A Survey on Decentralized Identifiers and Verifiable Credentials

Fuente: arXiv
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Hauptverfasser: Mazzocca, Carlo, Acar, Abbas, Uluagac, Selcuk, Montanari, Rebecca, Bellavista, Paolo, Conti, Mauro
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
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author Mazzocca, Carlo
Acar, Abbas
Uluagac, Selcuk
Montanari, Rebecca
Bellavista, Paolo
Conti, Mauro
author_facet Mazzocca, Carlo
Acar, Abbas
Uluagac, Selcuk
Montanari, Rebecca
Bellavista, Paolo
Conti, Mauro
contents Digital identity has always been considered the keystone for implementing secure and trustworthy communications among parties. The ever-evolving digital landscape has gone through many technological transformations that have also affected the way entities are digitally identified. During this digital evolution, identity management has shifted from centralized to decentralized approaches. The last era of this journey is represented by the emerging Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), which gives users full control over their data. SSI leverages decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and verifiable credentials (VCs), which have been recently standardized by the World Wide Web Community (W3C). These technologies have the potential to build more secure and decentralized digital identity systems, remarkably contributing to strengthening the security of communications that typically involve many distributed participants. It is worth noting that the scope of DIDs and VCs extends beyond individuals, encompassing a broad range of entities including cloud, edge, and Internet of Things (IoT) resources. However, due to their novelty, existing literature lacks a comprehensive survey on how DIDs and VCs have been employed in different application domains, which go beyond SSI systems. This paper provides readers with a comprehensive overview of such technologies from different perspectives. Specifically, we first provide the background on DIDs and VCs. Then, we analyze available implementations and offer an in-depth review of how these technologies have been employed across different use-case scenarios. Furthermore, we examine recent regulations and initiatives that have been emerging worldwide. Finally, we present some challenges that hinder their adoption in real-world scenarios and future research directions.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2402_02455
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A Survey on Decentralized Identifiers and Verifiable Credentials
Mazzocca, Carlo
Acar, Abbas
Uluagac, Selcuk
Montanari, Rebecca
Bellavista, Paolo
Conti, Mauro
Cryptography and Security
Computers and Society
Digital identity has always been considered the keystone for implementing secure and trustworthy communications among parties. The ever-evolving digital landscape has gone through many technological transformations that have also affected the way entities are digitally identified. During this digital evolution, identity management has shifted from centralized to decentralized approaches. The last era of this journey is represented by the emerging Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), which gives users full control over their data. SSI leverages decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and verifiable credentials (VCs), which have been recently standardized by the World Wide Web Community (W3C). These technologies have the potential to build more secure and decentralized digital identity systems, remarkably contributing to strengthening the security of communications that typically involve many distributed participants. It is worth noting that the scope of DIDs and VCs extends beyond individuals, encompassing a broad range of entities including cloud, edge, and Internet of Things (IoT) resources. However, due to their novelty, existing literature lacks a comprehensive survey on how DIDs and VCs have been employed in different application domains, which go beyond SSI systems. This paper provides readers with a comprehensive overview of such technologies from different perspectives. Specifically, we first provide the background on DIDs and VCs. Then, we analyze available implementations and offer an in-depth review of how these technologies have been employed across different use-case scenarios. Furthermore, we examine recent regulations and initiatives that have been emerging worldwide. Finally, we present some challenges that hinder their adoption in real-world scenarios and future research directions.
title A Survey on Decentralized Identifiers and Verifiable Credentials
topic Cryptography and Security
Computers and Society
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.02455