Yesterday it was announced that the cooperative IDunion was chosen for a German innovation competition to “Showcase Secure Digital Identities”. The second phase of the project started on April 1 and is backed by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy. Partners include DB Systel, Deutsche Telekom, GS1 Germany, Robert Bosch, Siemens and ten others with another 26 associate partners.
IDunion’s aim is to use self-sovereign identities (SSI) to launch a production network and implement more than forty identity applications. Use cases range from education, mobility and e-health to finance and IoT solutions. It aims to establish identities for people, legal entities as well as things.
The organization was previously called SSI for Germany, but the name change is a nod towards broadening its aim to be more European. The consortium leader is Main Incubator GmbH.
Because the project is in its second phase, it already has a test network up and running with multiple functioning identity wallets.
Solutions are designed to comply with international standards for verifiable credentials and decentralised identifiers (DID). So it acknowledges standards set by the W3C, Decentralised Identity Foundation (DIF) and the Trust over IP Foundation (ToIP).
Apart from the five big names mentioned, some of the associates include Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank, Deutsche Post, consultants msg systems and 51nodes, and enterprise blockchain firm R3.
SSI has been progressing slowly for several years. However, COVID-19 and the need for verifiable proof of testing and vaccines has thrust SSI applications into the limelight for digital health passports.
