DigiD – A Last Minute Reprieve?

Here in the Netherlands, DigiD is the online identity management system used by millions of us in our interactions with the government, local councils, hospitals and many other organisations such as pension funds and insurers. It acts as a digital passport by which we can prove our identity to service providers.

DigiD is managed by the Dutch government organization Logius, part of the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations. The company Solvinity provides the infrastructure platform that DigiD runs on, which is hosted in a government data center.

It became known that Solvinity might be acquired by the American company Kyndryl, which led to questions being asked about digital sovereignty.

We have already seen the Trump Administration force American software service suppliers to cut off their services from members of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, and this week it emerged that sanctions have been imposed on European officials who enforce the European Digital Services Act.

So there is a very real danger that were DigiD to fall into American hands, we could be held hostage at the whim of Washington. The current Administration is no friend to Europe.

Thankfully, the State Secretary for Economic Affairs and Climate Policy announced on Tuesday, 26 May that the acquisition of Solvinity by Kyndryl will not be permitted to proceed. This was stated in the parliamentary letter regarding the investment screening decision on Solvinity.

And, naturally, the Trump Administration is not happy about this – the US Ambassador here has already consulted Washington and criticised the ban.

I suspect that we haven’t seen the end of this saga.