Processo civile telematico
«on‐line civil trial»
Italian Ministry of Justice
Department of Judicial Organization, Personnel and Services
Giulio Borsari
IT Officer
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
Civil justice in Italy: huge numbers !
• 140 tribunals
• 26 Courts of Appeals
• 1 Supreme Court
• 465 justice of the peace offices
3.800.000 pending cases
2.800.000 new cases /year
PCT at a glance
• An e‐Government plan
• Supplies on‐line services to
– External users (lawyers, assistants, citizens and enterprises)
– Internal users (judges and court clerks)
• Key features
– Highest levels of security and confidentiality – Adoption of technological standards
– Openness to the market
200.000 active
500.000
3.000 15.000
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
Overall architecture
E‐Justice domain
Court Court
District data center District data center
e‐filing = PEC
On‐line services
Certified e‐mail system
judges
clerks
Lawyers (other practitioners)
Citizens
public/private companies Access point
Portal
PDF+XML
Digital signature attachments
Encrypted envelope
2‐factor authentication
e‐filing
e‐Filing timeline
2006 ‐ 2013 2014 2015
30/6
Mandatory by law for injunctions
+ pleadings in new cases (in all tribunals)
31/12
Mandatory for all pleadings (in all tribunals)
30/6
Mandatory also in all Courts of Appeal On a voluntary basis
When single courts and bars were ready
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
e‐Filing numbers
943.472 files e‐filed from 3.000 distinct judges
From January 2014
596.999 files e‐filed from 62.000 distinct external users
Minutes of hearing
267.381 28%
Decrees 263.511
28%
Injunction s 323.534
34%
Sentences 89.045
10%
Communications from Courts
2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
19/11
Introduction of certified mail
system (PEC)
18/2
Mandatory by law to send ONLY electronically (via PEC)
15/12
Mandatory also in criminal cases
Over 1 million
every month !
€. 40 million
saved per year
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
Available in all civil courts
More than 4.000.000 daily accesses Also via mobile Apps
Data and files available real‐time
Access to registers and files
e‐Payment of court fees
In a nutshell:
• Ministerial Portal creates a unique ID number for the transaction
• Site of bank trusts Access Point’s or Portal’s user e‐Identification
• Payment is done with any mean accepted by the bank
• The bank produces a digitally signed single‐usage receipt for Court
In the last 12 months:
15.096 payments (total income € 2.836.539)
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems 10
Investment Return
In the last 10 years
~ € 40 mln saved In only 1 year
€ 30 mln spent On
Return of Investment
Key factors
• Structured data data‐entry done only once by its producer = time saving in the courts
• Applications for external users are on the market
up‐to‐date integrated software = they do it better !
• No closing time Overcome opening times of courts
• Lawyers can work from everywhere overcome physical address for service
• Judges can work from everywhere out of office
• High‐level security, reliability and confidentiality
no exceptions
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
Obstacles objectives for the next future
• Organizational impacts due to heterogeneous practices
• Aging of court clerks (no turn over since years) cultural barriers
• Normative adaptations to paper‐based rules
interpretation problems
• Continuous specialized training and assistance needed
• High availability requested to systems have become mission critical !
• 30MB e‐filing dimension limit (due to PEC)
Lessons learned
• Keep it simple: 2006 revision to adopt PDF
(complexity for XML, encryption, etc left to vendors)
• Gradual deployment in courts: mandatory when mature
• Users need certainty
• High‐level disaster‐recovery and
monitoring required: under improvement
Italian Ministry of Justice
Directorate of Automated Information Systems
Thank you for your attention
http://pst.giustizia.it
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