Identosphere 212: Fixing Informed Consent • Product launches & Adoption
Upcoming events, company news, organizational updates; standards, specifications, and deep thoughts on everything related to decentralized identity and verifiable credentials
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Coming Up
New Listings
Can an Existing Digital Identity Wallet Leverage a Hardware Security Module to Meet New EU Standards? 11/28-29 anonyome.com
Anonyome Labs will co-present a paper with Queensland University of Technology (QUT) at the 8th Symposium on Distributed Ledger Technology in Brisbane, Australia
The 2024 Future of Government Awards, hosted by Public Digital, UNDP, and AWS Institute, are now open for nominations Centre for Digital Public Infrastructure (Nominations by 1/20)
Previously Listed Events
[Poland] Trusted Economy Forum 11/26-27
[Paris] TRUSTECH 2024 12/3-5
Shared Signals Interop Event at Gartner's IAM Summit 12/9-11
[Boston] Internet2 Technology Exchange 2024 12/9-13
[Berlin] European Cloud and Identity Conference Call for Proposals Open to 01/31
[Cape Town] DID:Unconf Africa 2/18-20 ← New DATES registration Open
[Zurich] Digital Identity Unconference Europe - Ecosystems 3/4-5
Digital Identity
James Monaghan on Linkedin
IEEE Digital Privacy Podcast Series: Episode 13 Salvatore D'Agostino
D'Agostino's involvement in digital privacy began with license plate reading systems and evolved into broader areas like identity management and smart cities.
Adoption
St. Monica University Adopts Shin for Managing Certificates socious.io
St. Monica University is known for its forward-thinking approach and dedication to providing the best resources for students and faculty
Shin is powered by Hyperledger Identus (formerly Atala PRISM), offering unparalleled security features
Ensures all certificates are tamper-proof and easily accessible by authorized parties
Streamlines the certificate management process, making it more efficient and user-friendly
Ahead of the DSCSA, 6 of the top 10 global pharma companies have partnered with Spherity 2024-11-14 Spherity
Spherity is a leader in secure digital identity solutions for enhanced security and compliance
With the upcoming Drug Supply Chain Security Act (DSCSA) deadline, 6 out of the top 10 pharmaceutical companies have partnered with Spherity
Verifiable credentials mature with product launches, implementations 2024-11-13 Biometric Update
Australia's Digital Identity Initiative:
Barbados Port Inc.: Verifiable Credentials Implementation
Authlete's Platform Upgrade: OID4VCI Support and Additional Features
Indicio's Proven Auth: Enhanced Identity and Access Management
MOSIP's shift from centralized trust models to decentralized frameworks with protocols like verifiable credentials.
Trust issuer chains provide secure digital identities for various use cases beyond government oversight
Standards
KERI: An Alternative to Blockchain for Decentralized Identity Management 2024-11-06 Manar Maher; blog.contenta.xyz
AID, Key Rotation and KEL form a self-contained system that eliminates the need for external validation or consensus across a ledger.
KERI redefines identity verification through its primary root of trust: the autonomic identifier (AID), which is cryptographically signed and under user control, while its secondary root of trust is the key event log system.
Breaks free from limitations in blockchain by offering optimized solutions for all three aspects of the Blockchain Trilemma.
A Little Open Recognition Goes A Long Way 2024-11-12 ; Doug Belshaw; blog.weareopen.coop
Open Recognition vs Microcredentials:
"Microcredentialing" is ambiguous term without agreed definition or standard
Open Recognition is attractive because it's holistic and decentralizes recognition practices
Can be badged, credentialed, endorsed by anyone
Development
Practical Advice for Fixing Informed Consent ; Rohan Pinto, Cto Informationweek.com
GDPR (European Union): freely given, specific, informed, unambiguous consent
CCPA (California): similar to GDPR but with some differences
Challenges: navigating various jurisdictions and industry regulations
Why We Build Digital Infrastructure in Rust 2024-11-12 blog.spruceid.com
Rust is the most widely used memory-safe programming language, gaining recognition from leading organizations
Adoption of Rust leads to better performance and fewer vulnerabilities without overhauling existing codebases (as seen in Google's Android development)
Microsoft invests $10 million in improving developer tooling for Rust and integrating it into Windows and Azure environments
Linux actively integrates Rust into its core architecture, shifting away from "inherent weaknesses" of older languages
Explainers
Verifiable Credentials in Decentralized Identity 2024-11-15 Dana Luna; Pingidentity
Example Use Case: Identification and authorization for contract workers with dynamic data like photograph or expiration date.
[Explainer] Why Verifiable Education Credential Matters? 2024-11-11 elockr.io
Eliminate risk of hiring based on falsified or inaccurate education records
Instant verification speeds up the hiring process
Compliance with industry regulations
[french] Verifiable Digital Titles 2024-08-27 Fabien A. P. Petitcolas, Smals Research
Physical documents, such as driving licenses, university diplomas, the European Health Insurance Card (EHIC), or the European A1 certificate allowing you to work abroad (PD A1), and more generally documents "paper" have several disadvantages. They are subject to loss, theft, damage or unauthorized duplication and they do not easily allow for data minimization as required by the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).
[french] Verifiable credentials 2024-08-27 Smals Research
Product
Authlete Streamlines Digital Credential Issuance and Management 2024-11-11 ; David Penn; Finovate
API that enables quick issuance of interoperable VCs with support for OpenID for Verifiable Credential Issuance (OID4VCI) standard
Multi-tenant management, multi-region server options, social logins and multi-factor authentication, granular access control.
Introducing Indicio Proven Digital Farming — a data management solution that frees farmers to do what they do best, farm 2024-11-12 ; Trevor Butterworth; Indicio
Challenges of Data Management in Agriculture:
Data-intensive work with multiple sources
Regulatory and market requirements
Time spent on data management takes farmers away from farming, with measurable economic cost
Regional
[EU] EU’s Digital ID Wallet Consortium Explores Payment Applications in White Paper idtechwire.com
Can act as an alternative SCA method during transactions
User links wallet to payment account or card during registration
Secure and reliable mechanism for authentication using cryptographic proofs and transaction data
[CA] California DMV Hackathon Win: Privacy-Preserving Age Verification 2024-11-14 Angie Jones;TBD
At the recent California DMV Hackathon, the Block team, represented by members from Square and TBD, won the Best Privacy & Security Design award for building a prototype of an instant age verification system. This solution utilizes mobile drivers’ licenses (mDLs) to provide secure, privacy-centric transactions for age-restricted purchases with Square’s Point of Sale (POS) system.
[Australia] Australians becoming familiar with verifiable credentials 2024-11-13 Stephen Wilson; Lockstep
Reserve Bank statistics show that consumers are ready to prove any important facts about themselves with the same security, speed and ease of use as they present their payment cards.
[South America] QuarkID: Bringing South America on-chain with SSI and account Abstraction 2024-11-15 Ethereum Foundation
QuarkID is a Self-Sovereign Identity protocol bringing millions of South American citizens on-chain. Citizens in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Monterrey, and Nuevo Leon, Mexico, are using government SSI deployed on ZKsync Era through the QuarkID protocol. Driver's licenses, birth certificates, and over 50 different credentials are secured by Ethereum technology in the world’s first case of governments using Ethereum’s permissionless blockchain to meet their identity needs.
[APAC] Predictions 2025 – Digital Identity in APAC 2024-11-11 Intelligent CISO
Q&A with Johan Fantenberg, Director, Ping Identity on what to expect from Digital Identity in APAC over the coming year.
[China] China RealDID - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org
Real-Name Verification: Ensures users are verified in real life before creating a DID address.
Data Encryption: Protects personal data with encryption techniques.
Secure Private Logins: Provides secure access to online services using DID addresses and private keys.
Business Identity Checks: Verifies the legitimacy of businesses using their identities.
Personal Identification Certificate Services: Issues, manages, and verifies user identities through Cyber Trusted Identity (CTID) system.
Use Cases
[AI Agents] The Agentic Economy Beyond Crypto - How AI Agents Will Change Consumer Experience 2024-11-15 Fraser Edwards, Cheqd
Verifiable AI in the Agentic Economy:
Ensures accurate trusted data for agentic economy transactions
Accelerates growth by ensuring reliable data for AI agents to rely on.
[E-Portfolio] Self-Sovereign Identity-Based E-Portfolio Ecosystem 2024-01-18 ; Hsieh, Yan, Liao, Yuan, Yu-Heng Hsieh, Jun-Yu Yan, Chia-Hung Liao, Shyan-Ming Yuan; MDPI
In Taiwan, traditional student assessments, covering academic and extracurricular achievements, have shifted from paper to electronic portfolios (e-portfolios). However, limited trust among institutions restricts students from freely sharing and using their educational data. This paper introduces a self-sovereign identity-based infrastructure aimed at enhancing personal data security within the e-portfolio ecosystem.
[Travel] SITA, Idemia partner to build digital identity ecosystem for travel Phocuswire.com
The collaboration will look at furthering interoperability, trust and data security as part of a Digital Travel Ecosystem initiative from SITA.
[Supply Chain] Supply Chain Tracking in Action 2024-11-12 ; Rebecca Johnson; DATARELLA
Discover how Track & Trust's probabilistic 360° supply chain tracking helps Aid Pioneers deliver aid to refugees in southern Lebanon.
Company News
The DOCK token migration to CHEQ is now live! 2024-11-12 ; Read More; blog.dock.io
This partnership unites the blockchain capabilities of two industry leaders to accelerate the global adoption of decentralized identity and verifiable credentials, providing individuals and organizations worldwide
Privately SA and Privado ID partner for privacy-first age verification thepaypers.com
SafetyTech company Privately SA has partnered with Privado ID to develop a privacy-focused, device-based age verification solution.
Kim Hamilton Duffy, Executive Director of Decentralized Identity Foundation: Why did you start to work in the digital identity field and could you share your history? 2024-11-14 ; Kohei Kurihara; Privacy Talk
Kim's Journey into Decentralized Digital Identity
Initially focused on building systems, platforms, libraries, algorithms
Interest in decentralized identity sparked when working as CTO at Learning Machine
Developed Blockcerts standard and product for ensuring usable credentials
Passionate about solving problems of availability and verifiability in digital identity
Realized importance of maintaining privacy while proving authenticity
Decentralized Web
The Holochain Foundation is Coming of Age 2024-11-15 Holochain.org
Holochain: open-source project to create digital spaces for groups without intermediaries or web servers (deep infrastructure-level project)
Bluesky, the Fediverse, and the future of social media ; Ben Werdmuller; werd.io
Bluesky vs. Mastodon:
Differences in funding, community size, and user experience
Bluesky: more mainstream, closer to pre-acquisition Twitter, larger user base (mainly tech users and journalists)
Mastodon: niche supportive communities, co-operative model, smaller user base but growing rapidly.
Is BlueSky the new Twitter, and if so is that a good thing? 2024-11-14 ; Mathew Ingram; torment-nexus.mathewingram.com
After deciding to write about Bluesky and its recent meteoric growth, I wrote down the headline above, and then I went to look at what I had written in the past about Bluesky while I was at the Columbia Journalism Review (where I was the chief digital writer until recently)
Non SSI Standards
Going Local With Open Networks 2024-11-15 ; Doc Searls
Discussing India's ONDC as a model for economies and cultures everywhere
Helping small businesses and local communities in digital commerce landscape
Decentralized system enabling buyers and sellers to transact across various applications
Boosts digital access and economic opportunity
Connects over a million sellers with shoppers in 600+ cities, supporting small businesses and rural entrepreneurs
For the Record: The IPSIE WG and OpenID Foundation Processes 2024-11-14 openid.net
OpenID Foundation (OIDF) committed to creating secure, interoperable identity standards
OIDF's Working Groups develop trusted standards through collaboration
IPSIE proposed by seven members under normal due process
AuthZEN Authorization API 1.0 Implementer’s Draft Approved - OpenID Foundation 2024-11-15 openid.net
The OpenID Foundation membership has approved the following AuthZEN specifications as an OpenID Implementer’s Draft:Authorization API 1.0 Implementer’s Draft: https://openid.net/specs/authorization-api-1_0-01.htmlAn Implementer’s Draft is a stable version of a specification providing intellectual property protections to implementers of the specification