Abbas Ali, Associate Director of R3, discusses the use of Blockchain technology for digital ID management and its biggest challenges ahead of Mobey´s Member Meeting in Paris, hosted by Gemalto. There is still time to join us in Paris for interesting insights!
1. What are some of the benefits of using blockchain technology for digital identity management?
Data privacy, security and control are some of the major benefits of using blockchain technology for digital identity management. Decentralized blockchain architecture ensures there is no central third party, managing a honey pot of consumer data, waiting to be hacked. Recent data breaches at extremely reputable organizations has demonstrated how vulnerable current identity management solutions really are.
2. Do you have digital ID schemes running on your blockchain network? Can you give any examples?
We are currently working with several partners that have developed digital identity schemes on Corda. A great example of one of our flagship products is our partner Gemalto’s Trust ID Network. Additionally, the Corda Network has its own digital identity scheme to identify nodes running on the network using a traditional PKI approach.
3. What do you think are some of the biggest challenges we are facing with digital ID right now?
There are many digital identity schemes, standards bodies, organizations and networks that exist today and one of the fundamental challenges faced by all of them is – adoption. There is no one, clear, standard used across industries, geographies or use cases that can be relied on and it is unlikely that there ever will be. Many have tried and failed as most have tried to own or control some part of the identity infrastructure.
Another challenge would be one of inclusion. Most digital identity networks today are reliant on smartphones to interact with end users. However, smartphone penetration globally currently stands at around 35% and is only expected to go up to 40% over the next three years – concentrated in a few regions. So how do you build an inclusive network that does not put the developing world at a further disadvantage.
