SPID, multi-year renewal of contracts in sight but time to evolve

It seems there will be one multi-year renewal of contracts with the managers of the SPID, the Public Digital Identity System expiring this April. Yesterday, as anticipated, the meeting was held between the undersecretary in charge of Technological Innovation Alessio Butti and the managers. However, from June work will begin on a profound reorganization of the entire infrastructure towards a unified service with the CIE (Electronic Identity Card).

The precise details of the new agreement have not yet been defined: in fact, it is fair to underline that nothing has yet been signed, but the government has signaled its intention to find a balance, which is already a significant step forward compared to the current situation. It is worth mentioning that so far the government has allocated 1 million euros which must be divided among the 11 managers; the premises of the SPID, released 8 years ago, were that it would be free for citizens and for the Public Administration, and would be repaid by its professional and private use, but the PA has never been able to promote it as requested by the managers.

In recent weeks (it is worth noting that the procurement contracts actually expired in December, but there is a temporary extension until 22 April) it has emerged that the demand from providers rose to 50 million euros. Butti did not confirm the exact figure, but guaranteed the intention of making the product economically sustainable unlike what has been seen in recent years. In general, the managers’ spokespersons expressed satisfaction with the meeting.

It is worth remembering that SPID is a successful initiative, both in absolute terms looking at Italy alone and comparing it to similar services in the rest of Europe. it is still too early to establish what the evolution process of the digital identity in a single SPID/CIE system will entail, but there are already some firm points: i.e. that SPID managers will be involved and that continuity of service will be guaranteed for both the PA and citizens and businesses.