Digital driving license and health card, starting today.
The digital version of the Driving Licence, the Health Card and the European Disability Card is officially available to the first 50,000 citizens, chosen at random by the technicians of the Department for Digital.
"After two years of constant and discreet work, the government has taken the first step towards the creation of the It-Wallet System, a digital revolution that I have strongly supported since I took office and that will be fully operational in 2025", underlines the Undersecretary to the Presidency of the Council with responsibility for Technological Innovation, Alessio Butti.
The public services app has been downloaded 40,407,686 times but so far only 50,000 Italians have received the push notification inviting them to use the new feature.
On October 16, the day after Undersecretary Alessio Butti announced the digital wallet, there was a peak in downloads of the application, over 24,500, double the daily average, which continued in the following days, almost a race to be among the first who could try out the service.
The wallet will be released in stages, from November 6 to 250 thousand citizens, from November 30 to 1 million and from December 4 for all Italians and soon the other Europeans will join us. Digital identity is in fact a tool that, on the recommendation of the EU Commission, other governments are also working on and the final goal is to have a European Wallet (Eudi Wallet). There will also be Wallets issued by private entities (we already know those of Apple and Google) but what we must avoid is that everyone is limited to their own services.
"With the introduction of the It-Wallet, and anticipating the times of the European Eidas2 regulation, Italy is embarking on an ambitious path towards the evolution of digital services. This tool will offer citizens new opportunities for using their digital identity, while ensuring maximum security and protection of personal data", says Butti.
However, physical cards are not being retired for now, the It-Wallet is not mandatory and for now the three digital documents can only be used for offline interactions : the Driving License can only be used in Italy to demonstrate that you are authorized to drive in the event of checks by the police; the Health Card - European Health Insurance Card will allow access to the services provided by the National Health Service; the European Disability Card will have the same uses already foreseen with the physical document version.
