Germany's d-you wallet: ID first, advanced privacy features later

A digital identity wallet is a privacy promise before it is anything else. Germany's will open without its more advanced privacy features. The Bundestag has passed the Digital Identity Act, clearing the way for the d-you wallet to launch on 2 January 2027, and as netzpolitik.org reports, it will start with ID functions only. The more advanced privacy features are to follow.

That sequence decides what the wallet becomes in people's heads. The ID function is what the state needs from it. The privacy features are what the person holding the phone needs. Ship the first and promise the second, and the first users will learn d-you as an ID card on a phone. Whatever arrives later has to change a habit, not form one.

The date also sits awkwardly against Brussels. The EU is aiming for wide adoption of its digital identity wallet by December 2026, and the Commission is still studying who pays to issue it, run it and verify it. Germany now has a law and a launch date, and that date falls in the first days of 2027.

Consumers…

The Court of Justice of the EU has ruled that banks must reimburse victims of phishing for unauthorised payments right away, as Heise reports. Whether the customer bears any liability is a separate question, settled afterwards. The refund no longer waits on the argument about fault, so it is the bank that is out of pocket while that argument runs. For phishing victims across the EU, that is a concrete gain.

Businesses…

Goodweek, founded in Strasbourg, has raised 10.69 million euros to manage AI tools for small and medium-sized businesses. Its platform unifies leading AI models, ChatGPT and Mistral among them, and keeps company data isolated and unused by the third-party models. For a small firm worried about where its data goes and what AI costs, that is a real answer. It is control over the contract, though, not over the model. A slice of digital sovereignty, not the whole.

Campaigners warn that EU Inc, the pan-European company framework meant to make scaling a startup easier, is being stripped of key provisions, and Tech.eu reports that supporters are urging the tech ecosystem to press policymakers to save it. A framework that loses its key provisions before launch risks becoming a label.

Further today

• DJ Reinier Zonneveld launches AI music startup GasLab with $1M pre-seed funding · Tech.eu
• CEE Startup & Tech Weekly: New Estonian Unicorn · The Recursive
• Czech Startup Week 2026 to Connect Startups with Capital and International Opportunities · The Recursive
• CNIL Clarifies Professional Email Address Reconstruction Rights Under GDPR · CNIL
• Norwegian DPA Fines Xandr EUR 8.6M for Unlawful Processing of Grindr User Data · EDPB
• European Authorities Publish Study on Data Protection and Value Creation in Finance · CNIL
• Dutch Data Authority Investigates Websites for Misleading Cookie Banners · Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens
• UK AI fintech Sequence sold to Intuit for $200M · Tech.eu
• EU AI Act and German proposals tackle deepfake challenges · Heise Online
• London's Unravel Health raises €2.96M for at-home hormone tracking · EU-Startups

Sources

• The Bundestag passed the Digital Identity Act; the d-you wallet launches on 2 January 2027 with ID functions first and more advanced privacy features later · netzpolitik.org
• The Court of Justice of the EU ruled that banks must reimburse phishing damage immediately, separating liability from initial reimbursement · Heise Online
• Goodweek raised 10.69 million euros for a platform that manages AI tools for SMBs and keeps company data isolated · EU-Startups
• Campaigners warn the EU Inc framework is being stripped of key provisions · Tech.eu