Requiring the use of electronic identification (“eIdentification”) and electronic signature (“eSignature”),provided by the State to the public free of charge, also in the case of electronic communications serviceproviders with a wide range of customers.

Draft Act amending Act CIII of 2023 on the digital state and certain rules on the provision of digital services

Hungary is committed to digitalisation, in the framework of which the National Digital Citizenship Programmewas adopted at the end of 2022 and the Act to implement the Programme in December 2023, which will, inprinciple, enter into force on 1 July 2024. A conceptual element of the new Act – in line with the EuropeanUnion’s regulatory framework for a European Digital Identity – is that services provided by the State to citizensshould be widely available and usable, which also requires their acceptance by private service providers.

In this context, the preamble to eIDAS 2.0 explicitly refers to the following sectors: “Private relying partiesproviding services in the areas of transport, energy, banking and financial services, social security, health,drinking water, postal services, digital infrastructure, education or telecommunications should accept the use ofEuropean Digital Identity Wallets for the provision of services where strong user authentication for onlineidentification is required by national or Union law or by contractual obligation”.
The new National Digitalisation Act retains the established and well-functioning digital services of the previousDigitalisation Act (Act CCXXII of 2015 on the general rules of electronic administration and trust services), and,in addition, already takes into account the rules of eIDAS 2.0 and introduces further new digital services,focusing primarily on administration via portable devices (e.g. mobile phones, tablets).
The main legislative purpose of the Act is to enable citizens to manage their affairs with the most importantactors in their daily lives in the most convenient, simple and secure way possible. Consequently, the purposeof the Act is also to enable citizens to use the possibilities offered by digital administration – which the Stateprovides free of charge – not only when dealing with public administration and public services, but also with allnon-state service providers that have a wide range of customers and are frequently contacted by citizens. Thisincludes, in particular, waste management public service providers, entities providing residential energyservices, residential public water utilities, banks and insurance companies.
In order to achieve the above-mentioned objective, the use of the unique and permanent identifier provided bythe State to citizens within the framework of digital citizenship, which is necessary for their presence in thedigital space, and the identification based on it ("eIdentification"), as well as the electronic signature("eSignature”), which is inherently a service facilitating official administration between the State and citizens,will be available for use beyond the scope of state use from 1 June 2025, including among the above-mentioned key economic actors.
The subject of the present technical notification is the amendment of the promulgated Act, which aims atbroadening the range of the above-mentioned service providers with electronic communications serviceproviders, given that these entities also provide services that are normally used in everyday life to a wide rangeof citizens. Accordingly, the promulgated amendment to Act CIII of 2023 would now create the possibility forcitizens to use eIdentification and eSignature, provided in the framework of digital citizenship, with theseservice providers as well.
It should be stressed that this need has been formulated not only by the State, but also by the marketoperators concerned, since administration with them also involves customer identification in all cases and, inaddition, they are required to carry out targeted data reconciliation procedures at specified intervals, whichcould be significantly simplified if identification were to be made with authentic state registration data.
EIdentification and eSignature to be extended does not affect banking, insurance and other self-developedidentification and signature systems that are in place and will be developed in the future, as the Act states thatservice providers may continue to use them; they shall offer public services to citizens alongside their ownservices performing the same function.
The purpose of the notified amendment is to include electronic communications service providers with a widerange of customers providing individual subscriber services within the meaning of the ElectronicCommunications Act, i.e. to allow citizens to use eIdentification and eSignature services when managingadministration with telecommunications companies (naturally, in addition to their own digital services, or, if theydo not wish to develop such services, instead of their own services), similar to a retail financial service provideror an energy service provider.