What is AS4?

AS4 (= Applicability Statement 4) is a B2B interface through which data and documents can be securely exchanged between trading partners. AS4 is the standard message protocol for the European Gas Network Operators (ENTSOG) and other industries, such as the health care sector, retail, automotive & electronics.

This message protocol was developed by the technical committee OASIS (= Organization for the Advancement of Structures Information Standards). It is a secure message format based on web services. Until now, the message format AS2 (= Applicability Statement 2) was used.

INPOSIA is now officially certified AS4 PEPPOL Service Provider since 17.01.2020. From now on we are allowed to operate with AS4 in the PEPPOL network and are also listed in the list for certified AS4 PEPPOL Providers. The AS4 message protocol is mandatory by PEPPOL and from February 2020 all those who wish to transfer data to the PEPPOL network must communicate via the AS4 protocol.

Thus INPOSIA is one of the first providers to offer the AS4 protocol for PEPPOL.

The message protocol AS2 is similar in structure to the new AS4. This builds on the development and advantages of AS2. AS4 now has the possibility to actively fetch messages from the receiver, because the AS4 server is permanently activated. It also has better interaction patterns and receipt documents and works within a web service context.

• Authorship of the message is secured by digital signature
• Data security is secured by encryption
• Timely delivery is proven by a digital receipt
• AS4 Server is permanently active so that recipients can retrieve messages permanently
• Provides B2B providers with access to web services
• The electronic data exchange is independent of business hours & server availability
• Data can be received from the connected system at any time

AS4 was deliberately designed as an open standard so that first of all market access can be simplified and in the future developers can program the required extensions so that the range of functions can continue to increase.

AS4 is interesting for industries or markets that use a service-oriented architecture for B2B messaging. AS4 is mainly used in the retail, utilities & energy and healthcare sectors. For example, Cisco was one of the first companies to use AS4.

According to the EU regulation 2015/703 of 30.04.2015, the AS4 message protocol will already be binding in the supply sector, e.g. the European Gas Network Operator (ENTSOG), in countries such as Germany, Sweden, Denmark and Italy from the end of 2017 / beginning of 218. In the above-mentioned regulation, the network code was laid down with rules for interoperability and data exchange.

In folgenden Ländern wird AS4 schon eingesetzt:

Europe:

• PEPPOL
• ENTSOG
• EPREL
• e-CODEX

Australia:

• Superstream Pensionen

Japan:

• JEITA

Worldwide:

• ATA (International Air Transport Association)

In AS4, ebMS 3.0 defines specifications that result in the following message types:

• User Message = Business Payload, which is exchanged between the business applications of two parties
• Signal Message = are divided into 3 types:
  • Acknowledgement (confirmation that incoming message has been analyzed)
  • Error (confirmation that incoming message encountered a problem while parsing)
  • Pull-Request (receiver can actively retrieve messages, as the server is permanently accessible)

AS4 (unlike AS2) has a “push” function as well as a “pull” function.