Germany’s Bundestag has passed the Digital Identities Act, the national law setting out the legal framework for the country’s European Digital Identity Wallet. The vote on October 15 clears the way for the state wallet, d-you, to launch on January 2, 2027.
The bill passed with the votes of the governing CDU/CSU and SPD parliamentary groups, while the opposition AfD, Greens and Left voted against it. Lawmakers also rejected an AfD motion calling on the government to halt the national EUDI wallet project and seek repeal of the wallet provisions in the EU’s eIDAS regulation.
The wallet will let residents prove their identity on a smartphone and store, manage and present digital documents to public and private services. It will also support qualified electronic signatures and seals. The government says use will be voluntary, existing identification methods will not be replaced, and the wallet will be the first electronic identification means for mobile devices at the “high” level of assurance. Germany named the wallet d-you in September.
The Committee on Digital Affairs and State Modernization amended the bill before the final vote. Users will be able to refuse inclusion of their biometric photo in their digital identity data, and a central federal citizen account will remain available as a voluntary route to digital government services. Digital sovereignty is to be given greater weight in procurement.
Other changes cut the deadline for providing attribute attestations from 24 months to 12 and bring forward the law’s evaluation. The amended bill also makes it easier for passport and identity card authorities to exchange biometric data, and allows the online identity function of the national ID card to be used from age 13.
Alongside the law, the Bundestag adopted a coalition resolution on the wallet’s pseudonym function, which lets users interact with services without revealing their identity. The resolution says that if the function is not ready when d-you launches, the government must deliver it as quickly as possible because it is required under EU law. Resolutions from the Greens and the Left were rejected.
The government estimates annual compliance costs for businesses at 1.1 million euros, plus one-time costs of about 13.5 million euros, while administrative compliance costs are expected to fall by about 121.7 million euros a year. The Federal Office of Administration, the Federal Office for Information Security and the Federal Network Agency will incur additional staff and material costs to build and operate the infrastructure.
The Bundesrat, which represents Germany’s states, supported the project in its opinion but asked that the form of wallet provision be decided by regulation requiring its consent. The government rejected that request, saying the responsible federal ministry should decide.
Sources: Deutscher Bundestag
–
By the ID Tech Editorial Team
