The Future of Identity Management at Border Controls: Gateless and Multiple Biometric and Beyond

My name's Paul Ferris and yes, apparently I'm an influencer I've been influencing for about eight years, but principally, we, we are very involved in the development of new technologies and the new, new way and new approach to managing identity. We've been pretty well centered on, on a particular set of approaches. There's I say that because it's, there's, there's some very familiar terms. I should think that everybody knows the, the term self-sovereign identity.

For instance, we, we write rather call it actually self-managed identity very much part of, and as you hear later, standardization, this area, and self-sovereign really done work in many parts of the world, and it's sort of, it's like a lot of things in blockchain technology, the terms themselves are very misleading. So, you know, there's blockchain itself, that smart contracts, aren't very smart and they're probably not contracts you self-sovereign is not, well, you're not trying to set yourself up as a new sovereign state, but that's how it gets interpreted.

So interpretation here is a very important thing, and hopefully we can move on to I'll I'll use those terms cuz they were very well known. But if you understand really talking about somebody managing their own data and actually owning their own data. So the future of identity at border controls, why is border controls such a great thing?

Well, the problem, for instance, just one, the use cases, you know, that identity is meant to be the sort of new, the new oil or the new gold rush. Well, so one of the, the sort of key use cases among many, many is that the problem of crossing borders, lack of an effective digital identity system across the travel airline travel industry around about 10 billion per year, you can make it 20 or you can make it five. It's a lot of money.

Anyway, certainly more than enough to just justify looking at an alternative way of doing things. And what we heard this morning was people talking about managing identity in principally the same ways we, we were that the infrastructure's built today. So that is we give our identity to a company that looks after us. This sort of paternalistic model means that we give our, our identity to one company and then the next and the next and the next and the next. And then the problem becomes, how do we make all those different parts of my identity join up and it's not done by me.

It's done between all the different companies that I've lent my identity to, or is it given or sold whatever it is I've given my identity multiple times. And that in itself has, was drawn attention to this morning is a problem. And yet I can't be the point of integration, even though I am the identity that's being talked about. Why is it that I can't be also the point where that one identity is held?

And if that one identity is held once and I enable permissioned use of that identity, then surely that's a bit far less complex problem than the one that we've been talking about where multiple corporates or governments start coming to agreement on how to share my identity. So the transformation is, is driven. I think these days by heightened security concerns, because, you know, when I give my identity, for instance, to at least 38 regulated businesses, in my case, cuz I do a little traveling and I've lived in different countries.

So at least 38 different businesses have a version of my identity and having been in, in it for over 30 years. Now, the, the difference in that data is a major integration problem. So even if I could share data individual's data with somebody else, then the integration itself of how that data's held is a major problem. And then the security concerns, obviously every one of those 38 different corporations in my case has vouched safe. That they're gonna look after my data. And that means that they spend a lot of money building walls, employing really good people.

Hopefully they're really good people cause they don't open the back door and therefore, you know, the security concerns actually multiply each time I give my data to some, another corporate. So our own solution really brings some of that together. And I'm gonna focus on the air travel side of our solution because I think it illustrates another major issue here.

So if, if you can provide an identity where I have the tools and the ability and the, and the legal ownership of my identity and I can, as the border, share it with the border authorities or whoever needs to see it, then I get an ideal custom friendly adoption model. And it's the adoption model. I think that's one of those things. One of the key things that we are here to talk about. So this becomes a people centered approach. That's the self-manage, that's the self-sovereign identity.

And if you want somebody's permission to use the data, then give them the tools to store and manage that data. Give them the tools to permission that data, to the different corporations that need to use that data in order provide services. And our digital identity enables that air travel and other services and other services by enabling that permissioned use of that individual's data.

And so it's user centric, it's input once and then share often, if you like when I was, I've worked in these financial services injury for industry for some time, how many times have I been on projects within major corporates, generally banks actually looking to build that sort of golden source just within one organization, a golden source of identity for the, for my customer seems like an easy problem. Why is it I've done it three or four times in my career?

And none of them last for very long because they're, you know, a big corporate, big, big bank for instance, is made up of number of different legal entities who have limitations. Now they should share my data and they need my permission to do that. So the golden source within a bit major corporation of, of their customer identity, isn't the right way to go.

Well, that's what we're contending. What do we need? We need something that a different approach and like any identity system, if you haven't got people in their identity system, it's useless. If you've got lots of people in our identity system, it becomes useful. And that's where air travel I think is a key differentiator. So if you look at air travel, it provides everybody who travels by air generally has to use an identity.

And it's that little 10 year old book generally, or some token on a mobile mobile phone for now, which has gotta be like a temporary solution, might be the next step, but very temporary solution. But how about then if you go through air travel, being able to use that identity for almost everything else. And at this point, I think let's switch to the video cause then you have to spend half. Now listening to my voice, Individual digital identity has the power to unlock the next generation of seamless experiences. Let's see what that future will look like.

As we arrive at our destination, we will simply walk through international borders and choose when and who we will share our identity with to create safer journeys. Payments will be automatic, secure and direct. Your destinations will acknowledge you and give you simple and seamless service. Your favorite brands will recognize you and give you personalized recommendations and rewards and give you access to exclusive and personal services. And when you need assistance, your records can be safely, accurately and securely shared.

The future will bring seamless travel, personalized services and experiences, security and privacy, wherever you go. So what you have, you have mass adoption potentially, and the ability to add new services. Somebody wants to provide you with a service and why not share your, your data with them. And if a lot of people are doing that and flying around the world to do it, if you establish one part, one point where that's possible, and everybody who flies in also generally flies out at some point and takes it back to their home country and says, why can't I do that here?

Why can't I get through the border of my destination? Why can't I jump in a taxi and have it paid for, from my identity? Why can't I go to a hotel? And if I want to I'll have them greet me by name, but sometimes I just wanna slip in cuz it's three o'clock in the morning. I just wanna get to my room and the door opens and the chocolate on my bed is actually the one I like. I know we get to sort of extremes, but that's the sort of service that you can start thinking about access to, to events. Why not use the same system to get across a border, as access to an international event.

So to do that, what you need is to pull together some of the best experts in the world. We've got a team of technology experts we're based in London, we're based in London, not because London's a, some sort of technology hub. It's actually because it's a legal hub for a, a legal structure because a lot of people want to talk about the technology here, but how you do it is much more to do with other things outside the technology itself, technology stuff we were using like 15, 20 years ago for trading purposes, it's now called the blockchain.

That's distributed distribution is really an important part of it, but the underlying technology is stuff we've used for years, but then the legal aspects of that, how do you own your own identity? There's an assumption that if you give an identity into something else, then you're giving it away. That's actually put in the terms and conditions as people like Facebook, I give my, I, I open an account and Facebook own all the data, all the data I put into it. They actually have to say this in the terms and conditions because that's the basis of their ownership of your data.

Well, let's not do that. I'll keep my data.

In fact, the terms and conditions will say that I actually own that data. And then the regulatory side of things we've worked with with major regulators around the world.

Now, starting back at the FCA in that great, those great days, pre sandbox, we were sandboxing with the FCA and we've gone to other regulators around the world and really presented this as a set of solutions, but actually serves current regulation. And at some stage, perhaps I can give a presentation about how that actually works, but it works non intuitively. But the idea that you self manage your, your identity means that whole load of regulations about how people will manage it for you don't even apply, but will need to go into that in a separate time.

Then it's already well having experts, of course, but then to get this actually working, what we are working towards is a competitive marketplace. We're not gonna own the whole of identity across the globe. There are many other companies that say that that's their aim. They give you given your identity and they will be the only identity provider across the globe. And there are some major corporations that have been trying to do this for years. And the ironic thing of course is other major corporations won't use it.

Why would a service provider go to another major corporation to work out who their client is? That's never gonna happen? So one bank isn't gonna be able to build an identity system that all banks use or one technology company can't provide an identity system for all banks uses. It was just examples because international standards provide us with a, a solution, a great platform, actually to share the, the basic rails that how this works technology wise. And that's why we're so involved in it. Pardon me, but mass adoption, you need mass adoption and airport hubs provide very fast adoption.

We think we've got probably have one of the fastest and largest adoption models in the world, the new airport at, at Dubai, just that one alone is projected to provide 20 million people per month. That's great. Thank you. You could tell thank you 20 million people per month going for that airport. And they're all going somewhere or coming from somewhere. The result in advocacy for those people to use an easy system that doesn't require a 10 year old book or filling informs before you get onto the airplane.

Like I was doing this morning and failing to dismally, cuz they wanted an Avis number, whatever that is. That's what creates demand, rapid global expansion of a new way of doing this. Just turning things on its head and saying, well, I don't wanna be looked after. I wanna look after my own data because it's been lost so often, almost every week, there are major data breaches and, and I can actually, if I have the right tools, look after my data. And if somebody hacks me, they get my data. The moment somebody hacks a bank, they get millions of people's data.

So what we are doing is basically taking away those honey pots distributing identity to all the individuals that need it. That enables global expansion, not just within air travel, but other vertical market financial services, health hospitality, just as some but access management in, in almost every instance. And we need this to be a competitive global platform for third parties, other people to join, not just to provide the platform itself, but actually to build the verticals.

One company thinking they can build all the verticals, all the, the actual identity for every time an identity is used is not feasible. So with this actually then leads into very important subject. We have a senior executives who have spent 30 years in the field in what is now called inclusion, but world bank estimates are a billion people right now with this current system cannot prove who they are.

If you can't prove who you are, you can't have access to many, many of of the services that probably everybody in this room assumes is almost the right access to bank services obviously, but how many insurance for your crops? Because they can't prove who they are. They can't take a significant role in the world, commerce, whatever they're doing. It excludes a whole section of the world's population. So build a, a standard standardized platform that can provide identity at a, at the, the level where we're not talking about crossing borders.

We're talking about ownership of, of land that your family has owned for generations or knowing who you're providing the, the, the, the food for today in an emerging situation for, for NGOs. So inclu inclusion actually then means unified markets and more products. And we can't just think about, say a bank account that I could open today and then get credit. For instance, it could be something as, as simple in terms of a product as one loan or somewhere to keep my money safe. So from simple to complex, those services can be applied to how much of an identity you can build for yourself.

So the more you build an identity that's provable and it doesn't necessarily have to relate in, in these terms, in inclusion terms to, I know the British passport office or the European union identity card of the future, it doesn't need to be that it needs to actually build so people can one day get to that, that level and get, get the sort of services that we're used to. And a standard unified identity can serve more than individuals as well.

So what we're building within the standards process, I think there's one or two colleagues here who are part of that standards process is that identity system, not just for people. So everything I've spoken about today so far is related to individuals cuz that's the default. When we talk about identity, everybody talks about people's identity, but there are other very important parts of identity. Let's talk, right? People as natural persons, this is standards talk really.

This is, this is sort of basic model of what we've been developing for the last three years, but they're natural persons. And then there's entities often call legal entities, but actually they're entities that aren't relate directly to legal entities. So this is still under development. The actual words we're using here and then identifying things. Now I think a number of people in this room realize what the potential is for identifying things. That's the internet of things perhaps, but the definition of that is, is open, but things could be aircraft parts leading onto a maintenance process.

That's far less complex, but then the fourth dimension here, we talk about things. Those are things that you can probably poke with your finger, but how about virtual things that processes, we all know the exist, but if you could actually identify a trading process, then I can tell you how much easier that makes a trading system. It's not this process happened at this time from this, this bank to that bank that happened at this time. It's this is the process and where can identify that process. So we're very involved one way or another in this room, there's the global convener convener.

That's gathering all the use cases for, for, for blockchain, from around the world, but also the editor of privacy, the privacy standards. How does this, how does blockchain relate to privacy? It's one fundamental thing that everybody should know. That was probably one of the first things that was agreed in privacy and identity was that you don't put identity on the blockchain. You don't put PII on the blockchain. So that might answer a couple of questions in the room, but also it's me. That's the global answer of the identity standards, developing identity standards in this area.

So it's a broad church. There's so much to talk about. There's so much to build, but by 2020, we're gonna be operating out of their airports. We think the adoption model's key. And we think it's important that identities looked on on the holistic way because the opportunities are huge, but also because that's the way it will work. And the adoption becomes a natural thing for every body, but also every company to adopt this way. It's like the internet TCP I P was a great thing. We just moved to the internet as a way of, of communicating and token ring fell by the side that shows how old I am.

But there we are. I think we probably go to either questions or switch to the, the panel where colleagues who are a lot who are working on the same thing, this competitive environment, that's what we're developing. Okay. Thank you very much. First of all,