is to drive innovation. By adhering to the guidelines set for technology under eIDAS, organisations are pushed towards using higher levels of information security and innovation. Additionally, eIDAS focuses on the following:[9][14]
Interoperability: Member states are required to create a common framework that will recognize eIDs from other member states and ensure its authenticity and security. That makes it easy for users to conduct business across borders.
Transparency: eIDAS provides a clear and accessible list of trusted services that may be used within the centralised signing framework. That allows security stakeholders the ability to engage in dialogue about the best technologies and tools for securing digital signatures.
Regulated aspects in electronic transactions
The Regulation provides the regulatory environment for the following important aspects related to electronic transactions:[2]
Digital identity: a European-wide framework (European Digital Identity Wallet, EDIW)[15] for digital authentication of citizens, with legal validity. Nine principles of European digital identity have been defined:[16] user choice, privacy, Interoperability and security, trust, convenience, user consent and control proportionality, counterpart knowledge and global scalability.
Advanced electronic signature (AdES): An electronic signature is considered advanced if it meets certain requirements:
It provides unique identifying information that links it to its signatory.
The signatory has sole control of the data used to create the electronic signature.
It must be capable of identifying if the data accompanying the message has been tampered with after being signed. If the signed data has changed, the signature is marked invalid.
There is a certificate for electronic signature, electronic proof that confirms the identity of the signatory and links the electronic signature validation data to that person.
Qualified digital certificate for electronic signature, a certificate that attests to a qualified electronic signature's authenticity that has been issued by a qualified trust service provider.
The eIDAS Regulation evolved from Directive 1999/93/EC, which set a goal that EU member states were expected to achieve in regards to electronic signing. Smaller European countries were among the first to start adopting digital signatures and identification, for example the first Estonian digital signature was given in 2002 and the first Latvian digital signature was given in 2006. Their experience has been used to develop a now EU-wide regulation, that became binding as law throughout the EU since the first of July, 2016.[18] Directive 1999/93/EC made EU member states responsible for creating laws that would allow them to meet the goal of creating an electronic signing system within the EU. The directive also allowed each member state to interpret the law and impose restrictions, thus preventing real interoperability, and leading toward a fragmented scenario.[19] In contrast with the 1999 directive, eIDAS ensures mutual recognition of the eID for authentication among member states,[20] thus achieving the goal of the Digital Single Market.
eIDAS provides a tiered approach of legal value. It requires that no electronic signature can be denied legal effect or admissibility in court solely for not being an advanced or qualified electronic signature.[21] Qualified electronic signatures must be given the same legal effect as handwritten signatures.[22]
For electronic seals (legal entities' version of signatures), probative value is explicitly addressed, as seals should enjoy the presumption of integrity and the correctness of the origin of the attached data.[23]
In June 2021, the Commission proposed an amendment and published a recommendation.[24][25][26]
The proposal would force browser vendors to place a backdoor in web browsers to let them perform a man-in-the-middle attack, deceiving users into thinking that they were communicating with a server they requested, when, in fact, they would be communicating directly with a government server. The government server could then read and change their messages before passing the possibly modified message on to the intended recipient.[27]
If passed, EU governments would in principle be able to intercept any information transmitted in encrypted form by those browsers, reading any sensitive or encrypted contents without the user's knowledge, and changing information at will.[28][29] This was considered particularly concerning in countries with weaker rule of law, where state and state-connected actors would be able to use the law to spy on their own citizens for political repression and personal gain. There was additional concern that this allow private actors with state connections to gain access to and misuse the power of mass surveillance for their own purposes.[4][6]
While the main language of that text remains in the final draft, provisions have been made in the text that enable browser vendors to continue to implement security provisions that in practice would make this type of interception difficult to perform without being discovered.[30] Specifically, the final draft text states that:
By way of derogation to paragraph 1 and only in case of substantiated concerns related to breaches of security or loss of integrity of an identified certificate or set of certificates, web-browsers may take precautionary measures in relation to that certificate or set of certificates.
which has been interpreted as allowing browser vendors to continue to use mechanisms such as certificate transparency to maintain browser security.[30]
Identity number
Database information has to be linked to some kind of identity number. To certify that a person has the right to access some personal information involves several steps.
Connecting a person to a number, which can be done through methods developed in one country, such as digital certificates.
Connecting a number to specific information, done in databases.
For eIDAS it is needed to connect the number used by a country having information, to the number used by the country issuing the digital certificates.
eIDAS has as minimum identity concept, the name and birth date. But in order to access more sensitive information, some kind of certification is needed that identity numbers issued by two countries refer to the same person.[31]
Vulnerabilities
On October, 2019, two security flaws in eIDAS-Node (a sample implementation of the eID eIDAS Profile provided by the European Commission[32]) were discovered by security researchers; both vulnerabilities were patched for version 2.3.1 of eIDAS-Node.[33]
The European Union Trusted Lists (EUTL) is a public list of over 200 active and legacy Trust Service Providers (TSPs) that are specifically accredited to deliver the highest levels of compliance with the EU eIDAS electronic signature regulation.[34]
An electronic signature, or e-signature, is data that is logically associated with other data and which is used by the signatory to sign the associated data. This type of signature has the same legal standing as a handwritten signature as long as it adheres to the requirements of the specific regulation under which it was created.
A mobile signature is a digital signature generated either on a mobile phone or on a SIM card on a mobile phone.
Electronic authentication is the process of establishing confidence in user identities electronically presented to an information system. Digital authentication, or e-authentication, may be used synonymously when referring to the authentication process that confirms or certifies a person's identity and works. When used in conjunction with an electronic signature, it can provide evidence of whether data received has been tampered with after being signed by its original sender. Electronic authentication can reduce the risk of fraud and identity theft by verifying that a person is who they say they are when performing transactions online.
XAdES is a set of extensions to XML-DSig recommendation making it suitable for advanced electronic signatures. W3C and ETSI maintain and update XAdES together.
Worldwide, legislation concerning the effect and validity of electronic signatures, including, but not limited to, cryptographic digital signatures, includes:
The Revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2, Directive (EU) 2015/2366, which replaced the Payment Services Directive (PSD), Directive 2007/64/EC) is an EU Directive, administered by the European Commission (Directorate General Internal Market) to regulate payment services and payment service providers throughout the European Union (EU) and European Economic Area (EEA). The PSD's purpose was to increase pan-European competition and participation in the payments industry also from non-banks, and to provide for a level playing field by harmonizing consumer protection and the rights and obligations for payment providers and users. The key objectives of the PSD2 directive are creating a more integrated European payments market, making payments more secure and protecting consumers.
CAdES is a set of extensions to Cryptographic Message Syntax (CMS) signed data making it suitable for advanced electronic signatures.
PAdES is a set of restrictions and extensions to PDF and ISO 32000-1 making it suitable for advanced electronic signatures (AdES). This is published by ETSI as EN 319 142.
Electronic signature allows users to electronically perform the actions for which they previously had to give a signature on paper. Estonia's digital signature system is the foundation for some of its most popular e-services including registering a company online, e-banks, the e-voting system and electronic tax filing – essentially any services that require signatures to prove their validity.
The Electronic Signatures Directive 1999/93/EC was a European Union directive on the use of electronic signatures (e-signatures) in electronic contracts within the European Union (EU).
An advanced electronic signature is an electronic signature that has met the requirements set forth under EU Regulation No 910/2014 (eIDAS-regulation) on electronic identification and trust services for electronic transactions in the European Single Market.
A qualified electronic signature is an electronic signature that is compliant with EU Regulation No 910/2014 for electronic transactions within the internal European market. It enables to verify the authorship of a declaration in electronic data exchange over long periods of time. Qualified electronic signatures can be considered as a digital equivalent to handwritten signatures.
A trust service provider (TSP) is a person or legal entity providing and preserving digital certificates to create and validate electronic signatures and to authenticate their signatories as well as websites in general. Trust service providers are qualified certificate authorities required in the European Union and in Switzerland in the context of regulated electronic signing procedures.
In the context of Regulation (EU) No 910/2014 (eIDAS), a qualified digital certificate is a public key certificate issued by a trust service provider which has government-issued qualifications. The certificate is designed to ensure the authenticity and data integrity of an electronic signature and its accompanying message and/or attached data.
A secure signature creation device (SSCD) is a specific type of computer hardware or software that is used in creating an electronic signature. To be put into service as a secure signature creation device, the device must meet the rigorous requirements laid out under Annex II of Regulation (EU) No 910/2014 (eIDAS), where it is referred to as a qualified (electronic) signature creation device (QSCD). Using secure signature creation devices helps in facilitating online business processes that save time and money with transactions made within the public and private sectors.
Banking as a service (BaaS) is the provision of banking products to non-bank third parties through APIs.
Associated Signature Containers (ASiC) specifies the use of container structures to bind together one or more signed objects with either advanced electronic signatures or timestamp tokens into one single digital container.
A qualified website authentication certificate is a qualified digital certificate under the trust services defined in the European Union eIDAS Regulation.
An electronic seal is a piece of data attached to an electronic document or other data, which ensures data origin and integrity. The term is used in the EU Regulation No 910/2014 for electronic transactions within the internal European market.
Smart-ID is an electronic authentication tool developed by SK ID Solutions, an Estonian company. Users can log in to various electronic services and sign documents with an electronic signature.
↑ "eIDAS-Node integration package". European Commission. Archived from the original on 10 June 2019. Retrieved 29 October 2019. The eIDAS-Node software contains the necessary modules to help Member States to communicate with other eIDAS-compliant counterparts in a centralised or distributed fashion.
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