Final Proposal of Government Information Infrastructure Act presented in Parliament

The current Government Information Infrastructure Act was adopted in 2014 to regulate the establishment, organisation, development and use of systems, components and services of Government Information Infrastructure. It was the basis for the improvement and modernisation of Croatia’s public administration, its information professionalization and the provision of fast and reliable public services, to ensure a business enabling environment and a better standard of all citizens

'Lessons learned from its implementation so far have indicated the need to adopt a new legal framework as an incentive for a new phase of development, modernisation and digitalisation of public administration', Minister Habijan said at the beginning of his presentation.

The final proposal of the Act defines the rights, obligations and responsibilities of users of Government Information Infrastructure related to the establishment, development and management of Government Information Infrastructure, content, purpose, terms and conditions, and obligations related to the application and use of the government information infrastructure in their work, the provision of public e-services and in electronic communication with natural and legal persons.

'The purpose of this Act is to ensure users’ performance efficiency by digitising processes, improving and modernising services through the application of Government Information Infrastructure and interoperable solutions', the Minister said.

Government Information Infrastructure represents a common information and communication technology base for the operation and development of the systems of entities subject to this Act, and the purpose of Government Information Infrastructure is to enable digitalisation of processes, consolidation and cost optimisation, mutual communication and data exchange, harmonise the provision of e-services, electronic communication and delivery of documents to natural and legal persons, enable uniform access to e-services and their safe use, and consolidate electronic communication with users of Government Information Infrastructure.

'The Act stipulates that state administration bodies, other state bodies and public institutions whose sole founder is the Republic of Croatia are obliged to use Government Information Infrastructure, and it also provides for the possibility of exemption of individual users from using parts of Government Information Infrastructure for specific organisational, technological or security reasons', the Minister said.

Users of Government Information Infrastructure

In addition to the entities obliged to use Government Information Infrastructure, the Act also specifies those who may use the state information infrastructure at their own request.

These are local and regional self-government units and public institutions (co)-founded by a local or regional self-government unit, legal persons vested with public powers, economic entities and non-profit legal persons.

The new Act also provides business entities with the possibility of using some components of Government Information Infrastructure, thus facilitating the replacement of their existing systems with government solutions that have already been notified at the European Union level, and the economic sector will benefit from savings and redirecting funds to further business development.

Minister Habijan added that the e-Citizens system currently has over 2 million users and offers 109 services.

Shared Services Centre

The Act defines the Shared Services Centre as an organisational and business model of providing shared services to users, and operationally establishes the technical infrastructure for the use of shared software solutions, common information and communication infrastructure, technical services, services of accommodation of ICT equipment and consulting services on ICT application, with the aim of consolidating and rationalising Government Information Infrastructure, harmonising procedures and providing shared services to users, and the services of the Shared Services Centre are specified in the Service Catalogue.

Also, the Act prescribes the obligation to store registers containing personal data in data centers located in the territory of the Republic of Croatia that meet the necessary level of security in order to protect the personal data of Croatian citizens, while registers containing only non-personal data can be stored in data centres in Croatia or an EU Member State.

The Act defines Government Information Infrastructure networks as unclassified information and communication networks used by users of Government Information Infrastructure, namely the HITRONET, CARNET, SRCE and Healthnet networks.

Furthermore, the Act regulates the management of the HITRONet network in such a way that the Republic of Croatia entrusts the Financial Agency with the tasks of establishing, developing, managing, supervising and maintaining the HITRONet network, and entrusts the company Odašiljači i veze d.o.o. Zagreb with the tasks of building, supervising, maintaining and managing the passive infrastructure necessary for the functioning of the HITRONet network, ensuring sufficient transmission capacities and lines for the HITRONet network, and physically connecting network nodes and connecting users to the HITRONet network.

'HITRONet is the basic network of Government Information Infrastructure, owned by the Republic of Croatia, which represents the security base of the information and communication network between users and the provision of common network and application services said Minister Habijan.

'In conclusion, the new Act defines Government Information Infrastructure more precisely, with clear and unambiguous legal provisions under which the Government Information Infrastructure system will be able to meet the requirements of modern public administration, it also focuses on terminological harmonisation with other applicable regulations of the Republic of Croatia, and defines the networks of Government Information Infrastructure more precisely', the Minister concluded.

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