Luukas Ilves, Deputy Minister of Economic Affairs and Communications for Digital Transformation of Estonia, told DOU about the launch of the Estonian app mRiik based on Diia.
99% of public services in Estonia are provided online. It is enough to have access to a computer. And very soon it will be possible to do this from a smartphone. Estonia is launching a mobile application based on Diia called mRiik. It is based on the code and design of the Ukrainian model.
The official noted that Ukraine was one of the first countries to implement high-quality public services on a smartphone.
“But even Diia was released in 2020, 13 years after the iPhone was launched. We are all years behind the private sector. In this vein, we are thinking about how not to repeat the same mistakes with AI tools that are revolutionizing user experience today,” he said.
mRiik was tested in May-June this year. Ilves is already using it himself, and it works well. But it is still in the development stage. The public version has not been launched yet.
One of the main obstacles, according to the official, is identity documents.
“Although Estonians have been able to use their electronic IDs and signatures in online services for more than 20 years, we need to give legal status to the use of electronic documents to prove identity in the physical world,” he notes.
In addition, the application’s functionality is still being expanded. The developers are striving to make all digital services available in mRiik that operate through the government portal.
The main difference between the Estonian app and Diia is that it is launched in an already working digital environment of public services, while Diia is getting new features that are added to the portal.
