Identosphere 199: DIF & Personhood Credentials • Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust • VCDM 2.0 • Identity and the Web
We curate the latest in decentralized identity, with upcoming events, applications and development in open standards, for dweb and the enterprise. Thanks for supporting by Paypal or Patreon
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Upcoming
[Berlin] SPRIND - EUDI Wallet Innovation Contest, including Lissi GmbH 9/3
Agenda for ETSI / CEN Workshop on EU Digital Identity Framework Standards 9/10-12
FediForum - unconference for the Fediverse 9/12-24 [Kaliya is facilitating]
Learn what FediForum is all about Check out the session notes and demo videos from our March 2024, September 2023 and March 2023 events to see what FediForum is all about. The sessions agendas you see there were created democratically each morning, and then run by FediForum participants. (Learn more about unconferences.)
[South Africa] DID UnConf: Africa *an IIW Inspired Regional Event 09/25-27
[Berlin, Global Trust Foundation] EU Digital Identity Wallets Forum 10/09
[California] Internet Identity Workshop #39 10/29-31 Early Bird Registration end August 29.
Shared Signals Interop Event at Gartner's IAM Summit 12/9-11
Jobs
Decentralized Identity Management Specialist www.upwork.com
Lead Software Engineer himalayas.app
Organizations
Decentralized Identity Foundation
DIF backs ‘Personhood Credentials’ to restore privacy to the net 2024-08-16 Biometric Update
One basic requirement of effective PHCs is a limit of one credential per person, along with measures to prevent or mitigate their theft and transfer. PHCs also require a way to check the credential, and either regular re-authentication or expiry. Another requirement is that they cannot be linked, and they support pseudonymity to protect user privacy. That entails minimal storage of personally identifiable information during enrollment and minimal disclosure when used.
Balancing Online Trustworthiness and Anonymity with Personhood Credentials 2024-08-16 Decentralized Identity Foundation
how Personhood Credentials (PHCs) can enhance safety and privacy for humans on an internet where AI users outnumber humans. DIF, including DIF members Microsoft and SpruceID, is honored to have contributed to this paper, and we share this as a call to action to the decentralized identity community and beyond, and an opportunity to build PHC systems the right way.
Personhood credentials: Artificial intelligence and the value of privacy-preserving tools to distinguish who is real online 2024-08-15 OpenAI, Harvard Society of Fellows, Microsoft, University of Oxford, SpruceID, az crypto, UL Research Institutes, Tucows, Collective Intelligence Project, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Decentralization Research Center, Digital Bazaar, American Enterprise Institute, Center for Human-Compatible AI, University of California, Berkeley, OpenMined, Decentralized Identity Foundation, Goodfire, Partnership on AI, eGovernments Foundation, University of Minnesota Law School, Mina Foundation, ex/ante, School of Information, University of California, Berkeley, Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, Harvard University
A PHC system, according to our definition, could be local or global, and does not need to be biometrics-based. Two trends in AI contribute to the urgency of the challenge: AI’s increasing indistinguishability (i.e., lifelike content and avatars, agentic activity) from people online, and AI’s increasing scalability (i.e., cost-effectiveness, accessibility). Drawing on a long history of research into anonymous credentials and “proof-of-personhood” systems, personhood credentials give people a way to signal their trustworthiness on online platforms, and offer service providers new tools for reducing misuse by bad actors.
Last Chance to Sponsor the Decentralized Identity Foundation Hackathon! 2024-08-15 Decentralized Identity Foundation
Don’t miss out on this chance to position your brand at the forefront of decentralized identity innovation. If you’re interested in sponsoring, please reach out to DIF’s Sr. Director of Community Engagement at limari@identity.foundation by August 26th.
Linux Foundation Decentralized Trust
LF Decentralized Trust to unify blockchain and digital identity projects 2024-08-13 Swapnil Bhartiya; TFiR
The Linux Foundation recently announced the intent to create LF Decentralized Trust, a new umbrella organization aimed at gathering and expanding a community and portfolio of technologies to deliver the transparency, reliability, security, and efficiency needed to successfully upgrade critical systems worldwide.
W3C Blogs
W3C issues new technical draft for verifiable credentials standards 2024-08-15 Biometric Update
VCDM 2.0 introduces several enhancements, including processing clarifications, transitions into an tangible data model, media types, and data model simplifications while still maintaining the VCDM 1.1 baseline. With support from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) and U.S. Citizen and Immigration Service (USCIS), the W3C Working Group has been developing the online digital ID standards.
Identity & the Web 2024-08-15 W3C Team
This document proposes an overview of Digital Identities on the Web and an analysis through different use cases of the systemic impact on both the market side and the human side, as well as the role that Web standardization may play in managing that impact.
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This document further develops the concepts described in "Identity on the Web" at W3C’s Member Meeting of April 2024 [identity-on-the-web]. It reviews the intersections of Digital Identities through their societal, ethical, and technical impacts and highlights several areas where standardization, guidelines, and interoperability could help manage these changes:
Societal, ethical, and technical impacts of digital identities 2024-08-13 Simone Onofri; w3.org
This blog post introduces an analysis of Digital Identities and their various architectural models. The paper focuses on the impact of identities on the Web and users, particularly on privacy, security, and human rights, the role that Web standardization may play in managing that impact and how collaboration among various stakeholders can mitigate these threats.
Business
From Learning Machine to DIF and the Evolution of Decentralized Identity 2024-08-14 Kim Hamilton Duffy
The early days at Learning Machine and how they acquired their first customers
The messaging strategies that resonated and the unexpected moves that set them apart, like making it easy for customers to leave
How adoption exceeded expectations at Learning Machine and how that compares to the current decentralized identity landscape
Demystifying User Research 2024-08-16 Doug Belshaw; WeAreOpen.coop
Now, we offer a comprehensive guide for those who are embarking on user research for the first time, or those looking to refine their current practices.* 1. Define the Scope 🔍 Every successful project starts with a clear definition of its scope. This involves establishing the “Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How” before taking any further steps.
This Month in Digital Identity — August Edition 2024-08-13 Wint Hmone Thant; Finema
Enhancing Digital Identity Adoption
Advancing Decentralized Identity
Balancing Privacy, Security, and Convenience
The Strategic Advantage of Open Working Practices
Government
[EU] Smart Contracts, Smarter Rights 2024-08-12 IOTA
The IOTA Foundation has developed a solution prototype within the European Blockchain Pre-Commercial Procurement, funded by the European Commission, to streamline the management of intellectual property rights using distributed ledger technology and Smart Contracts for Media. The prototype solution’s IPR Marketplace platform simplifies securing rights, replacing traditional negotiations with automated, transparent digital contracts. This ensures fair, immediate compensation for rights holders and enhances transparency using Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs).
[Bhutan] Bhutan’s Digital ID System Shifts to Polygon Blockchain findbiometrics.com
The transition also involves upgrading the protocol layer of the NDI system to CREDEBL, an open-source decentralized identity and verifiable credentials management platform. CREDEBL is endorsed by the Digital Public Goods Alliance (DPGA) and supported by the United Nations.
[literature, EU] Fido Core for Eid-Wallets 2024-08-10 Benjamin Fehrensen, Alain Hiltgen, Rolf Lindemann
A strong argument for FIDO is its compliance with the eIDAS regulation as detailed in Using FIDO with eIDAS Services[11] and Using FIDO for the EUDI Wallet[12]. This paper specifies a FIDO extension for user identification using Verifiable Credentials (VC) within the framework of the Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) paradigm, as originally suggested in [13] with focus on sole control. This extension aims to enhance the strong authentication capabilities of FIDO through robust identification.In the introduction, we first briefly explore the regulatory requirements. Next, we propose using the FIDO authenticator as a security core for protected confirmation under user sole control.
[SP] Age assurance demand spurs technical specifications from euCONSENT, Spain 2024-08-15 Biometric Update
The technical specification describes a “digital ecosystem which will facilitate an open and competitive market for interoperable, device-based, double-blind privacy-preserving age assurance.” In publishing it, euConsent hopes to find a balance between the convenience of device-based age verification with the necessary accuracy, regulatory oversight and cost effectiveness.
[NZ] The New Zealand Digital Farm Wallet with Sharon Lyon-Mabbett 2024-08-15 YouTube
Sharon Lyon-Mabbett, Project Manager for the Trust Alliance New Zealand joins the show to discuss her experience implementing verifiable credentials in the agriculture sector for the Digital Farm Wallet pilot project, which has since been named a finalist for the SuperNova Awards!
Development
Building Secure, Scalable, and Private DApps with Decentralized Identity Management 2024-08-12 Jathin Jagannath
Privado ID provides a decentralized identity management solution that ensures user data remains private and secure, while Cartesi’s off-chain computation capabilities allow DApps to scale effectively without overloading the blockchain. In this article, we’ll explore how to integrate these powerful protocols to build scalable and secure DApps. [...]
A sample DApp built with this template DecentraSign: Repo, Live Demo, Video Demo
Application
Publication: Decentralized DNS and PKI: Blockchain’s Role in Internet Security 2018-09; IEEE (via Enisden “ahead of its time”)
This paper explores how blockchain technology can be used to improve the security and trustworthiness of the internet. It focuses on two key internet infrastructures: the Domain Name System (DNS) and Public Key Infrastructure (PKI).
2060.io - Verifiable Credentials Chat App: Fabrice Rochette 2024-08-12 Decentralized Identity Foundation
2060.io enables anonymous, decentralized, sophisticated and interoperable chat connections between users and services. The company has developed Hologram Messaging, a Verifiable Credential wallet and messaging app with true privacy preserving features. Unlike other messaging apps, Hologram is a self-custody app, which means user’s data is only stored on device, and exclusively under user’s control. We spoke to the company's CEO and co-founder, Fabrice Rochette.
Digital Travel Credentials (DTC) are leading the digital identity revolution 2024-08-12 Trevor Butterworth; Indicio
This is where verifiable credentials and decentralized identity come to the rescue. There are multiple ways to bind liveness and biometric information to an identity check such that you can be sure that I am who I claim to be. And because this biometric information can be verified cryptographically, it can be held by the traveler instead of being stored in an airline database, where it turns into a permanent privacy and security liability.
Supply Chain Transparency: Its Role in Verifiable Credentials 2024-08-11 everycred.com
Think of supply chain transparency as lifting the curtain on how products are made and delivered. It is about companies providing clear, honest information about their supply chain operations, from where they get their raw materials to how the final product reaches customers.
dWeb
[youtube] DECaDE Self Sovereign Identity project 2024-08-11 DECaDE: Centre for Decentralised Digital Economy
To enable photographers to register their images while still preserving their privacy, researchers at the Surrey Centre for Cybersecurity and the DECaDE Centre, in partnership with Digital Catapult Field Labs, are using an identity management system known as Self Sovereign Identity or SSI, to develop their web app.
A Better Way to Do News 2024-08-15 Doc Searls
DWeb Camp is a wonderful gathering, hosted by the Internet Archive at Camp Navarro in Northern California. In this post I’ll give the same talk, adding some points I didn’t get to my 25-minute window. Here goes. For journalism, news is bad: Revenue sources are going away: Wages suck: So does employment: But it’s looking up for bullshit and filler: So what can we do? There’s the easy choice— But bear in mind that, News only sucks as a big business. But not as a small one.
The Fediverse Files: ActivityPub Interview with Evan Prodromou 2024-08-09 Jeremy Anderberg
In this episode of the Fediverse Files, Doc Pop talks with ActivityPub co-creator Evan Prodromou. ActivityPub is a fediverse technology that’s akin to what RSS is for podcasts and blog feeds; it’s the foundational element that connects platforms and allows them to communicate with each other.
Flipboard Users Can Now Follow Anyone in the Fediverse - We Distribute 2024-08-13 Anuj Ahooja, Sean Tilley; wedistribute.org
This new feature isn’t just limited to Mastodon or PixelFed, but includes Threads profiles that opted in to Fediverse Sharing, such as MKBHD, Molly Jong-Fast, and Nilay Patel. You won’t need to have a Threads account to cross this boundary, but will still be able to see what your favorite creators are up to. This is a neat way of letting people dip their toes into the wider network, without needing to fully commit to it on day one.
Algorithmic choice 2023-03-30 Bluesky
At Bluesky, we’re approaching this challenge from a marketplace perspective. Our goal isn't to create every algorithm in-house, but to enable the developer community to bring new algorithms to users swiftly and effortlessly. In this blog post, we’ll provide an overview of our motivation behind creating a system that enables composable, customizable feed generation, and embraces third-party development.
ID Not SSI
Surveillance Watch: They Know Who You Are
Surveillance Watch is an interactive map revealing the intricate connections between surveillance companies, their funding sources and affiliations.