What Are Credentials Solutions?
Credentials are used as proof of an individual or organization’s identity, qualifications, certifications, skills, and achievements.
Credentials solutions refer to the process of providing digital verification of an individual or organization’s identity or qualifications. They enable individuals and organizations to manage and share their verified credentials in a secure and tamper-proof way.
Examples of Organizational and Individual Credentials
Examples of credentials for organizations
- Business licenses
- Compliance certifications
- Accreditations
- Industry-specific licenses
- Trade association memberships
- Product certifications
Examples of credentials for individuals
- Professional licenses
- Academic degrees
- Digital identity document
- Skills badges
- Language proficiency certificates
The Importance of Verifiable Credentials in Credentials Solutions
In the past, digital credentials could be easily forged or faked because they were not linked to any reliable verification process. This made it difficult for employers, educational institutions, and other organizations to verify the authenticity of the credential holder's qualifications or identity.
However, with the growth of Verifiable Credentials, this problem can be prevented. Because Verifiable Credentials have secure and advanced verification technology, they enable credential documents to be fraud-proof and instantly verified. This makes Verifiable Credentials much more reliable and trustworthy than older versions of digital credentials because it’s easier for organizations to verify qualifications and identity and ensure that only qualified parties are granted access to information.
Dock’s Suite of Credentials Solutions
Dock has a suite of Verifiable Credentials Solutions with built-in advanced privacy features for organizations and individuals to:
- Create, own, control, and manage their digital identities
- Create, issue, manage, revoke, and verify digital credentials
Certs Web App
This easy-to-use platform that is powered by our Certs API allows you to turn your credential documents into fraud-proof Verifiable Credentials.
Key features
- Send credentials directly to users’ identity wallet apps
- Enable advanced privacy features such as Selective Disclosure
- Design custom credential templates with your brand
- Set automatic expiration dates and remotely revoke the validity of credentials
- Put a proof of issuance on the blockchain (anchoring)
Who this is for
- Organizations with little to no technical resources to manage digital identity and Verifiable Credentials
- Organizations and developers that want to understand and try Dock’s technology and see what kind of applications can be built with the Certs API
- Organizations that need to make verification requests from their computer or phone through the Dock Wallet
Example use cases for organizations looking for an easy-to-use no-code solution
- Health and safety training organizations that issue course completion certificates that can be verified by potential employers or regulatory bodies
- Professional associations that need to issue digital certificates to members to recognize their achievements or accreditations
- Government departments that want to issue program completion certificates such as English training for newcomers or skills development programs
Certs API
Dock’s Certs API easily integrates with your system and data sources to make your data tamper-proof and easily verifiable. Rather than spending months or years, money, and resources building Verifiable Credentials Solutions from scratch, simply integrate the API to get to market faster.
Key features
- Automatically issue Verifiable Credentials to help organizations scale this functionality faster for their customers
- Get to market up to 6 times faster
- Protect credentials from data manipulation and verify their authenticity
- Issue a Verifiable Credential with one API call
- Instantly verify credentials
Tyson Henry, the CTA of BurstIQ, one of Dock’s partners, said that if his team had to build the functionalities on their own it would take at least one year. But with the Certs API integration, it took them from testing to production within 2 months.
Example Certs API use cases
- Healthcare organizations can issue digital health records to patients, which can be easily verified by other healthcare providers for continuity of care
- Online learning platforms can automatically issue verifiable certificates to students upon completion of courses or programs, which can be easily verified by potential employers or other educational institutions
- Supply chain companies can issue digital certificates of origin or quality for their products, which can be easily verified by buyers to ensure authenticity and quality
- Financial institutions can issue digital identity credentials to customers, which can be used for identity verification and authentication purposes, as well as for complying with Know Your Customer (KYC) and Anti-Money Laundering (AML) regulations
- Governments can issue digital IDs or licenses to citizens, which can be used for a variety of purposes, such as voting, accessing government services, or proving age or identity for purchasing alcohol
Dock Wallet
There is an increase in demand for digital identity wallets around the world due to a number of factors. One of the main reasons is the growing need for secure and convenient digital identity verification, which has become increasingly important as more transactions and interactions take place online. With traditional methods of identity verification, such as physical IDs or passwords, there are concerns around security and privacy, as well as the inconvenience and time involved in verifying identity.
The Dock Wallet allows users to:
- Easily create and manage their digital identity
- Securely store, share, and manage their digital credentials
- Efficiently verify credentials
Benefits of the Dock Wallet for individuals
- Privacy: Individuals have more control over their personal information, and can choose when and with whom to share it. This can help protect against identity theft and other forms of fraud, and give individuals greater peace of mind.
- Security: The Dock Wallet uses advanced encryption to protect personal information, making it much harder for unauthorized parties to access or steal this information. Verifiable Credentials are stored on users’ wallets on their device rather than a centralized storage system that is vulnerable to data breaches and hackers.
- Convenience: Easily store and manage all their credentials in one place, making it easier to access and share this information when needed. This can save time and reduce the hassle of managing multiple credentials across different platforms.
- Interoperability: Work with a wide range of other systems and platforms, making it easier for individuals to share their credentials with third parties and participate in a variety of online activities.
Instant verification for organizations
Organizations can instantly verify the authenticity of a credential, without having to go through a lengthy and manual verification process. This can save time and reduce the risk of fraud or errors in the verification process.
White Label Wallet Credentials Solutions for Organizations
Instead of spending money, time, and resources building a digital wallet with Verifiable Credential and digital identity functionalities for customers, organizations can simply get a white label digital wallet and choose which features to offer.
White label wallet features
- Customize the wallet with your own brand and preferences
- Interoperability that follows World Wide Web Consortium’s (W3C) decentralized identifiers (DIDs) and Verifiable Credential standards
- Manage your own app store profile and relationships with users so you can see the feedback as well as use your own privacy policies
- Any wallet updates will be applied to the white label wallet so your features will be up to date automatically
- The wallet enables advanced privacy features like Selective Disclosure so users can choose which Verifiable Credential information to share
Benefits of Credentials Solutions for Key Stakeholders
Issuing Organizations
Privacy for users: Issue Verifiable Credentials with advanced privacy features that allow users to choose which data to share with verifiers.
Secure: Digital credentials are encrypted and stored on user devices only. With Verifiable Credentials, user data doesn’t need to be stored which reduces the risk of identity fraud and other security breaches.
Improved compliance: Credential solutions help organizations comply with regulatory requirements, such as background checks and employee qualifications.
Verifying Organizations
Instant Verification: Organizations can verify credentials instantly without the need for manual verification processes that can take weeks or even months or contacting the issuing organization.
Prevents Credential Fraud: Verifiable credentials use cryptography to ensure that the credentials are tamper-proof and cannot be forged. This makes them much more secure than traditional verification methods, which rely on physical documents that can be easily lost, stolen, or forged.
Reduced Costs: By eliminating the need for manual verification processes, verifiable credentials can help organizations save time and money. This can be particularly beneficial for smaller organizations or startups that may not have the resources to conduct lengthy verification processes.
Streamlined hiring process: Digital credentials make it easier to verify the qualifications of potential employees, speeding up the hiring process.
Individuals
Control: Individuals have full ownership and control over their digital credentials and can share them securely with employers, educational institutions, and other organizations. If the credentials enable Selective Disclosure, they don’t have to share more information than necessary.
Convenience: Digital credentials can be accessed and shared from anywhere, making it easier to apply for jobs, services, or educational programs.
Increased trust: Digital credentials are tamper-proof and secure, increasing the trust and reliability of the information on the credentials.
Reduced fraud: Digital credentials eliminate the risk of fake or counterfeit credentials, reducing the potential for fraud.
How Do Verifiable Credentials Solutions Work?
Verifiable Credentials are enabled with advanced technologies including blockchain and decentralized identifiers (DIDs), which enable the creation of tamper-proof digital records that can be easily verified.
Blockchain
A blockchain is a digital ledger or database that stores information in a secure and decentralized way. Think of it as a chain of blocks, where each block contains a set of data, such as a transaction or a record of ownership. Each block is linked to the previous block, forming a chain of blocks that cannot be altered or deleted once they have been added to the chain.
The blockchain is maintained by a network of computers that work together to verify and validate transactions or data entries. Each computer in the network has a copy of the blockchain, and each copy is constantly updated with new information as it is added to the chain. This makes the blockchain very secure and reliable, as it is very difficult to hack or manipulate.
Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs)
Decentralized identifiers (DIDs) are unique identifiers that are created and fully controlled by an individual or organization rather than a centralized authority.
Here is an example of a DID created by the Dock Wallet:
To store DIDs on the blockchain, a registry of DIDs is created. The registry is essentially a list of all the unique DIDs that have been created and stored on the blockchain. Each DID is linked to a public key, which is used to verify the identity of the owner of the DID. When an individual wants to prove their identity or link to their Verifiable Credentials, they can use their DID to do so. The public key is used to verify the information.
Compared to centralized identifiers such as email addresses and social media profiles, DIDs are a much safer way to share and verify information. Some of the recurring problems from centralized identifiers include people’s information being stored on centralized servers which can be vulnerable to data breaches and large scale hacks and it’s often unclear who has access to personal information.
When an individual wants to prove their identity or qualifications, they can share their Verifiable Credentials with a requesting party, such as an employer or educational institution. The requesting party can then verify the credentials when their digital wallet on the back end checks the digital record on the blockchain.
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Conclusion
Credentials solutions are becoming increasingly important as more organizations move towards digital verification of identities and qualifications. Dock's Verifiable Credential solutions provide a secure, reliable, and cost-effective way for organizations and individuals to manage and share their credentials.
By implementing credential solutions, organizations can improve their compliance, streamline their hiring processes, and reduce the risk of identity fraud. For individuals, credential solutions provide greater control over their qualifications and increase the trust and reliability of their credentials.
About Dock
Dock is a Verifiable Credentials company that provides Dock Certs, a user-friendly, no-code platform, and developer solutions that enable organizations to issue, manage and verify fraud-proof credentials efficiently and securely. Dock enables organizations and individuals to create and share verified data.
Dock’s Verifiable Credential Platform
- Dock Certs: Web app to issue and manage digital identity and Verifiable Credentials
- Certs API: Easy integration with your system to make your data fraud-proof and instantly verifiable
- Dock Wallet: Easily store and manage their digital credentials and identity (individuals) and verify credentials instantly (organizations)
Partner Use Cases
- SEVENmile issues fraud-proof verifiable certificates using Dock
- BurstIQ Makes Health Data Verifiable, Secure, and Portable With Dock
- Gravity eliminates Health & Safety certificate fraud with Dock
Learn More
- How to Prevent Supply Chain Fraud With Blockchain
- BurstIQ Use Cases That Leverage Verifiable Credentials
- Blockchain Food Traceability: Enhancing Transparency and Safety
- How to Prevent Certificate Fraud
- Decentralized Identity
- Self-Sovereign Identity
- Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs)
- Web3 Identity
- Blockchain Identity Management
- Selective Disclosure
