After a one-year trial, the online complaint filing service (PEL) for property damage has been extended to the entire country. An ultra-secure alternative which aims to relieve congestion at police stations.
The Government is continuing its strategy of digitalization of the administrative services of the French State, in particular with the arrival of the digital driving license and the deployment of the e-vital card planned for the end of 2025. But it does not intend to stop there! While he is working to modernize law enforcement, he has been striving for several years to dematerialize the filing of complaints, in order to relieve congestion at police stations and reduce waiting times. Thus, he launched THESEE, a service for filing complaints online dedicated to e-scams (account hacking, attempted extortion, ransomware, Internet fraud and scams, etc.), which has been very successful. At the same time, it is gradually rolling out a complaint submission service by videoconference.
After a first experiment in Gironde last year, another online complaint filing system, simply called “Online Complaint” (PEL), was deployed a few weeks ago throughout France. But be careful, this only concerns acts of damage to property. This makes the process a little easier, even if you get a little lost with all these platforms!
Online complaint: what are the facts involved?
3.5 million complaints, including 2.8 million concerning property damage, are filed each year in France. Also, the Ministry of the Interior has made a point of dematerializing the process. The PEL system therefore makes it possible to file a complaint against , you have to go through the THESEE platform.
Please note, it is impossible to use this device when the victim knows the perpetrator or if she is a minor. In this case, you must file a complaint in the “classic” manner at a police station or gendarmerie, or by mail to the judicial court of the place of the offense or the domicile of the perpetrator.
Online complaint: what is the procedure to follow?
The online pre-complaint already existed, but you had to travel to finalize the procedure. It is now possible to file a complaint entirely online. To do this, you must go to the My Security platform and identify yourself using your France Connect account, theidentification solution created by the State to facilitate connection to several hundred online services. This system thus makes it possible to avoid fraudulent declarations and secures the entire process.
The victim must then complete a detailed form and upload the necessary supporting documents. The declaration must contain as much information as possible about the offense before being validated and digitally signed. Once sent, the complaint is responded to within 48 hours and processed, with some exceptions, within the following seven days. The progress of the file is then monitored by email. Sometimes, the police can contact the depositary by email so that he can complete his declaration at a police station or gendarmerie.
Please note, it is possible that the complaint will be rejected if the facts do not constitute an offense. Here again, everything is explained in an email. This type of situation can happen when the declaration is not made in the right place. In the event of bank card fraud, for example, the complaint must be filed on Perceval, the dedicated platform – yes, that’s a lot of platforms.
Online Complaint: an ultra-secure system
The new online complaint system was developed by Oodrive, a French company specializing in secure collaborative solutions. This has developed an infrastructure meeting extremely demanding standards. It has also obtained the SecNumCloud label, issued by ANSSI and which ensuresone of the highest levels of security on the market.
The infrastructure combines several advanced security mechanisms. Thus, the data is hosted in France and in the European Union, which makes it possible to avoid legislation with extraterritorial scope, such as the American Cloud Act – thanks to these laws, the American authorities can require in certain cases that operators American cloud providers provide them with the data stored at home, wherever it is in the world. As for encryption and confidentiality protocols, they comply with ISO 27001 and 27701 certifications, which validate the management and protection of sensitive personal information. Finally, the documents associated with complaints are stored in a single space, accessible only to the complainant and the authorized authorities. It could hardly be more secure!