Moscow has developed a mobile application “My ID” for storing digital copies of documents

GKU Infogorod, subordinated to the Department of Information Technologies of Moscow, has developed a new mobile application “My ID”, which displays information from all the main documents of the user: data of Russian and foreign passports, SNILS, TIN, compulsory medical insurance policy, driver’s license, information about a pet. Now the application can be downloaded from the App Store, Google Play, AppGalery, RuStore and RuMarket, Vedomosti was convinced. The application was published in the app stores in mid-May, indicated in the description. The application displays documents that are also in the user’s personal account on mos.ru, while the user has the opportunity to choose which documents from the portal he wants to transfer to “My ID”.

Now nine types of documents are available in the application, Dmitry Ivanov, deputy head of DIT, specified. These are not only basic identification documents, but also Moscow identifiers – for example, a Muscovite card, a single library card and information about pets, he added. “All this information is convenient to use in everyday life, including when filling out various online forms, buying family tickets or ordering passes. And some documents are available in the form of a barcode, which can be used to receive services in city institutions,” says Ivanov.

He added that the app is for personal use only. Information about documents in it can only be viewed by the user himself, while he can set a pin code that will protect data in case the phone is in the hands of strangers. The description of the application states that data from it can be copied to fill out online forms when receiving services and services, as well as share them with friends or trusted persons, for example, when buying tickets or ordering passes.

At the moment, the application does not provide for the possibility of using information from identity documents as a digital replacement for the original, a representative of the DIT press service warned. Digital documents and virtual cards in the application can be used in various life situations, he added: presenting a single reader’s card in city libraries, receiving discounts on the barcode of a Muscovite card, making an appointment with a doctor or receiving a coupon using a QR code of the MHI policy in polyclinics.

Currently, digital copies of documents are not a replacement for the original, but such a legislative possibility is being worked out, although in the future applications like “My ID” can be used to present a passport and other documents.

Back in March 2021, the Ministry of Digital Development prepared a draft presidential decree, according to which, from December 2021, digital passports with legal force should begin to operate in Moscow, the Moscow Region and Tatarstan, and from 2023 they planned to extend the initiative to all other regions. But this document did not reach the signing.

In mid-February 2023, Minister of Digital Development Maksut Shadayev, during a meeting of Russian President Vladimir Putin with the government, said that in 80% of all cases in everyday life you can do without a paper passport, replacing it with a smartphone. The President, in turn, instructed the government, the FSB and the Ministry of Internal Affairs to determine by May 1 the cases and procedure for presenting a digital identity card instead of a regular passport.

In April 2023, the Ministry of Digital Development published a new draft presidential decree, which stated that citizens, on a voluntary basis, would be able to use the State Services application to present a passport, as well as a driver’s license or military ID. But in what specific cases a digital document can replace a paper one, the project did not specify. As follows from the information on the website regulation.gov.ru, this document is still under consideration in the White House.

The representative of the government apparatus redirected the request to the Ministry of Digital Development. A representative of the Ministry of Digital Transformation told Vedomosti that now [апрельский] the draft decree is going through the procedures corresponding to the regulations and must be signed before the end of the summer. According to him, at the moment it is assumed that the presentation of documents will be carried out only through the mobile applications of the State Services.

Vedomosti sent inquiries to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the FSB.

Also in July, the Ministry of Digital Transformation published a draft amendment to the SDA (approved by government decree), which equated the electronic version of the driver’s license in the State Services Auto mobile application to a paper document. The amendments have not yet been adopted.

And at the beginning of 2023, the ministry announced the launch of a service at Gosuslugakh, which, according to its authors, should allow you to confirm your identity, for example, in a store or at the entrance to an office without a paper passport. When using it, a user’s photo is displayed on the smartphone screen along with a generated QR code, which the inspector must scan in his Public Services application. It is currently only available for use on Android smartphones.

But by law, store employees have the right to refuse to sell alcohol or tobacco products to a buyer if he does not present an identity card, and until the decree is signed, a digital ID is not such, said Yury Fedyukin, managing partner of the law firm Enterprise Legal Solutions.

There really is no regulatory framework for the use of electronic identity cards or digital identity cards, Kirill Lyakhmanov, chief legal adviser of the intellectual property practice at EBR law firm, confirmed. Moreover, if the decree developed by the Ministry of Digital Transformation is adopted, it is possible that information from an electronic personal identifier can be transferred, including to databases of various kinds of applications, Fedyukin admitted.

Now the draft decree talks about the possibility of using only one application – “Gosuslugi”, said Alexandra Orekhovich, a teacher at the Moscow Digital School educational platform. That is, “My ID” can be used for identification only if this provision is changed at the stages of further approval, she added.

The mass appearance of digital documents in the coming years in Russia is unlikely, says Ashot Oganesyan, founder of the DLBI data leak intelligence and darknet monitoring service. This will require not only changing the “gigantic” amount of federal and local legislation, but also equipping a huge number of inspectors with special software and equipment that still needs to be created, he explained.

In order for digital documents to come into use, it is necessary to ensure the technical possibility of the widespread use of these technologies, Sergey Uchitel, partner at the Pen & Paper Bar Association, agreed with him. For more than six months, the ability to use the “Gosuslugi” to present a driver’s license to traffic police officers has been tested, the lawyer recalled.

Replacing paper documents with digital ones will require significant investments in protection against forgery, copying and other unfair use, Lyakhmanov also noted. The legitimacy of such documents can be verified through blockchain-based decentralized cryptographic systems, but a vulnerability in such a system would potentially compromise the data of many people, the lawyer noted.

The main difference between digital documents and those that actually exist on paper is that digital documents can be easily copied, notes Igor Sobetsky, Head of Information Security Incident Investigation at FBK CyberSecurity. “This means that it will be easy to “register” a stolen car, provide a driver’s license to a person deprived of his rights, “serve” in the army, etc.,” the expert said. The main risk when using digital documents is the loss of an identification device, in this case a smartphone, Hovhannisyan noted. It is already dangerous to put a mobile bank on mobile devices, as well as any applications that allow you to perform legally significant actions, such as “State Services”, and with the advent of digital documents, the situation will only worsen, he added.

At the same time, as the interlocutor of Vedomosti, close to DIT, notes, the information used by My ID is stored in the city data center, protected in accordance with the requirements of the regulator in the field of information security. This data is not stored on the user’s phone, he clarifies.