El mundo (News Paper) / Innovadores (Innovators) / January 2019
In 1897, Paul Gauguin, in Tahiti, after knowing the death of his daughter painted his masterpiece, -Where do we come from? Who are we? Where are we going? – An oil on canvas post-impressionist painting, questioning the intricacies of human identity. Today adorns the walls of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (USA), but it is still a magnificent reflection of the big headache that has been for philosophers and thinkers to define the essence of people.
To entangle the issue further, in recent years the concept of digital identity has come into play, a complex idea that could be defined as the electronic equivalent of a real identity. In some countries, it is something that is already part of everyday life. In Estonia, for example, citizens can vote or access their medical records online. Digital identities are managed through digital certificates, an identification number that allows us to perform all types of safe and qualified operations.
The Spanish company vintegrisTECH has created nebulaSUITE, a solution that provides the infrastructure to companies in order to create and manage digital identities. “It issues, manages and controls the life cycles of digital certificates,” says Facundo Rojo, CEO of the company. “Companies, through our directory, decide who uses their certificates and for what purpose.”
Digital certificates are not a novelty in Spain: “Until now, in our country, they did not have very good press, they looked like something heavy to obtain and expensive, they were more a hindrance than an asset,” explains Rojo. “They were not very controlled, the companies didn’t know who had the certificates, nor what their use was, if a worker left the company, they could take it with them. Our solution allows issuing certificates, store and managing them in infrastructure with the highest level of security”.
Large companies rely on the project: “Bankinter, Laboral Kutxa, Sabadell, Bankia, and BBVA are or have been clients of vintegrisTECH,” affirms the CEO of the company. In Spain alone, there are more than 120 end-user companies, some from IBEX 35. “Not only banks,” he says, “we work with leading Spanish food companies, distribution, and laboratories.”
One of the main functions of nebulaSUITE is navigation control: “When the company issues a certificate to do a specific task if that particular thing is not done, we cut the connection,” he explains. Thus, the proposal aims to optimize the work to provide the company with greater efficiency.
vintegrisTECH has invested a lot of money and effort in complying strictly with the requirements established by Regulation 910/2014 of the European Union, better known as eIDAS. This standard aims to establish a common legal framework in Europe for digital identification means: “If a transfer or transaction is to be made at a European level, the operation will only be valid if it is done through a qualified certificate that complies with eIDAS,” states Rojo.
According to the CEO of the company, the Regulation places much emphasis on equating “the qualified electronic signature with the handwritten one” as a way of “ensuring mutual recognition and validity throughout the EU.” In the eyes of Facundo Rojo, eIDAS had meant an advance: “Before, each country had its certificate, and they did not recognize each other.” Even so, he considers it necessary to evolve towards the consolidation of the digital identity worldwide since, nowadays, “each country legalizes as it wants.”
See or download the original article El Mundo Innovadores, vintegrisTECH (in Spanish)
