A team of 16 entities from 9 different countries will use Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain to improve online identification processes. Security, trust, and inclusion will be the central concepts of IMPULSE.
The IMPULSE (Identity Management in PUbLic SErvices) project was created to develop a technology capable of verifying the identity of citizens in the online processes of public services in a secure, easy-to-use and private way. IMPULSE is an initiative with a budget of around 4 million euros from the Horizon 2020 programme and involving 16 entities from 9 different countries. The project is led by the Spanish research and technology organization Gradiant.
The alliance will work on the concept of Electronic Identity (eID) – the way users can identify themselves (and be identified) through the network – and its implications in multiple contexts – through the use of Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain technologies. The multidisciplinary consortium will test an integrated software solution to meet the ethical, legal and social requirements for public services in different countries of the European Union, regardless of their culture and degree of digitisation.
The main role of LUT University is coordinating the Work Package 2 "Co-creative design and piloting". The project manager at LUT, Junior Researcher José Camposano, is happy about LUT receiving the Horizon funding and to get this interesting, but also challenging, work package.
"Our work package aims at guiding the design of the IMPULSE solution and ensuring the scalability of the piloting activities across six different locations around the EU. This is a challenging endeavor, not only because each pilot location faces a different social, cultural, and economic reality, but also because the COVID-19 pandemic severely restricts our opportunities to directly interact and engage with end users", Camposano says.
AI and blockchain for electronic identification processes
IMPULSE's innovation focuses on combining two of the most promising technologies available today, Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain networks, with the aim of improving the management of digital identity and electronic identification in the public sector. The Software Engineering team at LUT will research how these technologies can address the legal, privacy or social issues in the field of digital identity.
Most citizens have an electronic identity card to carry out the authentication processes with the online services offered by the administration; however, its use is cumbersome due in large part to the lack of user-friendly interfaces for the common citizen. To overcome this adversity, IMPULSE will incorporate advanced face biometrics and document validation techniques based on AI to facilitate identification processes and provide the user with a digital onboarding experience that is fully transparent.
"We will have to be very creative to design a participatory experimentation methodology that can be replicated in different contexts. We will also need to identify how to integrate existing technologies like blockchain or AI/ML into an electronic identity solution, which can be adapted to the needs of less tech-savvy segments of the population", José Camposano from LUT says.
In addition, blockchain technology and the use of smart contracts will allow adding trustworthiness in the process, providing mechanisms for users to demonstrate their identity without the need to disclose their personal data to third parties. In this way the citizen will maintain total control of their data and will be able to verify the use that is being given to them.
José Camposano sums up that all the partners are very optimistic about the project's results.
Additional information:
José Camposano
Junior Researcher
The IMPULSE project manager at LUT
Annika Wolff
Researcher
Case-Study Manager for the IMPULSE consortium
Kari Smolander
Professor
Principal Investigator, LUT representative at IMPULSE steering board
firstname.lastname@lut.fi
The 3-year project IMPULSE has EUR 4 million in funding from the European Union through the Horizon2020 programme. The digitisation of public administration services is one of the seven flagship initiatives identified in the NextGen Europe programme. LUT's share of the total budget is about 400k€.
LUT's team at IMPULSE:
Kari Smolander (Principal investigator & LUT representative), José Camposano (Project manager), Annika Wolff (Case study manager), Nasreen Azad (Researcher), Kari Heikkinen (Dissemination), and Antero Kutvonen (Business development)
The project partners with the Gradiant are:
LUT University (Finland); Agency for European Integration and Economic Development (Austria); Association du Pole de Competitivite Transactions Electroniques Securisees – DIH (France); Aarhus Municipality (Denmark); Departamento de seguridad del Gobierno Vasco (Spain); Gijón City Council (Spain); Municipality of Peshtera (Bulgaria); City of Reykjavik, Department of Services and Operations (Iceland); Unione italiana delle Camere di commercio, industria, artigianato e agricoltura (Italy); CyberEthics Lab Srls (Italy); ALiCE Biometrics (Spain); Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (Germany); Tree Technology SA (Spain); Infocert S.p.A. (Italy); y DIN Deutsches Institut für Normung e. V. (Germany).