Estonian Prime Minister Taavi Rõivas visited Duke Wednesday to discuss how his government has used technology to improve its citizens’ lives.
Rõivas—the youngest leader in the European Union—delivered a talk at the Sanford School of Public Policy called, “A 21st Century State: Anything is Possible.” He explained that his country’s emphasis on national security, fiscal prudence, a free-market economy and technology are the reasons for Estonia’s significant economic growth since regaining independence in 1991.
Blockchain’s public sector use goes beyond payments.
The Estonian Government will use Blockchain technology to protect citizens’ electronic health records.
Digital transactions made with Blockchain technology are irreversibly recorded. The records are impossible to change because they are shared globally across thousands of computers in real time through a distributed ledger.
Read more: Estonia using Blockchain to secure health records
Data security startup Guardtime has announced a partnership with the Estonian eHealth Foundation that will see it deploy a blockchain-based system to secure over 1 million patient healthcare records.
Under the deal, the foundation will integrate Guardtime's keyless signature infrastructure (KSI) blockchain into the foundation's Oracle database engine to provide "real-time visibility" into the state of patient records.
Read more: Blockchain Startup to Secure 1 Million e-Health Records in Estonia
In the framework of constitutional reforms in Armenia, the new electoral code addresses the introduction of electronic voting among other things. PanARMENIAN.Net spoke to Katrin Nyman-Metcalf, the Head of Research at the Estonian e-Governance Academy and the Head of the Chair of Law and Technology at Tallinn Law School about the peculiarities of e-voting in Estonia and the challenges the system faces worldwide.
The Baltic country is ‘looking for a solution instead of prohibiting a new form of business,’ President Ilves says.
In what Estonia claims as a European first, Uber and similar ride-sharing services are now officially regulated in the country and can legally compete with traditional taxis.
Under the law approved by parliament last week, drivers can provide “negotiated passenger transport” services in vehicles with up to nine seats, but only electronically, not by picking up fares on the street, New Europe reported.