Self-sovereign identity

Self-sovereign identity (SSI) is a concept in the digital movement that only the user should own their identity data fully without intervention from outside administration.[2] With SSI, the individual identity holders can fully create and control their verifiable credentials, without being forced to request permission of an intermediary or centralized authority and gives control over how their personal data is shared and used. The individual has a means of generating and controlling unique identifiers as well as some facility to store identity data.[3]

Relationship between entities, identities and attributes / identifiers

Decentralized identifiers (DIDs)[1] can be used to enable self-sovereign identities.

The basic structure of a SSI is as following: The claim-issuer issues identity to the user. User has control over the identity. User presents part of the identity to the relying party so that it could identify the user. For this system to work, the replying party needs to trust the identity issued by the claim-issuer.[4]

A SSI can be a decentralized identity, but could also be data from a social media account, a history of transactions on an e-commerce site, or attestation from friends or colleagues.

In the centralized identity paradigm a person’s identity is provided by some outside entity. In the decentralized identity paradigm the user is at the centre of the framework and there is no need for third parties to issue and administer an identity.[5]