It has been impossible to use Ameli identifiers via FranceConnect for a few weeks. Officially, it’s due to lasting technical maintenance. But security concerns are now in question.
What is happening with the interconnection between Health Insurance (Ameli) and the FranceConnect portal? For the past few weeks, it has no longer been possible to use the identifiers of the first to connect to other public service platforms, such as the tax site. The button is grayed out and an “unavailable” message is visible when hovering the mouse over it.
Officially, it’s due to a ” technical maintenance ” that access by Ameli to FranceConnect is suspended, can we read on the site of the general direction of public finances. No details are given on the causes that justified this intervention. As for the timetable for returning to service, it is also very vague: the outage will last “ until further notice. »
If FranceConnect remains operational through other connection tools (five other methods are listed, including access codes to the tax site and La Poste’s digital identity tool), the interruption targeting Ameli deprives individuals a familiar solution that is widely used, in the same way as access via the tax site.
However, this proves to be a handicap with regard to the increasingly central role that FranceConnect intends to take. This access portal for public services actually serves as a global gateway, through a unified connection system. More than a thousand administrative procedures are attached to FranceConnect today, which allows you to use only one username and password.
Of course, it is still possible to connect to each administrative platform with the corresponding username and password. FranceConnect remains optional. But the site turns out to be very convenient. Among a growing number of individuals, its use has become essential. Any disturbance on FranceConnect can therefore cause difficulties for individuals who need to take action.
For the time being, Internet users have no other choice than to refer to one of the five other remaining solutions. This is also the advice on the site of the Directorate General of Public Finance. On the Ameli side, FranceConnect is not offered as a connection solution. And its maintenance problem is not mentioned in its pages, according to our findings.
A phishing campaign usurping FranceConnect
But in the August 31 edition of Le Canard Enchaîné, we learn that it was not just for simple technical maintenance that this interruption was taken. It is indicated that the National Health Insurance Fund (Cnam) sent a letter to the Interministerial Digital Department (Dinum) to complain about an insufficient level of security.
Cnam has withdrawn from FranceConnect, according to information from Duck, cited by BFM Tech. For its part, the Dinum admitted to the weekly ” an upsurge in reports passing through FranceConnect “. Ameli is a regular target, with recurring campaigns of fraudulent phone calls, emails and text messages.
You can also regularly read warning messages on the pages of Ameli and FranceConnect. The latter also states: that a phishing campaign is currently in progress in the form of e-mails imitating the notifications sent by FranceConnect after each connection “. The goal ? Retrieve login credentials.
Still according to Le Canard, security measures were deployed during the summer by Dinum, with the aim of maintaining good usability of the service by as many people as possible – it’s a complicated balance, because tightening the protections is sometimes done to the detriment of the convenience of use. And the goal is not to make this platform a site reserved for nerd.
These new protections have, for the time being, not made Ameli bend. In any case, the cut with FranceConnect is still visible. In a page published on August 31, Health Insurance also reminds the public of the risks of phishing. And warns that phishing attempts use FranceConnect. Sign that the concern for usurpation of the service continues.