Re:Ask HN: Should the government provide email to its citizen?
by cookiengineer on Thursday July 27, 2023 @02:55AM
(#36889923)
If a government wants citizen to fill out forms online in a mandatory fashion, I think they have to provide free access to internet and email.
The current state where they tell you "to use the internet connection of a friend" when you don't have internet is kind of ridiculous, especially for migrating people from foreign countries that are overwhelmed by European bureaucracies.
You should try getting an internet contract when you don't already own a smartphone. It's impossible, because all ISPs require some form of web identification with shitty apps and your passport that's being recorded.
In Germany we had the "de-mail" for a while with exactly that purpose. But in a government fashion they ridiculously fucked it up, using a proprietary encryption and signing mechanism that never worked up until the point that de-mails were blocked everywhere and all "licensed" providers of that stopped servicing it.
The current state where they tell you "to use the internet connection of a friend" when you don't have internet is kind of ridiculous, especially for migrating people from foreign countries that are overwhelmed by European bureaucracies.
You should try getting an internet contract when you don't already own a smartphone. It's impossible, because all ISPs require some form of web identification with shitty apps and your passport that's being recorded.
In Germany we had the "de-mail" for a while with exactly that purpose. But in a government fashion they ridiculously fucked it up, using a proprietary encryption and signing mechanism that never worked up until the point that de-mails were blocked everywhere and all "licensed" providers of that stopped servicing it.