Starting today Wednesday November 6, 2024 the project IT-Walletwhich started on 23 October with the possibility for the first 50,000 Italian citizens to import their driving license and health card into the digital wallet of the IO app, extends the service to 250,000 Italian citizens. As the reach of IT-Wallet grows (on December 30th it will be extended to another million people and from December 4th it will be available to everyone), a proliferation of conspiracy theories according to which behind this innovation there would be a alleged secret plan to register the populationspy on and control her through the use of digital devices. However, things are not like that at all: so let’s debunk them hoaxes circulating online on IT-Wallet explaining why concerns about its adoption are unfounded.
IT-Wallet is not like the Green Pass: the digital wallet is not mandatory
The first major misunderstanding circulating online concerns an alleged association between IT Wallet and the Green Pass: IT-Wallet is a non-mandatory and free digital wallet service. Some argue that driving license digitization will be a dangerous tool to “lock out” people, as happened with “green certification” during the COVID-19 pandemic. This statement is completely unfounded: IT-Wallet has nothing to do with the Green Pass, which was a tool to allow the authorities to monitor the progress of the infection and the vaccination status of citizens. On the other hand, the digital driving license and other digitized documents do not contain health data or information related to vaccination and, in any case, their introduction does not change the way in which data is already managed by the State.
Furthermore, another fundamental point must be clarified: IT Wallet is not mandatoryjust as the electronic identity card or the SPID are not. It will not be a document that all people will be forced to have or use, as the Green Pass was to access many places. Those who do not wish to use IT-Wallet, as they prefer to carry paper documents with them, will be able to continue to do so without any limitations. Fears of being forced to own a “digital wallet” they do not rest on any foundation.
IT-Wallet: is our data safe?
Another argument circulating among conspiracy theorists concerns the possibility that digitized documents could be used as control tool by the government to limit the freedom of citizens. This too is a concern that is not based on any logical basis: the data relating to the driving licence, the health card and any other identification document they are already stored in centralized digital systemsaccessible if necessary by the police, without the need to digitize these documents in an ad hoc online archive.
Some fear that hackers or cyber attacks could compromise the security of scanned documents. If on the one hand it is true that no computer system is unassailable (as the news of recent days unfortunately demonstrates very well) it is also true that IT-Wallet has been designed to comply with very high security standardswith advanced systems for the protection and safeguarding of citizen data. The management of the platform is entrusted to public bodies, such asAgID (Agency for Digital Italy) and theState Printing Institute and Mintwho have the task of guaranteeing its reliability and safety.
We reiterate: this does not mean that the system is perfect and totally immune from risks. However, if we trust private companies that have sensitive data concerning us (among these there are the companies that develop the social networks used by the conspiracy theorists themselves) we can also have a certain trust in public companies where some of the greatest experts work. of information security in our country.
