EU takes initiatives to bolster online services 

Brian Cowen, the Irish foreign affairs minister, has signed the Council of Europe's "Convention on Information and Legal Co-operation Concerning Information Society Services " on behalf of the EU. The treaty establishes a notification system by which countries wishing to legislate on e-services are compelled to give prior notice to fellow signatories. The system is designed to ensure that regulations adopted in one country do not adversely affect online services in another country.

The ratification, on 22 March, comes only days after the Commission opened its 2004 version of the e-TEN programme. E-TEN is designed to support the deployment of online services rather than infrastructure, which can be funded under the structural funds to reduce disparities between regions. E-TEN follows the objectives of the e-Europe 2005 Action plan on e-government, e-health and e-learning with an annual budget of 42 million euros for 2004. Other areas to be funded under the plan include services for SMEs, e-inclusion and trust and security of e-services.