Trans-European Digital Services: Connecting Europe
Highlights from the conference 'Connecting Europe with Building Blocks'
The Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) provides funding for trans-European transport, energy and telecommunications infrastructures It has an allocated budget of €30.4 billion (of which €1.04 billion for telecommunications) for the period 2014-2020.
CEF Telecom funds set of generic and reusable Digital Service Infrastructures (DSI), also known as building blocks. The CEF building blocks offer basic capabilities that can be reused in any European project to facilitate the delivery of digital public services across borders and sectors. Currently, there are five building blocks: eDelivery, eInvoicing, eID, eSignature and eTranslation.
Cross-border and trans-European services help improve the daily lives of Europeans through enhanced digital inclusion and connectivity and are a key tenet of the Digital Single Market.
According to the CEF mid-term evaluation, the Building Blocks are being extensively reused also beyond the remit of CEF, in areas such as agriculture, environment and education.
The Online Dispute Resolution (ODR), for example, is an online platform that allows EU consumers and traders to solve disputes for online purchases in a simple and affordable way, keeping the dispute from having to be settled in court. To assure successful functionality of the service three of the CEF Building Blocks are reused: eID to verify the identity of consumers, eTranslation to translate legal documents and eDelivery to securely send documents sent by consumers, traders and relevant bodies. The number of success stories - such as ODR - demonstrate how the CEF Building Blocks help save both time and money in building cross-border digital services.
Grant funding also supports the CEF Building Blocks. Calls for proposals for grant funding are organised by the Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (INEA) on behalf of the Commission.
Furthermore, the CEF Building Blocks are built in compliance with the eIDAS regulation, which establishes a regulatory framework to enable secure and seamless electronic interactions regarding online services in the EU. For example, the eIDAS 2018 Municipalities enables citizens of EU Member States and EEA countries to electronically prove their identity with their nationally issued eID when seeking access to around 300 services in 81 municipalities across the Netherlands.
On 7 December 2017 at the 'Connecting Europe with Building Blocks: Making the Digital Single Market a Reality' event Commissioner Mariya Gabriel highlighted in her speech that "just as the Acquis Communitaire provides common rules for the Single Market, the Building Blocks are – as standards and technical specifications – in effect common rules supporting the creation of the Digital Single Market."
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