Abstract
Credential Exchange Infrastructures based on open standards are emerging with work ongoing across many different jurisdictions, in several global standards bodies and industry associations, as well as at a national level. This article addresses the technology advances on this topic, particularly around identification mechanisms, through the Self-sovereign identity model. It also tackles necessary institutional processes and policy concerns relating to their implementation. Rooted in a sociohistorical culture and practice of inquiry, the goal of the article is to bring emerging digital identity systems within the grasp of a wider public as well as to contribute to mutual understanding across stakeholder groups (technical community, governments, international cooperation entities, civil society and academia) about what is at stake. This is expected to enhance their capacity to better navigate across the pitfalls of this transition period from paper to digital systems and the full adoption of the latter, with each of these stakeholders playing a part in enabling trust around digital identity infrastructure and transactions, both within related ecosystems and in the broader society. This article makes contributions around three axes. First axis is conceptual and analytical. The article outlines three conceptualized phases in the evolution of identity practices in history with the hypothesis that the availability of new record-creation methods invites changes in, and expansion of, the existing identification processes. This helps make a stronger case for why the Internet needs an identity capability. In addition, the article defines or elaborates on key concepts including identity, credential and trust. The second axis of the article is a case study on self-sovereign identity as instantiated by the Sovrin network. The case study presents the technology and its design with a view to enabling a non-technical public to understand what it is and how it works, while highlighting the fact that the technology still needs institutional processes to make it work as intended. The final axis of this article provides guidelines to policy actors potentially facing the need to enable large scale implementations of these emerging technologies, as they mature. Policy-makers approaching this material may want to read this section first and then return to the rest of the paper.
Highlights
Most of the population in the industrialized countries and at least city dwellers over the rest of the world are familiar with situations where, for all intents and purposes, they have to present identifying documents before they can proceed with the business at hand
The purpose of this paper is to introduce to stakeholders other than the small group of technologists involved in building solutions to address this issue—meaning governments, international cooperation entities, civil society and academia—but to policy-makers, one of the fundamental ways in which the Internet identity problem is being solved today using a framework known as Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI)
As outlined in A Three-phase Evolution section of this article, we are at Phase III in the conceptualization of the historical evolution of identity mechanisms where digital technology is redefining the boundaries of the self in so many ways that we cannot fully address digital identity without addressing it for the Internet, the largest, most common, and mother of all digital networks
Summary
Most of the population in the industrialized countries and at least city dwellers over the rest of the world are familiar with situations where, for all intents and purposes, they have to present identifying documents before they can proceed with the business at hand. That is an identification process which is enabled by some administrative artifacts we generically call identity documents. Some other people may find incentives to forge those documents where they cannot or do not want to get proper ones. Authenticating those documents themselves, as well as authenticating the link between them and their holder (checking the accuracy of their identity function), has been a critical need and endeavor throughout their multi-century history
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
