The National Interoperability Framework Observatory (NIFO) community is making available an updated series of NIFO factsheets. The updates track interoperability initiatives in European countries.
Recently published on the Joinup platform, the updated NIFO factsheets provide new information on interoperability for over half of the countries. The update replaces factsheets from May this year. The observatory identified new interoperability platforms in many fields, including data exchange, eServices and eSignature.
Launched last September, the open data portal of Finland provides open data and the tools and guidelines promoting interoperability. In March, Finland also opened the development of the Service Bus to developers, using a collaborative development environment. The Service Bus is part of the national service architecture. A first pilot with the City of Espo Sitra was completed successfully in spring. The pilot transferred data across various nursing care support systems. The service bus will be finalised in 2015. The National Service architecture aims at creating an interoperable digital service infrastructure. This allows data transfer between the organizations and services.
Recently, the Balearic Islands (Spain) presented an Interoperability Platform (‘Pinbal’) which links local eServices to those provided at the National level through the ‘State Mediation Platform’. The services are accessed through a web application or using web services. The new version of the Spanish Semantic Interoperability Center was launched in July. It aims to encourage the sharing and reuse of semantic assets. In September, the Cabinet approved an agreement for the creation of Cl@ve. This is the new Spanish common platform for identification, authentication and digital signature for the public administration State sector.
eSignature has also seen a recent uptake in Iceland, the first country to make use of electronic signatures in signing annual financial statements. Government accounts were endorsed electronically by the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs, the Director General of the Financial Management Authority and the Auditor General. Over the next few years the use of electronic ID is to be greatly increased in Iceland. The country wants to make this the principal means of identification for various types of electronic services and Internet transactions.
In Italy, as from July, the regional forms for the submission of applications for the Unique Environmental Authorisation (AUA) in Lombardia are available online. The forms aim at enhancing administrative simplification by using unified and simplified forms implementing an interoperability standard currently drafted at the national level: the Single Model for Electronic Filing of applications.
The NIFO factsheets give a high level abstract of the NIF of each country. They present:
- An overview of the MS main activities on interoperability and the main online sources
- A summary of the NIF
- An overview of the alignment of the NIF with the EIF
- An overview of other initiatives on interoperability
- An overview of the implementation of the NIF
NIFO is a project by the European Commission's ISA programme (Interoperability Solutions for European Public Administrations). It assists countries in aligning their national interoperability frameworks (NIFs) with the European one and in monitoring their implementation.