Estonia, EU – Baltic States, Legislation, Technology

The company also emphasized that the company has not disclosed to the press or any other third party any kind of information that pertains to ongoing negotiations with the Police and Border Guard Board aimed at reaching an agreement, whether the information be the fact of the negotiations taking place or the content of them.

"Gemalto AG would never allow the press or any other third party interfere in similar negotiations, which by nature and in the interest of success must remain confidential," the company said.

The Estonian Police and Border Guard Board on Thursday announced to representatives of Gemalto AG that it will end compromise agreement talks regarding the compensation of expenses incurred to solve the ID-card security risk and in the next few weeks will file a statement of claim to court regarding breach of contract.

"The Police and Border Guard lack trust regarding contract partner Gemalto, who has not indicated willingness to cooperate and actual interest in entering into a compromise. The Police and Border Guard Board over the course of the control procedure carried out has collected enough information regarding the circumstance that state institutions had no information on the security risk on June 15 and Gemalto's version regarding notification about the security risk published in Postimees today [Thursday] has been disproved with evidence. We have no reason to fear the court dispute, therefore we will submit a statement of claim to court as soon as possible," Deputy Director General of the Police and Border Guard Krista Aas said in a press release.

The daily Postimees published an article on Thursday in which it notes that the Police and Border Guard Board was informed of the ID-card security breach already in June of last year, that is two months before the Police and Border Guard Board informed the public of the security flaw.

The Police and Border Guard Board and Gemalto had until now held negotiations for entering into a compromise agreement that would end the three largest disputes between them. Postimees reports that according to the compromise agreement, the Gemalto would have withdrawn from the circuit court an action against the next ID-card production period tender.

Secondly, the Police and Border Guard Board would have withdrawn a claim regarding one smaller ID-card flaw and Gemalto would have agreed to pay to the state only half of the direct expenses concerning the solving of the ID-card crisis, that is approximately 1.5 mln euros.

"Gemalto AG still wishes to achieve a compromise with the Police and Border Guard Board during negotiations, the evidence of that being the numerous and constant exchanges of information and meetings in the name of achieving an agreement. We hereby affirm that we are still making great efforts to reach that objective and fully and conclusively solve conflicts outside the court as we believe that is in the interests of both parties," Gemalto said on Friday.