Identity Woman
Independent Advocate for the Rights and Dignity of our Digital Selves
I was interviewed by the Domain Standard for their 2nd issue. The interview fills 5 full pages beginning on page 7. It covers the core infrastructure of decentralized identity – DIDs, VCs. It discusses how they contribute to new internet scale infrastructure. I touch on how I see the landscape of identity today and why I’m keen to support liberal democracies getting it right.
I participated in the Internet Identity Workshop Episode of the Rubric Podcast, a casual chat on DIDs and DID methods. Basically, the conversation was mostly with the Internet Identity Workshop’s original organizers and creators.
A rubric is a standard tool for evaluating subjects. In the context of Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs), Legendary Requirements developed two key rubrics published by Rebooting the Web of Trust and the World Wide Web Consortium. You can see the DID Method Rubric here. The Rubric podcast explores this further while introducing listeners to the people and technologies behind Decentralized Identity, including DID Methods, which determine how DIDs are created, read, updated, and deactivated.
DIDs enable powerful identity services without a trusted third party and offer a flexible alternative to traditional centralized authentication. They can be used by anyone, anywhere, for any purpose. Each DID carries information about its method to ensure secure interactions. The Rubric also interviews creators and users of different DID Methods and thus sheds light on their performance, security, and privacy tradeoffs. Also, it helps users choose the DID Method that best suits their needs.
In the IIW Episode of the Rubric podcast, the following subjects were discussed.
Kaliya shared about her new SSI course written with her business partner Lucy. The first half of the course on understanding identity in general before delving into the technologies around Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI). This framing is essential as SSI as an innovation would not make sense without understanding how identity functioned in the past.
Kaliya also shared mentioned a grant from the Filecoin Foundation & Unfinished to pull two years of newsletter information into a wiki. The information has been compiled into a spreadsheet to create Jekyll pages. It supports knowledge discovery within the community.
DIDs (Decentralized Identifiers) is undergoing development, with a 1.0 version published. There’s a focus on standardizing various aspects like DID resolution and iteration of the DID course specification.
DID resolution, the process of turning a DID into its associated document, was identified as a key aspect needing more discussion. Standardizing this part of DIDs was considered an open and important question for the community.
The speakers discussed their favorite DID methods while highlighting Peer DIDs for peer-to-peer interaction. DID Web was mentioned as an interesting method, despite some concerns due to its dependence on the DNS system.
The conversation raised an interesting question about rotating underlying keys for a DID and rotating the DID itself. This aspect of transitioning DIDs, from DID Web to another method was considered an unresolved challenge.
The participants used the platform to promote various projects, like the “Pico” programming system, “did directory.com,” and the “Rebooting the Web of Trust” conference. These plugs showcased innovations, resources, and events within the DID community.
I pointed to my URL, “identitywoman.net,” as a place to connect with my work and access resources like the book, newsletter, and hosting events. It’s presented as a hub for those interested in identity and related events.
The conversation was sprinkled with humorous and lighthearted moments, like comparing the hosts to the two old Muppets on the balcony. The element added a relaxed and engaging tone to the discussion and enhanced the listening experience.
To learn more about the podcast, click here.
As an enthusiastic member of the RadicalxChange community, I have actively participated in numerous RxC forums including working with the team to produce their 2022 conference series. I was in Zurich for the Digital Identity unConference Europe (DICE) that I co-produced and co-facilitated. Folks who organized the RxC Zurich/Switzerland asked me to be the featured discussant about Digital Identity and AI.
The significance of identity, especially in managing and protecting it in the digital world, has emerged as a critical issue in our time. As the influence of generative AI grows, the distinction between human-authored content and that produced by AI agents becomes increasingly blurred, which intensifies the urgency of this matter.
Acknowledging this context, I participated in the RadicalxChange Swiss Chapter meetup, which provided a platform for discussing digital identity-related aspects.
The meetup addressed the challenges associated with maintaining control over our identities online, where the proliferation of large language models raises concerns about the origin and ownership of digital content. By exploring topics related to digital identity, the meetup fostered an environment for exchanging ideas and perspectives while offering valuable insights into this pressing issue.
GPT is primarily used for brainstorming, generating ideas, and finding answers. It is helpful in tasks like content creation, article design, and social media posting.
Users have also found value in using GPT for language learning, including finding grammar-focused apps. Additionally, GPT has been used to summarize content, extract keywords, and assist with research. It can generate illustrations, answer philosophical questions, and create specialized AI tools.
However, there is still a need to focus on designing AI for the greater good and promoting a positive impact. The integration of AI and blockchain technology for privacy and decentralized identity management is discussed. Some concerns include the volume of output generated by GPT and the need for verification and editing.
To see the full video of this meetup, click here.
At Identiverse in 2022 I presented this paper about Understanding SSI in historical context.
To see the full video of the session, click here.
To read out the full relevant paper, click here.
In a podcast hosted by NEWFORUM and centered on the topic of Web3 vs Decentralized Identity, I discussed a variety of topics, including open standards for digital identity, the benefits and drawbacks of using standards for digital identity, the confluence between web3 and decentralized identity, and many more.
NEWFORUM is a podcast exploring the future of human interaction, economics, and the emerging Internet, including innovators, entrepreneurs, and investors. It helps promote research-driven conversation and hence encourages collaborative value creation.
How did I get started in the field of identity? I shared my journey into the identity field, focusing on how personal experiences and the potential impact of digital identity solutions on people’s lives inspired my career choice.
The importance of using open standards. The discussion highlighted the value of adopting open standards, which promote interoperability, collaboration, and innovation in the digital identity ecosystem.
Decentralized identifiers. This section explored the concept of decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and their role in providing unique, persistent, and secure identifiers that individuals control.
What is a decentralized identifier? I clearly defined a decentralized identifier, explaining its purpose and how it functions in the context of decentralized identity systems.
Differences between decentralized identity and web3. The conversation emphasized the distinctions between decentralized identity, which gives individuals control over their data, and web3, which revolves around decentralized applications and blockchain technologies.
Verifiable credentials never go on a blockchain. The podcast emphasized that verifiable credentials are not stored on a blockchain but are shared securely between parties, ensuring privacy and reducing the risk of sensitive data exposure.
Overlapping Opportunities between web3 & SSI. I discussed the areas where web3 and self-sovereign identity (SSI) technologies intersect, offering possibilities for collaboration and innovation in the digital world.
Accountability & Anonymity in virtual worlds. The final section discussed the challenges of balancing personal anonymity and accountability in virtual environments and how decentralized identity solutions could address these issues.
At the Plurality Research Network Conference 2023, which commenced on January 13, 2022, and continued through January 15, 2023, I delivered a lighting talk the first day.
Researchers and practitioners from various domains, such as computer science, sociology, political ethics, and government, who are exploring plural technologies are brought together at the Plurality Institute.
Plural technologies are reusable computing platforms that promote collaboration and development across various social communities.
During my presentation at the conference, I discussed the issues and difficulties that are associated with digital identifier systems, including the following examples:
I also discussed how different groups, organizations, and political systems handled the management of their own boundaries historically using paper.
After that, dove into Decentralized Identity. I went through the identifiers that don’t fall under the category of private namespaces or global registries. In essence, the protocols of DID (decentralized identifier), together with the standard components of the DID document, as well as Verifiable Credentials. You can se my talk here.
I really enjoyed the other talks given that first day. You can see them all here – if you click on “show more” in the comment each different speaker has their own links.
This post highlights the two questions I asked during the event of Better Identity Coalition Day on the 25th of January, 2023.
The Better Identity Coalition is dedicated to working closely with policymakers to advance digital security, privacy protections, and user-friendliness for all individuals. The coalition is made up of some of the most successful companies worldwide, and its purpose is to encourage education and collaboration on securing identities online.
They are exploring innovative solutions to allow people in the United States to take control of their identities and operate their businesses online in a risk-free and protected environment.
On January 25, I went to the Better Identity Coalition Day, and while there, I asked two questions.
1st Question:
I questioned whether or not they are aware that the federal government of the United States is going to issue secure digital IDs to a certain demographic. For instance, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is going to start issuing digital green cards soon, utilizing the format of verifiable credentials.
Click here for the detailed conversation on the 1st question.
2nd Question:
I also questioned a recent conspiracy theory involving Phyto that suggests Apple, Google, and Microsoft are involved in a scheme to grant the NSA access to cloud data. While I was not asking for a response to this theory, I wanted to bring attention to the issue of conspiracy theories within the Meta industry. As a leader, I was curious to know what steps they and other leaders in the room were taking to collectively address this problem.
Click here for the detailed conversation on the 2nd question.
An event hosted by the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) asked me to give a talk on the subject of self-sovereign identity and provide a foundational overview for privacy professionals.
The following are some of the primary issues discussed throughout the event:
The Panel was put together by Katharina Koerner, the Principal Technology Researcher at IAPP. Myself, Dominique Beron CEO of walt.id and Kristina Yashuda, who does Identity Standards at MSFT.
Self-sovereign identity (SSI) is essentially a fresh take on digital identity solutions. Its goal is to empower users with additional options in managing their online identities and in deciding how much of their private data to make public.
In this manner, the self-sovereign identity technology provides assistance for the data reduction and purpose restriction tenets of privacy.
Simply click this link to see the whole video.
At the invitation of the organizers of DWeb Camp 2022, I delivered a session on the subject of three open standards for decentralized identities.
Decentralized identifiers, verifiable credentials, and decentralized identifier communication were discussed throughout this session as three of the most important developing standards for decentralized identity.
Decentralized Identifiers: I went through a variety of issues in this standard, including how a decentralized identifier (DID) differs from private name spaces and globally controlled registries, what it looks like, the standard components of a DID document, DID specifications, and more.
Verifiable Credentials: In this section, I discussed what verifiable credentials are, how they function, as well as characteristics and benefits such as extensive expressive capacity and a vast array of potential applications.
Decentralized Identifier Communication: It is also known as DIDComm Messaging, and inside it, we are able to have peer-to-peer ownership of the social graph commons. During our presentation on this protocol for decentralized identification, I went through its viability and several uses, in addition to the mechanism behind it.
To that aim, I also discussed ways in which we might integrate many of the aforementioned open standards. In addition, two more standard ideas, the “personal data store” and “object capabilities,” have been offered in the conclusion.
Here is the link to the complete video:
https://archive.org/details/25-15-45_-_decentralized_identity_open_standards.qt
I was cited in an article that was published in Forbes. The article was part of a series that was assessing the activities of 2022 on Twitter, the crazy policies of a new CEO, and the ramifications on the future of social media.
The article’s central emphasis was on the question of whether or not, in the near future of social media, users can feel secure while maintaining their individual identities.
I was quoted in the following lines as part of a discussion on the pros and cons of maintaining anonymity and pseudonymity online:
“Kaliya Young, Identity Woman, recalls an incident with Kathy Sierra, a female blogger and game developer, who in 2007, experienced death threats online and finally gave up her tech career, withdrew from the blogosphere and from online life. Following that incident there were calls to create blogger codes of conduct to stop this online violence against women.”
“’Look, if the first bad instances of online violence against women were treated seriously and the perpetrators that were not known were held to account then we would be in a different place [today]. They were not.’ Weeve, the pseudonym, of the hacker and self-described neo-Nazi and white supremacist responsible for posting false information about Sierra, had gone unpunished. As per Young, ‘He should have gone to prison for that. I was at the conference when they got up and said Kathy isn’t here because of death threats! It affected my life as a woman working in technology. Instead, he was left alone and went on to commit more acts of terrorism.’”
About the other side, you may find me in the following lines, where I’m contributing to a discussion regarding the importance of transparency and verification:
“Young stresses that it will take ‘time, rigour, investment and a proportionate approach’ to see the payoff. She points out that there is also a middle ground and it’s possible to implement speed bumps to make it less appealing for bad actors to exploit a poorly designed platform. ‘Designing a social media platform with possible consequences including, but not limited to privacy and security risks in mind (like One Dot Everyone, a consequence scanning tool), can improve the design while exploring alternatives to identity verification. Privacy Impact Assessments and Human Rights Impact Assessments will also go a long way to mitigate risks.’”
“Young questions the process for verification. Who will decide a person is who they say they are? Given her work in the Identity space, development of a trust framework should be leveraged to deal with the complexities of identity verification. But it continues to call into question what individuals or groups are responsible for defining the rules for verification?”
“Young professes that Identity has its place online but argues that the systems including the governance layers need to be in sync. ‘So men like Galloway and Haidt can go on about this ‘real name’ stuff all they want. Until the systems they built actually work as claimed and that men who use their real names and are known will be held to account, then what business do they have suggesting that?’”
Now, the purpose of this section is to provide a response to the following question: will technology save us? In the passage that follows, I am referenced as follows:
“Social media accounts have been around for a long time and Young makes clear they are, for the most part, run and managed by real people, attached to other real identities online that have more credibility: I think that analog is the new digital – meaning people will seek out and connect and value time with each other in person.”
Lastly, I am cited in the following lines on the remark that identity verification on social networks does not compute or make sense:
“As per Young, identity needs careful and thoughtful consideration:
There is a difference between the platform knowing who someone is and the whole world knowing the same. Who is enforcing what type of ID? Like Doctor, Young signals the marginalized, and those who have been suffering the abuse on the platform for over a decade. The rules for verification need to incorporate the varying definitions of identity that include cultural, general and local perspectives.”
You can read the full article here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/hessiejones/2023/01/04/will-the-future-of-social-media-mean-the-coexistence-of-safety-and-identity/?sh=5851ac587fba
I was asked to offer my perspective on the risks associated with the biometric data of Worldcoin, which was included in an article Spectrum IEEE published.
A crypto currency, Worldcoin, aspires to become the most globally and uniformly distributed cryptocurrency ever by allocating the same modest number of coins to every individual on Planet. The business has spent the last year creating a system that allows other parties to utilize its vast registration of “unique humans” for various identity-focused applications.
However, Worldcoin’s biometrics-focused approach is being greeted with widespread concerns regarding privacy, security, and transparency.
Here is the section of the article where I was mentioned about the possible risks posed by Worldcoin’s biometric data.
“It’s also questionable how useful the concept of ‘unique humanness’ really is outside of niche cryptocentric applications, says Kaliya Young, an identity researcher and activist. Identity plays a broader role in everyday life, she says: ‘I care what your university degrees are, where you were born, how much money you make, all sorts of attributes that PoP doesn’t solve for.'”
Another one:
“Worldcoin’s biggest challenge may not be the functionality of its technology but questions of trust. The central goal of blockchains is to avoid relying on centralized authorities, but by using complex, custom hardware to recruit users, the company is setting itself up as a powerful arbiter of digital identity. ‘Worldcoin posits that everyone in the world should have their eyeball scanned by them and they should be the decider of who’s a unique human,” says Young. ‘Please explain to me how that’s not ultracentralized.‘”
You may read the complete article by clicking on the following link: https://spectrum.ieee.org/worldcoin
I was invited to discuss self-sovereign identity on Episode 7 of The Future of You Podcast with the host, Tracey Follows, and a fellow guest, Lucy Yang.
On this podcast, we discussed digital wallets, verifiable credentials, digital identity, anonymity and self-sovereignty.
Listen online: https://bit.ly/3w1cxbu
Listen on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3vIB9qK
Listen on Apple: https://apple.co/3w3fqbN
Listen on Google Podcasts: https://bit.ly/3w0hWQ1
Listen on Amazon Podcasts: https://amzn.to/3KBBC29
I was quoted in the article in MIT Technology Review on April 6, 2022, “Deception, exploited workers, and cash handouts: How Worldcoin recruited its first half a million test users.”
Worldcoin, a startup built on a promise of a fairly-distributed, cryptocurrency-based universal basic income, is building a biometric database by collecting data from the financially disadvantaged in the developing nations, in exchange for cash incentives.
Below is the paragraph which I am quoted in, with regards to Worldcoin’s business.
Others remain unconvinced that Worldcoin can actually reach everyone in the world—and instead, serves as a distraction from ongoing work to create new identity paradigms. Identity expert Kaliya Young, while declining to comment on Worldcoin specifically, says that “it’s common for companies to claim that ‘if everyone in the world was in our system, everything would be fine.’ Newsflash: everybody is not going to be in your system, so let’s move on and talk about how we solve problems” in online identity.
You can read the entire article by following this link, https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/04/06/1048981/worldcoin-cryptocurrency-biometrics-web3/
I chatted with Katherine Druckman and Doc Searls of Reality 2.0 about the dangers of ID.me, a national identity system created by the IRS and contracted out to one private company, and the need for the alternatives, decentralized systems with open standards.
We see democracy as ideally a process of co-creating the conditions of our shared lives, solving our collective problems, and learning about life from and with each other.
Most of the social technologies for democracy we work with are grounded in conversation – discussion, dialogue, deliberation, choice-creating, negotiation, collective visioning, and various forms of council, assembly, conference, and so on.
Democratic technologies, thought of and used in this way, can be applied in creative new ways that enable people to become more engaged with each other, with better results and less wasted, counter-productive energy, thus moving towards more successful, enjoyable self-governance. They operate at a variety of scales from small groups, organizations, and networks to whole societies.
I chatted with Alexa Raad and Leslie Daigle of Techsequences about self-sovereign identity: what identity is and how we’ve lost control of our own identity in today’s world.
Click on the link below to listen.
https://www.techsequences.org/podcasts/?powerpress_pinw=252-podcast
“Who are you?”. Answering that may seem at once easy and yet incredibly complex. In the real world, we are born with, gain or develop aspects of our identity. But distinguishing who is who is a lot more complex online. Multiple entities assign IDs and keep track of our activities. Identity models have evolved from the traditional or siloed model to the federated models. The common denominator however is that you are not in control of your identity. Join us for a conversation with Kaliyah Young, expert in self-sovereign identity, on how we as individuals can gain control over what is uniquely ours: our identity.
You may need to prove your vaccination status for travel or work, or to attend an event. Paper credentials usually work, but a new crop of digital verification apps is adding confusion.
Kaliya Young, an expert on digital identity verification working on the COVID Credentials Initiative, is also concerned that the rush to digitize important documents—including health cards and electronic driver’s licenses—will result in faulty designs.
“I’m happy about the digitization—just not happy about the failure to be discerning in those choices pushed by health IT people who don’t care about privacy pushing static QR codes like SMART Health Cards,” she says. Young says static QR codes can easily be copied by anyone who has access to them, and perhaps used by someone who is not the owner. “We will be stuck with bad systems that have baked within them privacy-infringing defaults.”
Last week while I was at Phocuswright I also had the pleasure of being on the Keynote Panel at EEMA‘s Information Security Solutions Europe [ISSE] virtual event. We had a great conversation talking about the emerging landscape around eIDAS and the recent announcement that the EU will work on a digital wallet and open standards for Europe.
Here is a link to the video if the embed isn’t working.
I had the pleasure of talking with Bill Johnston who I met many years ago via Forum One and their online community work. It was fun to chat again and to share for the community management audience some of the latest thinking on Self-Sovereign Identity.
Kaliya Young is many things: an advocate for open Internet identity standards, a leader in the identity space – including hosting the Internet Identity Workshop, a published author, and a skilled Open Space facilitator.
On this episode of the Cohere podcast, Kaliya joins Bill to discuss the history of online identity, what events led us to the consolidation of identity into a few centralized platforms, and what steps we need to take to recover and protect our online identities.
For the opening episode of ‘Identikit Sequent X’, Michelle Dennedy welcomes Kaliya Young, also known as The Identity Woman, to Smarter Markets for our latest series examining the evolution of digital identity, and how self-sovereign identity, specifically, can advance a consent-based economy.
Kaliya is one of the world’s leading experts in self-sovereign identity and identity on the blockchain. She is the co-author of ‘A Comprehensive Guide to Self-Sovereign Identity’ and is widely known as The Identity Woman; also the name of her blog and twitter handle. Ms. Young has committed her life to the development of an open standards-based internet layer that empowers and enables the people and was named one of the most influential women in tech by Fast Company Magazine.
We had a great conversation about digital identity in Political Economies and specifically a paper with a proposal by Bryan Ford.
Life on Intersections: Digital Identity in Political Economies
Most digital identity systems are centralized (e.g., in big government or technology organizations) or individualistic (e.g., in most blockchain projects). However, being in the world is fundamentally social and intersectional — we are all part of networks. So how might we formalize digital identity in a way that better reflects this complex reality? This panel with leading social technology and computer researchers explores more robust digital identity approaches and potential application areas in political economies.