Blockchain
Say hello to Europeum. EU blockchain project will impact citizens’ ‘everyday life’, officials vow – DL News
- Ten EU countries have agreed on a block-level blockchain.
- The project will provide tools for the public and businesses.
- The so-called Europeum project is an attempt at EU sovereignty.
Europe hopes its own blockchain will help it free itself from dependence on US technology.
On Tuesday, the European Union created a new organization designed to introduce blockchain infrastructure and revamp record-keeping and data transfer between the bloc’s 27 member states.
The launch took place during a meeting of telecommunications ministers at the European Council in Brussels. Lawmakers also approved the EU’s basic law on artificial intelligence.
“Europeum will have a tangible presence in the daily lives of European citizens.”
— Mathieu Michel, Belgian State Secretary for Digitalisation.
Blockchain infrastructure will impact both individuals and companies, said Mathieu Michel, Belgian state secretary for digitalisation.
Michel, who pushed for the blockchain project administered by EU states, dubbed it Europeum.
“Europeum will have a tangible presence in the daily lives of European citizens,” he said at a press conference.
It would allow citizens to trace the origins of their products and allow companies to protect their intellectual property by keeping data on immutable blockchain networks, he said.
Ten European member states, including Italy, Poland and Greece, have agreed to help manage and implement the EU blockchain. Other European countries will still be able to use blockchain infrastructure.
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More nations are expected to join, Michel said.
Germany and France have not committed to the agreement. However, the latter supported the project, Michel said DL News Before.
Europeum for sovereignty
“We need to create a new sovereign infrastructure, instead of depending on Amazon Web Services for telecommunications,” Michel said DL News at an event in early May, alluding to the online retailer’s global cloud computing business.
The idea is that digital identities, wallets, credentials and licenses will be registered on Europeum.
Michel hopes that blockchain infrastructure will translate legal and bureaucratic processes into automated smart contracts efficiently. And that will support metaverse applications, as well as the European Central Bank’s digital euro.
Digital twins
“We talk about the future of digital twins or the metaverse, so we need a sovereign infrastructure that can meet important criteria such as singularity, security, privacy, interoperability.”
The blockchain infrastructure has been under construction since 2017. Under the auspices of an agency called European Blockchain and Services Infrastructure.
Developers and companies have created a prototype that already works today, European Commission officials said DL News.
Since the European Commission does not have a legal basis to operate a blockchain for use by European citizens, it remained in pilot mode.
That is why the project is now transformed into a so-called European Digital Infrastructure Consortium, a multinational project supported by the European Commission.
These consortia are part of the European Digital Decade 2030 Policy Programme, a project that has €165 billion to support its objectives.
“People don’t need to be happy that Europeum exists,” Michel said during the interview.
“They just need to know that if data is exchanged between countries, governments or companies, its use is safe.”
Inbar Preiss is DL News’ Correspondent from Brussels. Contact the author at inbar@dlnews.com.