On a separate but related topic, since it relates to national IT systems, the minister has also said that the work required to render family benefits needs-based is too costly to be prioritized any time soon.

The minister gave an interview to ERR which follows.

Analysis on transitioning family benefits on to a needs-based model is currently underway. At the same time, some government politicians have expressed the hope that by 2027 at least, a shift to needs-based family benefits could be considered. How realistic is this when taking into account Estonia's national information systems?

Social support in Estonia is household-based, in other words resources available per person in a family are estimated. This means that for family support to become needs-based, the databases would need to communicate with each other.

Because a person is the owner of their data, a solution must be found to how the state can use this data. Up to now, all digital services have been useful to people and have been built on trust, which means that individuals have willingly given over their data for state use.

The first thing to consider is who is the owner of this data. Without that, more well-off individuals may remove their consent to use their data, increasing the burden on the state.

Here there are really very many questions to address which concern how to solve information systems and how we handle data, who is the owner of this data, when can it be drawn on, and how we handle this data in Estonia. All this groundwork has to be laid first.

We are not talking here about having this achieved by 2026, especially in an environment of budget cuts. I believe even 2027 would be too optimistic.

But this would require a specific political direction be given. It requires projects which clearly cost money. Should this goal be included in the government's action plan, together with certain deadlines?

There are several things to consider here. First, it is possible to make certain benefits needs-based if they only concern one individual, and not a family.

For example, there has been long-standing discussion about applying a lower pension growth index for those receiving very high pensions. In other words their pensions would still grow but only by half in comparison. We are talking about pensioners who would get receiving thousands of euros in pensions.

In these cases, database communication isn't needed, and this change would be easy to implement, requiring only a political decision.

However, when discussing data-based decisions involving multiple databases, my clear preference is to first focus on the security of these databases.

We have just seen how Russian intelligence has hacked into our data.

A study in July showed that nearly 70 percent of our databases and software are outdated and are easily compromised. This means our primary task is to route all available funds toward cybersecurity and the most important choice is which databases are even needed. This is the most important goal.

What is clear is that if cybersecurity is our most important priority, public trust in the digital society comes a close second. From there, it is a big step before we can talk about making family benefits needs-based. All these things are work in progress, but there are many steps we need to take first.

In listening to you, it seems that child benefits will not become needs-based this decade. This is despite some members of the coalition having this expectation.

To speak frankly I would place firmly state that our main goal right now is to make significant progress in cybersecurity. Second, we need to identify which databases will stay in use. Third, our goal is to render Estonia's digital state resilient.

Cyber strikes against Estonia have significantly risen, meaning we must focus on making the digital state resilient, securing databases, and boosting data utilization. These are the objectives in the coming years. I do not see needs-based family benefits being a database-related priority in the near future though.

Have you been able to make this clear to your own political party?

Eesti 200's stance is that we must move forward in enabling the state to make data-driven decisions. This is fully the right goal, and these steps which I mentioned are really in-step with this direction. It is simply that there are many preliminary steps to be taken, and we need such a long-term plan. And we are currently executing a long-term plan.

Incidentally, is this pensions rise on a needs basis being done with a political plan in mind?

Discussions on adjusting pension growth speed were part of coalition negotiations, but they didn't garner support.

This was simply the an example whereby if a benefit affects only one individual, it can be changed more quickly.

If the saga is about household-based benefits, you need to consider a family's assets, does a child have special needs, and what the other actual family requirements are.

And these insights come from various databases, which must be of high quality and communicate securely. This we cannot guarantee at present. Vice versa, our main goal is to establish a much firmer foundation for security.

How much would rendering family benefits needs-based cost?

[Former] Digital Minister Tiit Riisalo estimated that around €300 million would be needed to improve database communicationa and make progress on personalized services.

Currently, we are making cuts, so we don't have this additional funding available, from anywhere.

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