Overview

pIBM Decentralized Identity provides a solution suite for establishing trust in a peer to peer way that has yet to exist on the internet, built upon open standards and source. This puts data owners in control of their identity and removes the reliance on intermediary identity providers. All exchanges of identity are done peer to peer, providing an experience we are used to in physical world interactions – issuers of credentials don’t know what or when credentials are being used and identity owners chose what is shared. Blockchain serves as the root of trust through a web of trust, based on a public, permissioned ledger to facilitate these new, trusted interactions. Through a community driven, open approach we are building the missing layer of trust on the Internet./p

Supernova Award Category

Digital Safety, Governance, Privacy, and Cybersecurity

The Problem

pDespite the digitization of our interactions, how we establish trust has not modernized – the internet was built without a layer of trust. This lack of a trust layer opened the door for third parties to establish themselves as identity providers and intermediaries collecting and storing our information through unregulated and un-mandated vetting policies - in most cases exploiting our data. Identity theft is an all too common occurrence. Our personal information is not under our control and lives in repositories that are targets for hackers. The Identity Theft Resource Center recorded 1,339 breaches impacting over 170 million records in the U.S. in 2017 alone. The global numbers are so staggering that no one has been able to accurately measure the impact. These breaches are damaging because the data stolen can too easily be used to commit fraud. Despite billions of dollars spent on identity verification, we lack a trusted way to identity people, and we lack a secure way to exchange information. In addition, as regulations emerge to protect end user data, businesses need to remain relevant with end users in an ever-growing digital world that is pedantic about personal information and how it’s used. This means businesses need to transform how they interact with their end users while increasing trust – this means moving away for siloed relationships entrenched in user name and passwords to more portable, credential-based interactions. /p

The Solution

pIBM developed capabilities for clients to build decentralized identity applications for credential lifecycle management within decentralized identity ecosystems. One of the clients IBM is working with is MyCelia, an organization founded by Imogen Heap and focused on solving the inefficiencies and lack of trust within the music industry. MyCelia is also looking to help aspiring, grassroots artists build a reputation through peer attestations as they interact across the music making supply chain, in which up to 50% of payments don’t make it to the rightful music maker. MyCelia is using decentralized identity within their Creative Passport application, serving as the way for music makers to permission their data in the music making workflow. As a stepping stone, Creative Passport has enabled a passwordless experience built using the IBM Decentralized Identity solution to bootstrap the permissioned attribute exchange economy./p

The results

pIBM Decentralized Identity is one of the first vendors to provide an end to end experience to participate in decentralized identity ecosystems through digital credential lifecycle management and also provide services to establish decentralized identity networks. IBM also enables clients to think through and build decentralized identity applications, such as Creative Passport, through a persona driven, user defined workshop to address business problems and pain points – this includes understanding what decentralized identity is, the interactions with identity, data models, and use cases as it relates to the exchange of attributes in a peer to peer model. IBM has learned from our work with clients about the type of governance, data ownership, security principles and shared decision-making that’s needed to get decentralized identity solutions built./p

Metrics

pstrongThese metrics are confidential metrics for the sole purpose of evaluating and judging nominations – we request that these metrics do not get communicated outside the judging nomination committee. /strong/p pIBM developed it’s decentralized identity solution in 2Q19 and is growing the adoption of the solution across different user bases – the solution is still in early stages but we are seeing growth in a space that is still emerging. Currently IBM has 40+ accounts using its decentralized identity solution, with 100+ agents and 200+ connections. /p pOur IBM Decentralized Identity solution is also aimed at increasing time to value for developers. The MyCelia team was able to build an end to end working application to issue and verify verifiable credentials within a few weeks – this time included environment preparation, learning/reading of documentation, coding, testing, and deployment of their web application. This was made available through our open sourcing of an SDK, removing the complexities of blockchain and cryptography to accelerate developer time to value./p

The Technology

pIBM Decentralized Identity provides hosting services to establish decentralized identity networks. This service is used for clients looking to run and operate nodes on the Sovrin identity network. IBM Decentralized Identity also leverages HL Indy/Aries as the open source technology to build a solution for credential lifecycle management. It allows credential issuance and verification along with identity owner control for credential presentment across contextual interactions./p

Disruptive Factor

pWhile other companies are building for technology that allows clients to participate in decentralized identity networks – issuance, holding/presentment, and verification of digital credentials, IBM Decentralized Identity took an approach to help clients across the entire decentralized identity stack. The approach for IBM Decentralized Identity considers are (i) establishing highly available decentralized identity networks, (ii) participating in a credential exchange within a world of heterogenous networks, (iii) transforming business process workflow with industry expertise and design thinking. Each of these aspects help clients re-think trust and information exchange across a complete solution that requires business, legal, and technical components. Every entity in the ecosystem serves a role, to establish decentralized identity networks, issue credentials, hold/manage credentials, and verify credentials. IBM Decentralized Identity recognizes the journey clients are on and the uniqueness of them – considering all aspects of what is required to build a proper solutions beyond just the technology, such as the ecosystem needed to build around. This is where governance is key as ecosystem participation grows. All these pillars are shaping how we move forward in building the technology, providing a consistent, reliable, and secure exchange of identity to establish trust. /p

Shining Moment

ul liOffering (IBM Verify Credentials) for credential lifecycle management to build decentralized identity applications /li liOffering (Sovrin Steward Hosting) for establishing decentralized identity network with hosting service capabilities /li liIBM THINK 2019 session with Imogen Heap (2x Grammy Award Winner) ul lia href="https://www.ibm.com/events/think/watch/replay/120170000/"https://www.ibm.com/events/think/watch/replay/120170000//a/li /ul /li liFounding member of the Sovrin Foundation/li /ul