STS successfully runs on-boarding test with EU gateway for digital Covid certificate authentication

The Special Telecommunications Service (STS) successfully completed today together with the EU technical working group the gateway on-boarding test for the generation of EU COVID-19 digital certificates, STS announced. "The IT system developed by STS facilitates the generation of EU COVID digital certificates, the transmission of security elements that allow verification, their centralization in the EU gateway and the validation of QR codes by the other EU member states," STS said in a release. According to the timetable established at European level, Romania and Latvia jointly performed the interconnection test with the EU gateway that centralizes and manages the member countries' public keys required for the verification of digital signatures. "To implement the EU digital certificates in Romania, STS has developed the communications infrastructure and the IT system that allow interconnection with the European gateway. During the test, the DSC public key was uploaded to the EU gateway for centralization. The EU digital certificates issued by Romania will be signed with the private key," the release mentions. The EU digital certificate contains essential identification data - name and surname, date of birth, issuing member state, medical data concerning the category for which the document is issued, as well as a unique identifier of the certificate. After the IT system is implemented in Romania, the data to be included in the EU digital certificates will be transferred automatically from the National Electronic Covid Vaccination Register - for vaccinated people, and from the Corona Forms application for people who underwent a negative test in the last 72 hours, or for those who recovered from a SARS-CoV-2 infection, the cited source states. "Certificates will be issued in digital format, with the possibility of being displayed on the smartphone, but they are also printable. They will include a QR code that will contain a digital signature, so that upon reading the code, the authenticity, integrity and validity of the document can be verified. The digital signature belongs to the issuer, so that citizens will not need a digital signature. EU digital certificates are free of charge and will facilitate travel in the European space without pandemic restrictions, and without impeding on the freedom of movement," STS said. The next step is the completion of the secure portal from which the citizens will be able to download their EU digital certificates and running the IT system's internal performance and security tests. "According to the European timetable, EU digital certificates will be implemented in early July. STS experts will ensure the implementation, from a technical point of view, of the IT system in accordance with the EU schedule," the cited source said. AGERPRES (RO - author: Mihai Stoica, editor: Andreea Rotaru; EN - editor: Simona Klodnischi)