Decentralized Federation: A New Trust Model Built on Existing Systems and Connecting Trust Registries

What would happen if standards-based digital credentialing technology becomes widely accessible? Any entity, large or small, can start issuing and verifying within weeks, days or even hours. Then, the initial adoption of digital credentials will mostly be driven by ‘local’ needs. This is inevitable due to the decreasing cost and complexity of technology. However, as more and more begin to issue credentials on their own terms with little to no coordination, even when the technology everyone uses is based on interoperable standards, as long as there is no established human trust, two entities won’t be able to accept each other’s credentials right away. So how to facilitate trust building in this emerging world of digital credentials?

This session will introduce a new model, Decentralized Federation, which leverages to the best extent possible of existing systems and connects trust registries, and how it is already being implemented to solve today’s trust problems.