In a new report on Wednesday 11 January, the European Court of Auditors gave a positive assessment of the implementation and use of the EU Digital COVID Certificate during the pandemic. However, it said other tools, such as the contact-tracing gateway, the digital passenger location form and the platform for exchanging them between the EU Member States, were less effective and less used.
The EU Digital COVID Certificate helped coordinate travel restrictions between EU countries and was an effective way of facilitating travel during the Covid-19 pandemic, the Court said in its report.
The Member States and many third countries have made extensive use of the EU Digital Certificate system, and more than 1.7 billion have been issued in the EU and the European Economic Area (EEA) by March 2022. The auditors also found that the European Commission had “moved fast to propose suitable technical solutions”. However, these different tools have been used in very different ways by EU countries and have not all facilitated travel with the same impact.
The development of the various IT tools cost €71 million. The auditors found that the European Commission “mobilised these funds quickly and took a pragmatic approach to develop the tools under time constraints”.
However, the Commission needs to better anticipate other crises and “analyse and address the causes of the low use of European digital passenger locator forms”, the report says. It should also make communication on incidents related to EU Digital Certificates more effective and develop relevant EU tools to deal with future crises.
The report notes that the current legal basis for the EU Digital COVID Certificate expires in June 2023 and has not yet been replaced.
Link to the report: https://aeur.eu/f/4uq (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)