The newly upgraded system will automatically exchange residence data from each country's population register for all citizens with IDs issued in Estonia and Finland. Information about citizens' family events will also be shared.

From now on, residence data can only be submitted in one country, the Estonian Ministry of the Interior said

The exchange has been in place since 2006, when Finland started sharing information about Estonian citizens living in the country.

Finland is a popular place for Estonians to work due to the similarity of languages and culture and higher wages. The largest Estonian diaspora community is situated in Finland.

As of December 2025, there are 6,676 Finnish citizens living in Estonia and 54,920 Estonian citizens living in Finland, data from the population register shows. The countries already share tax and health information.

Enel Pungas, head of the population operations department, said the upgraded data exchange means both population registers will show the same, most recently submitted address.

"The automatic exchange of residence data between the two population registers means that if a person moves, for example, from Estonia to Finland, then regardless of their citizenship, Finland will forward their residence information to Estonia, and that data will be recorded in Estonia's population register as their place of residence," she said.

Pungas said citizens who currently have one address listed in the Estonian population register and a different one in the Finnish register will have to make a choice.

"At the beginning of the year, we will send personal letters to nearly 12,000 people with so-called dual residences to clarify which country they are more connected to in their daily lives. If we cannot determine a person's preference, they will automatically be registered as a resident of the country where their permanent residence was most recently changed," Pungas explained. "If the person is satisfied with that, then there's actually nothing they need to do or report to anyone."

The data exchange with Finland was developed by the Information Technology and Development Center of the Ministry of the Interior (SMIT).

Maie Ristissaar, head of the population services department, said this is a major step forward in the modernization of the population register.

"Finland's automated data exchange is based on the new REST X-Road services of the population register. It is a modern, flexible, and secure system for retrieving and issuing data," she said.

The Ministry of Interior has compiled a list of FAQs about the data exchange in English here.

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