Online Access Act

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Basic data
Title: Law to improve online access to administrative services
Short title: Online Access Act
Abbreviation: OZG
Type: Federal law
Scope: Federal Republic of Germany
Legal matter: Administrative procedural law
References : 206-7
Issued on: Art. 9 G of 14 August 2017 ( Federal Law Gazette I p. 3122 )
Entry into force on: 18th August 2017
Last change by: Art. 77 VO of June 19, 2020
( Federal Law Gazette I p. 1328, 1337 )
Effective date of the
last change: 		June 27, 2020
(Art. 361 of June 19, 2020)
Weblink: Text of the law
Please note the note on the applicable legal version.

The Online Access Act (OZG) is a German law that was promulgated as Art. 9 of the Act to revise the federal financial equalization system from 2020 and to change budgetary regulations. It obliges the federal and state governments to also offer their administrative services electronically via administrative portals by 2022 at the latest .

On the one hand, the law aims to set up a federal portal, including a user account as an identification component. On the other hand, the law includes the linking of the federal and state administration portals to form a portal network, the provision of basic services and IT components, and the complete expansion of digital administration services by the end of 2022.

The Online Access Act was enacted on August 14, 2017. It came into force on August 18, 2017, in accordance with Art. 25 (1) of the Act on the New Regulation of the Federal Financial Equalization System from 2020 and on the Amendment of Budgetary Provisions. The implementation of the law is anchored in the coalition agreement of the grand coalition.

background

With the amendments to the Basic Law of July 13, 2017, a paragraph 5 was added to Article 91c of the Basic Law. Art. 91 (5) of the Basic Law stipulates that overarching IT access to administrative services of the Federation and the Länder is regulated by federal law with the consent of the Bundesrat. On this basis, the OZG was decided on August 14, 2017.

In fulfillment of the new joint task, the OZG wants to network the competencies of the federal, state and local governments in order to accelerate the digitization of the administration in Germany. In practice this means that the federal, state and local governments have to link their own portals with one another.

The aim of the uniform user account is to provide citizens and companies with a “digital identity” for their communication with public administration on the Internet. The user account can be used for all online administrative services and should be accepted by all portals in the network. It is therefore interoperable.

In the “overall KONSENS project ”, the federal government and the states work together in accordance with Article 108 of the Basic Law, which was also amended in July 2017, on the uniform use of IT processes and software and their uniform development in order to evenly implement the taxes administered by the states on behalf of the federal government § 1 of the KONSENS law).

Content of the law

The law obliges the federal and state governments to offer their administrative services electronically via administrative portals by 2022. In addition, the federal and state administration portals must be linked to form a portal network ( Section 1 OZG).

In § 2 OZG the terms “portal network”, “administration portal”, “administrative services”, “user”, “user account” and “IT components” are defined in the sense of the law.

The portal network ensures that users have barrier-free and seamless access to electronic administrative services via all federal and state administration portals. The federal and state governments must provide user accounts in the portal network through which users can uniformly identify themselves for the electronic administrative services available in the portal network ( Section 3 OZG).

The Federal Government, together with the IT Planning Council , is authorized to specify binding IT components in accordance with Section 2 (6) OZG. The states can deviate from the regulations made in the statutory ordinance by state law, provided that they provide suitable IT components for operation in the portal network ( § 4 OZG).

The standards required to guarantee IT security are stipulated by ordinances issued by the Federal Ministry of the Interior without the consent of the Federal Council. Here is § 9 of the Federal Data Protection Act to be considered. State law cannot deviate from the provisions made in the statutory ordinance ( Section 5 OZG).

For the communication between the information technology systems used in the portal network, the Federal Ministry of the Interior, in consultation with the IT Planning Council, defines the technical communication standards by means of a statutory ordinance without the consent of the Federal Council ( Section 6 OZG).

The federal and state governments each designate a public body that offers users the opportunity to set up a user account. At the same time, the federal and state governments determine public bodies that are allowed to register user accounts ( Section 7 OZG).

Different levels of trust can be used to identify the user of a user account. The level of trust is adapted to the respective administrative procedure ( § 8 OZG).

implementation

The federal states are currently working on the implementation, which must be completed by 2022. In addition to the close cooperation between the federal, state and local governments, the division of labor is crucial for the successful implementation of the OZG. To this end, the IT planning council has adopted the so-called OZG implementation catalog, which categorizes 575 administrative services in over 50 life and business situations in 14 subject areas.

In Bavaria, the AKDB already offers the technical and content-related services for the implementation of the OZG with its citizen service portal (BayernID). The citizen service portal (BayernID) is in productive use in the Bavarian portal network and is used by over 1300 administrations nationwide.

The eID card law of June 26, 2019 also enables non-German citizens of a member state of the European Union or a signatory to the Agreement on the European Economic Area to access German digital administrative services ( e-government services ) with a card for electronic proof of identity (eID card).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Federal Ministry of the Interior: portal network. In: bmi.bund.de. Federal Ministry of the Interior, June 13, 2019, accessed on June 13, 2019 .
  2. ↑ Act amending the Basic Law (Articles 90, 91c, 104b, 104c, 107, 108, 109a, 114, 125c, 143d, 143e, 143f, 143g) of July 13, 2017, Federal Law Gazette I p. 2347
  3. ↑ IT planning council: Interoperable service accounts for the use of administrative services: The focus is on company requirements. In: https://www.it-planungsrat.de/ . IT Planning Council, June 13, 2019, accessed on June 13, 2019 .
  4. ^ Mario Martini / Cornelius Wiesner: Citizen Account, Portal Association . In: Veit / Reichard / Wewer (ed.): Handbook on administrative reform . Springer, 2019, p. 1–13 ( springer.com [PDF]).
  5. ↑ cf. Law to improve online access to administrative services of the Berlin administration (Online Access Act Berlin - OZG Bln) Template for resolution. Berlin House of Representatives, Drs. 18/1850 from April 30, 2019
  6. ↑ cf. Project 1 - Lower Saxony administration portal Website of the Lower Saxony Ministry of the Interior and Sport, accessed on June 16, 2019
  7. ↑ IT planning council: OZG implementation catalog. In: https://www.it-planungsrat.de/ . IT Planning Council, June 13, 2019, accessed on June 13, 2019 .
  8. ↑ Free State of Bavaria: BayernID. In: https://www.buergerserviceportal.de/ . Free State of Bavaria, June 13, 2019, accessed on June 13, 2019 .
  9. ↑ Stefan Krempl: eID: Bundestag adopts electronic proof of identity for EU citizens heise.de, April 12, 2019