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Sectioin 3. Managemen
https://doi.org/10.29013/EJEMS-20-2-14-20
Nguyen Huu Xuyen, PhD, National Institute of Patent and Technology Exploitation, Vietnam E-mail: huuxuyenbk@gmail.com Dang Minh Tuan, PhD, Nguyen Trung Hung, BS CMC Institute of Science and Technology, Vietnam
Nguyen Xuan Ha, PhD, Hanoi University of Science and Technology
Tran Duc Can, PhD, University of Economics Technology for Industries, Vietnam
THE APPLYING OF INTERNET OF THINGS (IOT) IN BUIDING E-GOVERNMENT OF ESTONIA AND LESSONS FOR VIETNAM
Abstract. Building the e-government plays an important role in the interaction between the Government and the citizen, and creates favorable conditions for citizen to exercise their democratic rights and participate in state management. IoT application in buiding e-government is interested by many countries in the world, especially Estonia is the country that with 99% of online public services and having many successes in construction and operation e-government. In Vietnam, building the e-government is interested in by the Party and the State to better serve the citizen, towards the openness and transparency of state management agencies' activities on the network. Despite certain achievements in the development of e-government, the implementation has not been as effective as expected. Vietnam is currently at an average level in the ranking table of development Indicators of the United Nations for e-government. Based on the experience of Estonia, the article offers lessons suitable to Vietnam's context on the application of IoT in building e-government. The paper is part of the research results of the topic "Construction technology map and technological innovation roadmap in developing and applying IoT in Vietnam", code: BM.40.DA/19.
Keywords: IoT application, E-government.
1. Overview of research ernment will change the mode of production and
E-government is an inevitable trend the devel- supply of public services to better serve the citizen. opment of public administration of nations. E-gov- Building an e-government depends heavily on the
development speed of technology, technological infrastructure, national culture and technology, and high quality human resources to be able to effectively exploit and use the policies of government.
Up to now, there are many different views on e-government. According to the World Bank (2002), e-government means a systematic use of information technology by government agencies to make relationships with citizens, businesses and social organizations. Thereby transactions of government agencies with citizens and organizations will be improved, contributed to reducing corruption, enhanced publicity, convenience, reduce costs, and contribute to economic growth. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development argues that [16], e-government refers to the use of new government communication technology to perform various government functions, in which the internet brings about changes in government structure and mode of operation. And United Nations [18] shown that, e-government is the government that exploits the Internet and web features worldwide to provide information and services to people and others in society.
In addition to internet and web applications, e-government also includes other information technology applications such as electronic databases, networks, automated services, multimedia, personal identification technology [14]. E-government is the continuous optimization of service delivery, election participation and management by changing internal and external relationships through technology of Internet and new means [13]. Developing the e-government and maintaining this system requires the cooperation of both internal and external stakeholders, such as leaders at all levels, heads of agencies, information technology professionals and personnel operators, citizens and businesses [7].
Although there are different concepts, but it can be understood that e-government is application of information and communication technology for government agencies to innovate, work more effectively,
services to citizens, businesses and organizations; At the same time, it creates more favorable conditions for people to exercise their democratic rights in participating in the state management. E-government consists of main three entities: citizens, government and business. The interactions between the three entities include: Relationship between government and citizens (G2C - Governmnet to Citizens), government and Business (G2B- Governmnent to Business), relations between government agencies (G2G- Government to Government).
E-government has many differences compared to traditional government. For the traditional government, the internal administrative process of state agencies is manual, laborious, time consuming. People cannot contact the government, state administrative agencies outside office hours, cannot be anywhere outside the headquarters of state agencies. People cannot register for a business license, make a birth certificate for their children or pay registration tax 24/24, 7/7 days and anywhere. E-government can overcome the above limitations of traditional government. In addition, the automation of administrative procedures of e-government allows processing procedures much faster, more compact, and simpler. Not only that, the information provided to people is also full, accurate, easy and more transparent.
Thus, building e-government and applying IoT in building e-government is an inevitable trend. However, the building depends on the conditions of resources and development level of each country, but they have the following general conditions [4, 11-20]: Building a solid information infrastructure on the basis of developing electronic data centers and computer networks with super hightway Infomation; universalizing the IT culture among the people, creating a premise to form a knowledge society; develop new business methods based on information technology; retrain the labor force and create new occupations and jobs; restructuring the system of state management agencies such as apparatuses, personnel, computerizing in order to
increase the operational efficiency of government agencies.
2. Research method
In order to have the lesson for Vietnam on the application of IoT in building e-government, the research team inherited published studies related to IoT, relating to building and operating the e-gov-ernment in general and at the Estonia in particular; At the same time, refering to the information from website (https://e-estonia.com/) to better understand the current situation and solutions to build e-government in Estonia.
For more information, the research team conducted discussions and interviews with some employees and managers in Estonian businesses and academy such as the Company of Levikom, Proek-spert Company, Cityntel Company, 1oT Company, Estonian Electronic Showroom, Mobilab Company, ReachU Company, and Electronic Government Academy - EGA. The results of the interviews were summarized, analyzed to clarify the assessments of IoT applications in building Estonia's e-government.
3. Research results
3.1. Building the e-government of Estonia
Estonia has encountered difficulties after separating from the Soviet Union, but until now, has become the focus of technology development and software development as well as being at the forefront of educational policy. According to Joseph M. Ellis (2018), Estonia is a model of e-government. It was built to support the government's work in a more efficient, sustainable, democratic and transparent manner. The foundation of this model is a national database that allows people to solve everything from paying taxes to voting. Each person will be issued an electronic identification card with a digital identifier. As a result, they can carry out any electronic transaction from paying taxes to paying bus tickets anywhere and anytime.
According to Hannes Astok [12], the process of building e-government has been going on since the 1990s, with the philosophy "Information technology
is the future of the country". The Government has drastic and exemplary guidance from the highest level of leadership. Specifically, the Prime Minister of Estonia has always been the direct leader and decision maker of information technology application policies and building the country's e-government. As for the Ministers and gencies will direct the application of information technology, building e-government of the Ministry and the agency under their responsibility. In addition, Estonia has built a national public service portal (https://www.eesti.ee) to provide up to 99% ofessen-tial services (1,500 online services) to citizens, businesses and establish citizen registration management system, authentication system via electronic citizen code (eID), authentication via phone number (MobileID). Having to 99% ofEstonian citizens have been granted a unique identification number (eID), and an electronic ID card with a digital signature to conduct transactions with state agencies, currently have about 14,000 accesses per day at https://www.eesti.ee.
To facilitate interaction between the government and the people, Estonia has applied IoT, building an X-Road platform to connect information systems and databases of state agencies. This system allows linking between different information systems. To date, about 1,000 agencies and organizations have connected to X-Road. Each information system has its own database but all are connected via X-Road and for information security, all data sent from X-Road is encrypted and digitally signed. All messages sent in the system are signed. The digital signatures are certified by X-Road central authority. All incoming messages are recorded and time stamped. Central agency X-Road provides time stamping services. The recipient of the message can then demonstrate with the help of the central agency X-Road. The system has been operating since 2001 with more than 2000 connected electronic services, more than 900 registered organizations and databases, more than 350 million transactions in a year.
The results of interviews and surveys at some Estonian companies and e-government showroom
(1/2020) show that: The success of building e-gov-ernment by having of intelligent infrastructure and secure services ecosystems, with IoT connectivity solutions in various fields such as e-identify, security and safety, health care, e-government, mobile services, business business and finance, education, and etc, specifically:
- E-identify includes ID-card, mobile-ID, smart-ID, e-Residency services: 99% of Estonians have identity cards, 91.6% use the internet regularly, more than 700 million electronic signatures, and every citizen can provide electronic signatures to identify and use electrical services safely.
- Security and safety: Estonia is a country that uses blockchain technology at the national level to ensure the integrity of data stored in government databases and protect data against threats network security. In addition, Estonia has developed an electronic law system (e-Law), an electronic judicial system (e-Justice) and an electronic police system (e-Police).
- Health care: Estonia's health care system has been revolutionized by electronic solutions, 99% of data on health and prescription are digitized, and there are about 2.3 million queries of Doctors every month, 100% using electronic bills in healthcare. Patients, doctors, health facilities, and governments all benefit from electronic health services. Estonian citizens who have ever had a medical exam have an electronic health record online. Health information is determined by an electronic identification code that is highly confidential and accessible to authorized individuals and organizations.
- E-government: Estonia has 99% ofpublic services available online 24/7. By the safe, convenient and flexible digital ecosystem, Estonia has reached a level of transparency in governance and building trust in the digital society. Therefore, Estonia has saved more than 844 years of annual working time and became a favorable environment, actively supporting businesses and entrepreneurs.
- Business and finance: Modern electronic solutions make setting up and running a business in Es-
tonia quick and easy. Solutions such as e-signatures, e-tax, e-banking, e-business registration, or online public records have reduced bureaucracy to a minimum and created a favorable environment for operations production and business activities.
- Education: Estonia every citizen has the training and knowledge necessary to access modern digital infrastructure for using future. Estonia has completed its education information system since 2005; it is a database that collects all information related to education such as educational institutions, students, teachers, lecturers, graduation documents, learning materials and curriculum.
In addition, Estonia has built an information system for government meetings (e-Cabinet) to monitor, manage meetings, research, process electronic documents and records online to serve the government and the system of policy consultation (e-Consultation). Draft documents and policies after being consulted by related subjects via e-consulta-tion will be sent to e-Cabinet for ministers to study, absorb and direct editing. These systems help reduce the time and paperwork for government meetings; support inter-ministerial policy consultations, consult citizens on draft legislative documents or draft policies. The priority resource for annual economic transformation and e-government in Estonia is an investment budget of 1.4% of the government's cost.
3.2. Building Vietnam's e-government
Since the 2000s, Vietnam has always attached importance to the development and application of information technology in operations of state management agencies, which is a driving force contributing to national renewal, industrialization and modernization. In 2014, Vietnam issued Resolution No.36-NQ/TW of the Politburo on promoting the application and development of information technology to meet the requirements of sustainable development and international integration. The Resolution has set specific targets by 2020 "to effectively implement the administrative reform program, closely linked to the development of e-Government and to provide high-
level online public services and in many sectors". In 2015, the Government issued Resolution 36a/NQ-CP on e-Government in order to promote the development of e-government, improve the quality and performance of state agencies to serve the people and businesses better. In 2019, the Government of Vietnam continues to promulgate Resolution No. 17/NQ-CP on a number of key tasks and solutions for e-government development in the 2019-2020 periods, with a vision to 2025.
Vietnam has early awareness of the importance of e-government, and has set certain targes. The Ministry of Information and Communications [4] has targeted, that by 2020, up to 30% of citizens' information will be automatically entered into online forms, 50% of online public services will be processed by electronic records, people do not need to the state agencies to carry out administrative procedures but do online at home. However, the implementation of e-government has not achieved the desired results despite certain improvements [6, 3-5], Vietnam's position in the United Nations e-government development Index is still at an average level. According to the United Nations [18], in 2014, 2016 and 2018, Vietnam's e-government development index has continuously increased, from 0.47 in 2014 to 0.51 in 2016 and above 0.59 in 2018, bringing Vietnam from 99 (2014) to 89 (2016) and continuing to rise to 88/193 countries, ranked 6/11 among ASEAN countries.
The above limitations are due to slow deployment, connectivity, integration of data sharing systems, integrated platforms, IoT connectivity, and electronic data sharing in unfinished ministries, branches and localities. Some important national databases in building e-government are still slow to implement, leading to the sharing of unrealized information systems, affecting e-government deployment. The handling, exchange, sending and receiving of electronic documents internally and among state agencies has not yet been effective, ocument management and operating systems of a number of different ministries, branches and localities. Along with that, the online public service is designed
sporadically, is not friendly, the process of handling administrative procedures has not guaranteed the science, investment from budget for use of information systems and IoT in association with administrative reforms is limited, no meeting the need to modernize the administration, and not strong enough to create leverage to improve the governance efficiency of the government.
4. Conclusions and recommendations
Each country has measures to build e-government in accordance with its resources. On the basis of the achievements achieved in buiding e-government of Estonia; along with the current situation, the desire to build an e-government with IoT applications of Vietnam can draw some lessons and recommendations for Vietnam on building e-government as follow:
Firstly, enhance the role and responsibility of the leader in building e-government. This shows the determination to build the e-government of the entire political system, especially the Vietnam's Prime Minister as the chairman of the National Committee on E-Government. Building an e-government contributes to promoting the people's mastery, contributes to the transparency of the national administration, and improving the governance capacity of the government, creating a premise for access to 4.0 revolution and digital economy. Accordingly, in addition to the responsibilities of the head, the tasks of implementing e-government will be evaluated in association with the individual responsibilities of the heads of each ministry, sector and locality, measured through a set of indicators evaluate efficiency, measure the quality of e-government construction results. In order to achieve the set goals, it is necessary to have the high determination of the entire political system to create a new way of operating to promoting the development and application of IoT in building e-government, thereby promoting socio-economic development.
Secondly, complete and update the e-government portal (http://egov.chinhphu.vn/), enhance
the interaction between the government and the people through this portal. Along with that is the completion of institutional improvement for the development of e-government. It is therefore necessary to develop a policy on data sharing, about protecting personal data, on electronic authentication, on the reporting regime among State administrative agencies. It is necessary to study and propose the elaboration of the e-Government Law and guiding documents to ensure the legal corridor for developing e-government based on open data, application of IoT technologies, towards a digital society.
Thirdly, to build and perfect national foundations, especially national databases on population, business, education, health, science and technology. In order to ensure the efficient use of these national databases, it is necessary to build an IoT integration platform, to share data between central and local information systems; electronic system of sending and receiving electronic documents; electronic identification authentication system; link between the Government's specialized digital signature authentication systems and public digital signatures. Especially, National payment gateway to ensure smooth data and information among government levels.
Fourth, continue to accelerate the implementation of Resolution No. 17/NQ-CP of Vietnam's governmen on a number of tasks and key solutions for e-government development to 2025, with the task of building the foundation technology platform to develop e-government as with the trend of e-government development in the world. Accordingly, it is necessary to complete the update of Vietnam's e-government architecture framework, to supplement the reference model of shared information systems and national databases. Announced and updated annually through the integration of ministerial level e-government architecture, provincial e-government architecture, shared information systems architecture and facilities national database, and ensuring that in line with the context of the fourth industrial revolution.
In addition, it is necessary to mobilize resources both financially and humanly to build e-government, along with training a contingent of civil servants and officials with skills working in the Iot environment, step by step developing IT infrastructure, speeding up the information provision from plicies, legislation of state to people and businesses through the Internet.
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