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Getting started with decentralized identity

nathangould.com

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Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#41

Post by whatisweb3 »

Comevius wrote: post #15
whatisweb3 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the long term I hope Apple does not win. The idea that we should just submit the world’s private data to Apple for the next century is… terrible. Zero knowledge proofs are one of the more promising things starting to emerge from crypto and decentralized blockchain space. If desired, you can still trust Apple for the ZK proof generation and verification without having to store any private details on their servers.

Practical ZK is coming from cryptography, like this decentralized gun registry by the Brown University. https://eprint.iacr.org/2021/107.pdf People in the crypto space are coming from a different angle, they are franctically trying to find a legitimate use for cryptocurrencies, so far unsuccessfully, by constantly rebranding blockchain technologies without being able to address the challenges. It's not that we desire…

I don’t see any reference to zero knowledge proof in there.

Look into modern research around succinct and generalized ZK proofs. SNARKs, STARKs, PLONK, zkVMs, MPC and secure setup ceremonies. All of this is coming from blockchain and crypto space and will transform some ways we manage privacy in the future. It does not need to be used with a blockchain but pairs well as the choices of arithmetic are often optimized to EVM.

“Apple is faster at delivering than a decentralized group of developers and researchers creating novel cryptographic protocols and open source software” - well, no shit.

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#45

Post by geonnave »

For the "Learning resources" section, I would also recommend checking ION¹. I have tested a few DID Methods including Sovrin, Veres One, and ION, and the latter is the most spec-adherent and well-implemented, apart from receiving funding from companies like Microsoft and TBD (which is proposing web5 in the first place). And yes, it is the only DID Method to receive support from big tech (was incubated within Microsoft, then donated to the Decentralized Identity Foundation), and it also happens to be a technically better solution.

Why I think it is better: (1) don't need a new blockchain (re-uses Bitcoin's); and (2) implements DIDs / DID Documents with all needed features (e.g. last time I tried, Sovrin's implementation did not support serviceEndpoints!)

¹ https://identity.foundation/ion/

² https://www.coindesk.com/markets/2021/03/25/microsofts-ion-d...

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#46

Post by jeroenhd »

Blockchain. It's always blockchain. Can we just not?

How about we go back to web 1.0. TLS mutual cert auth with an ID card as a smart card, either from the government or from your favourite third party.

Or maybe we go back to web 2.0 with OpenID. Users pick their own identity providers and websites can pick which ones to trust and which ones not to trust. Actually, we already have that, and it's "sign in with Google/Facebook/Apple".

If you're a fan of stuffing Javascript everywhere you can, just use FIDO2/WebAuthn before or after validating the user through OAuth.

Solutions exist. Nobody wants to implement them, it seems. Inventing new ways to do what has been done before doesn't solve the problem, it just creates more dead protocols.

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#47

Post by nibbleshifter »

thomassmith65 wrote: post #36
ipaddr wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Connecting your digital identity opens you up to stalking, data mining, identity fraud and a host of other things not government related.

Sure, but a pseudonymous digital identity can provide decent protection for those problems. If government wants the user's personal details, that's different, since, even if the information were never stored on computer, one could obtain it via court order – but the ability to do that is partly the point.

Personally, I think the state being able to deanonymize users is an antifeature. A bug that needs fixing.

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#48

Post by nibbleshifter »

bawolff wrote: post #19
conradev wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The process of binding a DID to something in the physical world, such as a person or an organization — for example, by using verifiable credentials with the same subject as that DID — is contemplated by this specification and further defined in the Verifiable Credentials Data Model [VC-DATA-MODEL]. https://www.w3.org/TR/did-core/#proving-control-and-binding Here is the diagram: https://www.w3.org/TR/vc-data-model/#…

> but the idea is that I can now take this cookie, show it to a third party and the third party can verify the credential's validity. Or you know, like oauth. Or if you want to really play up the credential angle, how tls client certificates work, if anyone would ever use them.

Having worked with TLS client certificates before, I like them, but I wouldn't inflict them on anyone else.

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#49

Post by ahelwer »

jeroenhd wrote: post #46

Blockchain. It's always blockchain. Can we just not? How about we go back to web 1.0. TLS mutual cert auth with an ID card as a smart card, either from the government or from your favourite third party. Or maybe we go back to web 2.0 with OpenID. Users pick their own identity providers and websites can pick which ones to trust and which ones not to trust. Actually, we already have that, and it's "sign in with Google/…

Well, one of the few plausibly-valuable additions to the world offered by blockchains are globally-distributed databases not owned/controlled/bound to any single organization. Why not make use of them for something other than scams, pump & dumps, etc.?

Re: Getting started with decentralized identity

#50

Post by ETH_start »

thomassmith65 wrote: post #28
helloworld11 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bullshit on at least a couple fronts. First, even when people strongly have their real identity tied to their digital or other activities, it amazingly often does nearly nothing at all to stop them from all kinds of spammy abuse, fraud, lying, trolling and all sorts of bad behavior. This happens across the board, world-wide in any non-personal social or digital setting. Secondly, I'd argue that the ability to "decent…

even when people strongly have their real identity tied to their digital or other activities, it amazingly often does nearly nothing [...] Is that based on any particular example? Off the top of my head, I can think of several mechanisms by which tying a pseudonym to a real identity could deter or address malicious behavior: law suit, jail time, loss of collateral, permanent ban of a human being from a service, etc.…

>>but let's entirely ignore all that, and just daydream about the valiant freedom fighters it will save from oppressive government /s

The threat from governments and other entities that obtain a monopoly on violence is one that is not naturally self limiting. There is no right governments cannot deprive people of, making most of the methods people use to defend themselves from a threat (e.g. being discriminating when choosing who to associate with, hiring private security, etc) ineffective when dealing with threats posed by governments. Therefore, I think mitigating the dangers posed by the state should be the highest priority.

One way we know that achieves this is eliminating, via disintermediation of centralized platforms, the bottlenecks that magnify the power of the state, and reduce the political cost for those who control the state to enforce mass-surveillance or censorship edicts.

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