Image: screenshot of the France Transfer home page.
To circumvent WeTransfer, a popular solution, but also problematic from the point of view of the sovereignty of data hosting, the State has designed its own digital tool to transfer the largest files, called France transfert.
Made available to ministries, France transfert supports up to 20 GB (2 GB maximum per file) in one fold, and at the same time meets the requirements of the trusted cloud, being hosted on a qualified cloud SecNumCloud by ANSSI, specifies a presentation document.
The interministerial tool was first tested by the Ministry of Culture, where “users had to regularly send, for their procedures, heavy documents such as architectural plans and images, which did not go through email” explains Estelle Cheng, product manager in the digital department of the Ministry of Culture. These constraints prompted rue de Valois to test a first prototype of the tool in July 2020, under the supervision of DINUM. The tool was then gradually rolled out to other departments.
Files kept for up to three months
Now open to all state agents, France Transfer has recorded more than 10,000 shipments and 15,000 downloads over the past two months, according to a press release. The Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs is one of the most regular users, since it has made it its default transfer tool for its 13,000 agents around the world.
State agents can send documents to each other, but also to their external interlocutors, up to 100 recipients. Only prerequisite requested: that the sender or the recipient is a State agent (the professional email address serving as proof). State agents can import a list of contacts, personalize the transfer by adding a password, a message or even by choosing the retention period for the files sent.
In its efforts to move on to sovereign solutions, the State is gradually deploying collaborative tools for administrations, such as Webconf, Audioconf, Tchap instant messaging or the Osmose and Resana platforms.