Centro Nacional de Serviços Eletrônicos
In 2012, on the initiative of the Оperational and Analytical Center under the President of the Republic of Belarus, the National Center of Electronic Services was established, the main purpose of which was the development of e-government, including the creation of conditions and mechanisms to reduce administrative barriers and the transition to e-government.
The National Centre of Electronic Services (NCES), being a unique company on the Belarusian market (an infrastructural operator of interagency information systems as well as of identification systems and services) proposes to open up new horizons of cooperation with the People’s Republic of China as regards transboundary electronic interaction.
One of the key tasks of the NCES is providing of electronic services to business and citizens on the basis of information from the State information resources (systems) the owners of which are Belarusian State administrative bodies. Part of the electronic services and facilities is available to foreign citizens who reside on the territory of Belarus. The NCES is interested in developing the range of the services as well as in organizing the joint electronic facilities’ provision to Belarusians, who live in other counties, with participation administrative bodies.
There due to the use of a single infrastructure of interaction in Belarus have been channels of electronic communication set up between all categories of the information exchange’s participants:
♦ between the State and citizens (G2C, Government-to-Citizen);
♦ between the State and business (G2B, Government-to-Business);
♦ between various branches of State power (G2G, Government-to-Government).
The single infrastructure of interaction in Belarus is represented by a number of interagency information systems the major ones of which are as follows:
♦ the Electronic Interagency Document Management System (EIDMS);
♦ the Nation-Wide Automated Information System (NWAIS);
♦ the State System of Managing Public Keys for Electronic Digital Signature (SSMPK).
One of the main basic components of the eGovernment in the Republic of Belarus is the Electronic Interagency Document Management System (EIDMS)
At present more than 10 400 Belarusian organizations and agencies work in the EIDMS, comfortably and promptly exchanging electronic documents.
Among them are all Ministries and Agencies including the ones that are subordinated (accountable) to the President of the Republic of Belarus, educational, health care, culture and sports establishments, entities of the real sector of economy and social sphere’s institutions.
This is possible thanks to a single data exchange format allowing for exchanging of electronic documents in agencies that use electronic document management systems of various producers.
There are more than 30 companies-developers of agency-wide electronic document management systems are represented on the Belarusian market. Purchasing the electronic document management systems from the National Centre of Electronic Services, customers automatically get connected to the EIDMS within a service package.
Today the number of subscribers connected to the EIDMS makes it possible to assess the extent of benefits and privileges from working in the system:
♦ prompt interaction with State administrative bodies and organizations around the whole Republic;
♦ increase in the speed of making managerial decisions;
♦ reduction of paper document management costs.
Every month the number of active users of the Electronic Interagency Document Management System increases by more than 200 subscribers. Development and strengthening of foreign economic links dictate the necessity of bringing the electronic communications to the international level.
There is a Trusted Third Party (TTP) service intended to ensure possibility of transboundary exchange of electronic documents and automation of processes related to legalization of electronic digital signature, integrity of an electronic document and, as a consequence, acknowledgement of its legal force and authenticity.
In accordance with Edict of the President of the Republic of Belarus of November 8, 2011 No. 515 “On Certain Issues of Development of Information Society in the Republic of Belarus” the NCES was appointed national operator of the trusted third party for acknowledgement of authenticity of electronic documents in the process of interstate electronic communication, authorized operator of the integration gateway of the national segment of the integrated information system of the Eurasian Economic Union (IIS EAEU).There was software for the IIS EAEU and Trusted Third Party’s facilities deployed, tested and commissioned within the infrastructure of the NCES.
The following is considered to be among the possible areas of the Trusted Third Party facilities’ use: e-commerce, State procurement, telehealth, distance learning, stock exchange. mobile payment systems, electronic libraries, etc.
There among other spheres of the TTP technologies’ use EDI providing is especially given prominence to. EDI (Electronic data interchange) is a series of standards and conventions in respect of transmitting structured digital information between organizations that is based on certain rules and formats of messages being transmitted.
The EDI’s main task is to standardize interchange of transactional digital information, to ensure possibility of software interaction of computer systems of various segments, organizations and enterprises.
As of today, there has been interaction of the TTP-Belarus organized with the Republic of Kazakhstan’s TTP, the operator of which is the “State Technical Service” Republican State Enterprise of the Ministry of Information and Communication of the Republic of Kazakhstan.In the longer term there is setting up of transboundary electronic communication envisaged with other countries of the Eurasian Economic Union and Eurasian continent.
One of the most important interagency information systems established for electronic interaction between the State and citizens is the Nation-Wide Automated Information System (NWAIS). The NWAIS is a basic element of the Government in Belarus. This system is intended for integration of all State information resources (systems) and provision of electronic services to all categories of customers on the basis of the information from these resources (systems).
There on the basis of the NWAIS has been a universal mechanism established of carrying out administrative procedures in the electronic format and rendering of electronic services through the Single Portal of Electronic Services.
The Single Portal of Electronic Services (SPES) is a basic access point for interested parties in the process of their remotely filing of applications in respect of carrying out administrative procedures in an electronic form and respectively receiving administrative decisions from State bodies and organizations in the form of an electronic document.
Use of the SPES for carrying out administrative procedures in an electronic form (е-application, е-registration, е-requests to gather information for the purpose of implementing the procedures, etc.) makes it possible to simplify processes of State bodies’ informational interaction between each other as well as of the population with the State bodies and organizations.
Today there at the SPES located at the portal.gov.by address on the Internet users have access to about 100 electronic services for legal and natural persons. All services are rendered through remote ordering and receiving on a real-time basis.
There at the Portal are electronic services implemented in the spheres of finance and taxation, labour and social protection, trade and State procurement, land and property relations, court proceedings and a number of others on the basis of information from 20 State information resources.
There are more than 55 000 users registered at the Portal and it renders about 400 000 electronic services every month.There for users’ convenience all electronic services are grouped according to subject categories.
The widest range of electronic services is accessible to legal persons. For someone to competently conduct business it is important to possess information on his/her opponents to plan the work accordingly and neutralize possible risks. Whether your companion is not a bankrupt, whether there have not been enforcement proceedings initiated against him/her and whether he/she does not have indebtedness before the budget — this and other information is accessible at the Portal.
As regards natural persons, for them of the utmost interest are electronic services and administrative procedures in the sphere of social protection for the public that concern maintenance amounts, amounts of pensions and other social benefits.
The Portal implements a possibility of performing all actions of receiving electronic services online, starting with ordering a service in the user’s personal area and ending with paying for the service.
The concept of the “personal area” used in the process of the user’s registration at the Portal ensures:
♦ access to the services in accordance with the user’s rights;
♦ possibility of ordering a service;
♦ receiving of the informational message in respect of complying with the request;
♦ storing of the user’s requisites.
At present a number of electronic services are provided at the Single Portal of Electronic Services to foreign citizens together with the Ministry of Interior, State Border Committee, Ministry of Taxes and Assessments, other Belarusian Ministries and Agencies.
For example, the Portal makes available information on invalidity of machine readable documents (including the permit of a foreign citizen to reside in the Republic of Belarus); possibility of obtaining the permit for entering (in a vehicle or on foot), temporary staying in and moving around, a border area; possibility of obtaining the permit for the right of out-of-turn entry to the territory of motor vehicle crossing points at the State Border of the Republic of Belarus; obtaining of a special permit to work in the Republic of Belarus.
Foreign citizens may avail themselves of the electronic services that require user’s strong authentication at the Single Portal of Electronic Services by using the facility of the cloud electronic digital signature.
Working in modern information systems is unthinkable without reliable means of identification and cryptographic protection of information. It is about electronic digital signature facilities intended for safe operation in information systems, for personal authentication when performing legally significant actions.
An electronic digital signature is an electronic document’s requisite resulting from cryptographic transforming of information with the use of a signature’s private key and ensuring integrity, authenticity and preservation of the electronic document.
There in Belarus in 2014 was the Republican Certification Centre (RCC) established and accredited in the State system of managing public keys for electronic digital signature’s certification. The RCC renders services of issuing electronic digital signatures’ (EDS) keys which will be used for working with all information systems of State bodies and organizations.
At present the EDS’s key of the Republican Certification Centre is used when organizing legally significant interagency information interaction as well as for:
♦ registration of enterprises and individual entrepreneurs;
♦ filing of tax returns;
♦ filing of electronic VAT invoices;
♦ customs e-filing and registration of declarations of products’ conformity with the requirements of the regulations of the Eurasian Economic Union’s Customs Union;
♦ submission of statistical reports;
♦ submission of documents to the «Belgosstrakh» insurance company;
♦ working with the Single Portal of Electronic Services;
♦ working with the Single State Register of Real Property, Titles to It and Transactions with It as well as with the geoportal of the land information system;
♦ working at digital marketplaces of the country;
♦ in the banking sector, etc.
Today there are more than 400 000 owners of the EDS’s keys and every day their number increases on the average by 1 000.
Traditionally an electronic digital signature is used on a computer with special software and this undoubtedly limits user’s mobility. In 2016 the National Centre of Electronic Services offered to users a new service — EDS on SIM card, or mobile EDS.
The mobile EDS technology handles the same tasks as the other EDS technologies: provision of a possibility to pass authentication with the use of the public key certificate and possibility to generate the EDS.
In terms of convenience, the main distinguishing feature of the mobile EDS as compared to other technologies is simplicity of its use: there is no need for a separate EDS facility, there is no need to install and fine-tune software, all EDS functions are performed by the specialized SIM card in a mobile telephone.
The EDS on SIM card makes it possible to work with documents remotely: bring them into accord, sign them and perform other operations. Know-how 2018 is a cloud-based electronic digital signature.
The cloud EDS is an electronic signature that identifies the signatory and imparts legal significance to the electronic document. But the key to it would be stored not on a USB token, memory card, SIM card or computer but on a server of a certifying centre.
The cloud EDS technologies are interesting first of all to those who often works not from his/her office. For example, for lawyers and auditors who often go to visit their clients as well as for managers for whom it is important to sign documents in any location. For them, the cloud electronic signature will become an indispensable aid in work.
An EDS in the cloud will also quicken interest of foreign countries’ representatives in getting the electronic services at the portal.gov.by platform.
Today it is already possible to state that there has been a foundation of the eGovernment laid in Belarus. The task of the nearest future for State administrative bodies is to actively fill the established infrastructure with electronic services and, thus, more widely engage citizens and business into electronic environment of interaction with government authorities.
The National Centre of Electronic Services will continue its work aimed at promoting development of the eGovernment’s services and facilities both in Belarus and abroad.
While taking into account the accumulated experience in establishing and developing the eGovernment as well as being aware of the scope of the upcoming work of building up facilities, fine-tuning mechanisms of rendering State electronic services, the NCES is prepared to share experience with and adopt practices of foreign colleagues.
In General, acting as a battery of ideas in the field of e-government of the Republic of Belarus, NCES is open to partnerships aimed at promoting comfortable cross-border electronic interaction of representatives of any groups of both States: officials, business, citizens.
Those international organizations that are interested in cooperation should contact NCES directly. A contact person: Olga Lenartovich, tel. +375 17 229 30 00 ext. 217, e-mail: loa@nces.by
