- Use of x.509 user certificates to access many government services online. - Getting a government ID right away at the appointment (from the police of all places) - FTTH 600Mbit/s symmetrical. Three days after ordering it. - Digital health record (At least in some regions)
But then, Spain has also some of the poorest regions of Europe. And from what I heard, aristocrats own large areas of land.
- Use of x.509 is nice but the installation process is tricky for non-experts (the root certificates are not trusted by your OS or browser) and yearly the root certificates need to be changed for reasons that escape my understanding. Usually root certificates should have longer lives, but somehow every year I have to update them. Are they being compromised?!?
- The government ID process is a breeze in comparison with other EU countries and quite cheap in comparison, too. The ID card is itself a smart card with your certificates (this is quite common in the EU). The newest ID card also has NFC and can be used to authenticate with government institutions with your phone, quite neat!
- FTTH penetration is quite nice, indeed. Internet prices are also reasonably low and internet packs don't have bullshit restrictions on downloads.
- One of the quirkiest/funniest examples of a digitalization miss was dealing with the notary on a recent house purchase of a family member. After everything was done we received a copy from the notary with the official documents of the property registration, which included as an annex a printed XML with the GML detailing the limits of the property. When I asked for the digital version of said XML we received a PDF with a scan of said XML. I laughed and desisted in my effort to obtain the .xml file. It shows that things are headed in the right direction but there are some hiccups when the rubber meets the road, in this case the notary or its secretary were technologically illiterate and did not receive any formation on how to handle this type of documents.
It is not needed yearly. The validity is 4 years for "personal" certificates: https://www.sede.fnmt.gob.es/preguntas-frecuentes/problemas-...
> (the root certificates are not trusted by your OS or browser
You can use the Automatic Configurator. Just run the "Configurador FNMT-RCM.". It should help your less tech savvy acquaintances.
> we received a copy from the notary with the official documents of the property registration, which included as an annex a printed XML with the GML detailing the limits of the property.
That's funny, but I agree it is a missed opportunity.
> It is not needed yearly. The validity is 4 years for "personal" certificates:
Indeed, the "personal" certificate is invalidated each 4 years and you have to visit the police to get a new one.
What I meant is that the root (or subordinates) certificates of the FNMT are revoked with a surprisingly high frequency. With "yearly" I mean that roughly every year I have to see what's up with the certificates on my dad's computer as he complains he cannot log in anymore to AEAT, at first I assumed he misconfigured something but nope it's the public certificate of the root or subordinate CAs that have to be changed as the previous ones are revoked. This is done with a noticeably higher frequency than needed.
This has happened several times and always leaves me baffled as what could be the reason.
Are you sure? As far as I know, your OS doesn't need to recognise the root certificate to authenticate yourself towards a web-server, the web-server needs to know it.
At least when I was working with client certificates, I was working with a self-signed one, and I didn't need to register my CA, I just dropped it with the web-server, which was doing the validation.
I tried it now with a MacOS, and the certificate is marked as not trusted, but I can present it to the server, and it validates it.
> Indeed, the "personal" certificate is invalidated each 4 years and you have to visit the police to get a new one.
As I read it, you can renovate it online 60 days before expiry: https://www.sede.fnmt.gob.es/en/certificados/persona-fisica/...
Also rather with the AEAT, if you prefer.
That's true for the spanish national's ID (the DNI) but for foreigners, even EU ones, it's a huge pain. I've lived in a couple of EU coutries and only Spain asked EU members for a special card (NIE), private health insurance, bank account details, etc
If it makes you feel any better, it can be much worse. I present to you Belgium's bureaucracy! Obtaining residence in Belgium includes circular dependencies (you need bank account and work contract to obtain residence, you need residence to obtain bank account). Multiple visits to the administration for different steps. A visit by the Police to your house (usually during work-hours), including inviting them over to snoop around. And the entire process takes between 6 to 12 months due to the slowness of everything. If you switch from one town to another you have to re-register again (a quicker process that still requires a visit to the town hall) and another visit by the Police to snoop around again.
My experience in the UK and Germany (as a EU citizen and pre-brexit UK) has been that you get there and that's it, you can rent a house you can register with the doctor. There's no special card, there's no police involved. It's how I'd expect the idea of free movement within the EU to work.
I understand the problem with people coming to Spain to just get a surgery but surely for a EU citizen it could be simpler since the idea is that we all have the same rights. I don't think the health system in Spain is much different to the NHS where there's no payment involved.
You are right. That's the part about "easy tax collection system, and many other public technologies".
But, even in big cities, the people with money are technology uneducated. Many of them tried to move to tech before the dot-com bubble. But to move money from hosing to tech was the worse investment ever. 5 yeas later the tech stocks were worthless while housing was booming. Bad timing, but the result is that investors saw tech as too high risk, and hosing as a safe ever increasing investment.
> Spain has also some of the poorest regions of Europe
That is true, but I do not see that as part of the problem. Madrid and Barcelona are in the top 5 metropolitan areas of Europe. There is limitless potential in that cities.
Mainly foreign investments is using that potential. That is the reason I moved to Sweden, I wanted to be closer to where the important decisions are taken. And Swedish companies are really kind on empowering employees, it is way worse with countries were top down management is more prevalent.
The poor regions are going to need help form the most developed ones. But, that is not possible if the economy of large cities is also based in tourism.
Remove London from the UK and you will see what I mean. The UK is a rich country, but it starts in London. Spain is poor because Madrid and Barcelona (and other big cities) are not using their citizens full potential.
On the other hand there are quite a few reasons to despise tech in its current state because it is connected to larger predatory companies.
The reasons are economic. To build vacation apartments for locals and foreigners is a big business and the tourism industry is easier to understand and has less risk (until 2020 I guess) than the tech industry. So, politic and industry leaders are not interested in tech.
Luckily that is changing with many international companies creating offices in the country to take advantage of the existing talent and, as a side effect, inspiring more locals to work in the tech industry.
I love the country's easy tax collection system, and many other public technologies. But, there is still too many misconceptions.
I will not get into the historical reasons (also related to agriculture and politics) that made tech difficult to penetrate in Spain.
Anti-intellectualism also has been rampant in the arts. Many people equated being educated to understand art (literature, painting, wine tasting) and despise technology.
I am hopeful with a new generation growing to understand better technology, and if the current circumstances should have a positive side, to be wary of a tourism focused economy.
That police struggles with tech, is just on of many situations that older generations still struggle with a technology that learned to see as a lesser subject than others.