The development of e-government based on cloud computing in Europe

With the development of cloud computing, e-government based on cloud computing is being paid more and more attention by more and more countries. Some countries in Europe are incorporating cloud-based e-government into national strategies, and some have started to apply. Among them, Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Spain and the United Kingdom are the development of cloud-based e-government better countries, and they benefit from cloud computing, but also face many challenges.

I. National strategies

(i) Austria

Although Austria has not yet applied cloud computing to public services, the Austrian chancellery data platform published a public sector application of cloud computing in 2012, covering legal, economic, technological and public-sector opportunities and risks for using cloud computing. According to the document, the Austrian E-government application system may deploy private cloud, community cloud and public cloud.

(ii) Denmark

The Danish government began discussing the use of cloud computing in the public sector as early as 2009, but is still grappling with the issue of security and privacy protection for cloud computing. In fact, the Danish Government is a leading country in the public domain using cloud computing. In 2011, for example, Denmark plans to use Google Apps (calendar, email, etc.) in the school system. In addition, the Danish government Procurement organization also moved government procurement into the cloud in 2011.

(iii) Finland

Finland does not yet have a national strategy for the application of cloud computing in the public sector, which has only launched an exploratory study of cloud-based ICT services, but the Finnish Government has highlighted the importance of cloud computing in its report on productivity and Innovation Finland-the 2011-2020 digitization agenda.

(iv) France

France supports the development and deployment of a nationwide government-specific cloud, called the government Cloud (governmental Cloud). In 2011, France began to develop a government cloud called "Andromeda", which was serviced by two major local operators, using an IAAS platform. France's intention to develop government clouds is to safeguard local data protection and legislation, and to comply with national data protection and security laws. In addition, Accenture has built a dedicated cloud for French law and administrative Information Management (DILA) to provide a more convenient and efficient public five-blessing for French citizens.

(v) German

The German federal government issued an ICT strategy in 2010, and cloud computing is the core of the strategy. Germany wants to promote the development of cloud computing services and to benefit SMEs and the public sector as quickly as possible. In addition, Germany has issued a cloud computing action plan, specifically discussed how to face the challenges of cloud computing.

(vi) Ireland

Ireland launched its "Science and technology action Support intelligence Economy" report in 2009, raising cloud computing to a national strategic level, as the main driver of national economic development. In 2012, Ireland released its cloud Computing strategy report, which plans to use cloud computing to provide public services in a number of government departments. In addition, a cloud computing application guide, SWIFT10: Cloud computing Decision Support, has been published, setting a series of standards to guide companies to better apply cloud computing.

(vii) Spain

The extent to which the Spanish public sector applies cloud computing is rather limited. In fact, cloud computing, with its cost-saving advantages, has been better developed by local governments with limited fiscal capacity, and some local governments have been using cloud computing for more than 3 years. The more popular in Spain is the private cloud (accounting for 58%), then the public cloud (accounting for 31%) and the mixed Cloud (17%).

(eight) the United Kingdom

The British government issued an ICT strategy in 2011 that mentions the deployment of a British government cloud. In the 2012, the UK successfully established cloud stores and used prepaid models to provide infrastructure, software, platforms and professional services.

Ii. Comparison of development status

Table: A comparison of the development status of e-government based on cloud computing in eight countries

5 out of 8 European countries have integrated cloud-based e-government into national strategies, while in the other 3 countries, cloud computing has been applied in individual places, such as municipalities or municipalities.

Most countries plan to apply cloud computing to the public sector at the national level, while four countries in Austria, France, Spain and the UK are planning or have developed a dedicated government cloud (G-cloud). Due to insufficient information, the situation in Finland and Germany is unknown.

The most common types of cloud computing used in 8 countries are private cloud and community cloud, and public cloud is only considered in the context of satisfying security and privacy requirements.

Of the 8 countries, 50% of the countries most commonly used in the cloud computing services model is the infrastructure as a service (IaaS), Platform, Services (PaaS) and software as a service (SaaS), depending on the actual situation of each country, such as France focused on IaaS, Denmark's preference for SaaS, Other countries have chosen PAAs mode.

The last column in the table lists the types of e-government services that countries plan to use in cloud computing: The IaaS service model is primarily used for cost-effective backup and archival methods, and for the promotion of government data disclosure; The PAAs service model provides e-government solutions based on cloud computing frameworks, And as the basis for local government to develop an independent e-government application; SaaS service patterns are most commonly used in e-mail services. In addition, most countries consider using cloud computing for collaborative work.

Iii. Advantages and Challenges

E-government based on cloud computing has many advantages, but it also brings many challenges.

(i) advantages

Scalability (scalability). At the 2009 World Climate conference, the Danish Government provided information technology services based on community clouds to anticipate peak load peaks before and during meetings.

Easy to implement (Easy-implementation). Spain's De government has been updating and replacing system migrations in the cloud since 2010, and has successfully moved the e-mail system (10,500 users) into the cloud.

High availability. such as Amazon EC2 or Microsoft Azure are in the service level agreement (SLAS) commitment to ensure All-weather government service availability of 99.95%.

Prepaid fee (Pay as your go). The UK government plans to use cloud computing to build a platform for public-sector sharing and reuse of applications that use prepaid models for application management.

Low cost. The Spanish Culpepper Municipal council is using virtual desktop terminals to update civil service desktops to save costs and maintenance costs.

(ii) challenges

Security challenges. Security challenges remain one of the biggest challenges to cloud computing services. Private cloud and community cloud are now favored by many countries for providing more control settings and infrastructure to protect data security. Cloud computing service providers typically guarantee levels of security through service level agreements (SLAs) or certification (such as ISO27001), such as the White Paper on security recommendations for cloud services providers issued by the German government, which sets out the security level requirements for public sector cloud computing information.

Data protection challenges. In order to comply with data protection regulations, some countries (such as France, Britain) will deploy dedicated government clouds to store sensitive information in their territories. Individual countries are abandoned because the public cloud lacks protection for sensitive data.

Interoperability and data migration challenges. To avoid interoperability and data migration issues, many countries, such as the UK, use open source components and open standards for cloud-based e-government.

Authentication and identification challenges. E-government applications based on cloud computing require a more secure and reliable authentication and recognition system. Some cloud computing service providers are already offering this service, which can be seen as the key to driving e-government further into the cloud, such as the Austrian cloud computing service provider, Fabasoft, which provides secure identification for electronic IDs in countries such as Austria, Germany and Switzerland.

Review the challenges. General public cloud service providers cannot easily be reviewed, and only private cloud or community clouds in individual countries can be implemented.

All in all, according to the European Union's Network and information Security Agency, all EU governments should integrate cloud-based e-government into national strategies. Such national strategies should focus on the security and resilience of cloud computing and avoid incompatible issues, thus ensuring interoperability of operational platforms and data formats.

Iv. Summary

High scalability and huge cost-saving potential are unique advantages of cloud computing, and the public sector can benefit from it. Many European countries are already using cloud computing in some sectors of the public sector, while others are planning.

Half of the 8 European countries that have taken cloud computing into the country's strategic dimension, but most of the country's cloud-based e-government is still in the early stages of development. Cloud-based E-government in 8 countries is made up of specific private clouds and community clouds that governments serve. Because private clouds and community clouds are more tightly compliant with national rules and regulations than public clouds, there are still countries that use public clouds to handle low-risk and insensitive information. For public sector applications, all cloud computing service patterns (IaaS, PAAs, and SaaS) apply.

Source: European Government Cloud Report of Technical University of Graz, Austria

Compiling: Zhang Jing Wang, Center for International Economic and Technical cooperation, Ministry of Industry and Information technology

(Responsible editor: Mengyishan)