@article{discovery10074541, note = {This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/}, volume = {2}, month = {November}, journal = {Frontiers in Blockchain}, year = {2019}, title = {A Decentralised Digital Identity Architecture}, url = {https://doi.org/10.3389/fbloc.2019.00017}, author = {Goodell, G and Aste, T}, abstract = {Current architectures to validate, certify, and manage identity are based on centralised, top-down approaches that rely on trusted authorities and third-party operators. We approach the problem of digital identity starting from a human rights perspective, asserting that individual persons must be allowed to manage their personal information in a multitude of different ways in different contexts and that to do so, each individual must be able to create multiple unrelated identities. Therefore, we first define a set of fundamental constraints that digital identity systems must satisfy to preserve and promote human rights. With these constraints in mind, we then propose a decentralised, standards-based approach, using a combination of distributed ledger technology and thoughtful regulation, to facilitate many-to-many relationships among providers of key services. Our proposal for digital identity differs from others in its approach to trust: by avoiding centralisation and the imposition of trust from the top down, we can encourage individuals and organisations to embrace the system and share in its benefits.}, keywords = {digital identity, certification, identification, trust, privacy, anonymity} }