Onboarding Working Group Kick-Off
One of the key principles of DIDAS is that we help experts coming from various industries and professions to work together, learn from each other and bring new ideas on how to apply SSI technology in real world.
To make it happen, we encourage our members to propose topics and explore ideas in dedicated working groups. Working Groups allow us to agree on the goals that the experts will pursue jointly, structure the work and define the results. After all, we want to see SSI become a reality in Switzerland!
We are very happy that more than 15 experts got together to kick off our Onboarding Working Group. This group grew out of the idea that many different activities today require sharing of verifiable information – personal identity, company registration, tax identifiers, addresses, and so on and so forth.
In Switzerland, Financial sector is very strong and so a lot of innovation happens around Fintech. Our original idea, therefore, was to focus on Fintech use-cases around onboarding, KYC and AML processing and similar activities.
As we started to explore these ideas in depth during the session, we understood that not only Fintech, but other Industries ( e.g. Insurance, B2B Supplier onboarding, etc) can benefit strongly from an ability to securely exchange identity and registration data using Verifiable Credentials, which are easy to maintain in the future, including automated invalidation of credentials that were recalled by their issuers.
It is also clear that various use-cases depend on the existing legislation and might be difficult to implement in today’s legal environment.
In recognition of this fact, the group has agreed to catalog various use-cases, examine their legal implications and requirements, explore whether or not it is possible to find solutions and approaches that are compatible with the today’s set of laws, plan technical PoCs and implementations.
It’s important to note that Swiss lawyers are among the most creative professionals in the world and are enthusiastic about opportunities to find improvements in the legal system that are required to make Switzerland the best and the most innovative country to do business. The recent legislation on Blockchain Assets in Switzerland is a great demonstration of that fact.
Even in the case that some SSI onboarding use-cases might be difficult to implement within the limits of the current legislation, the group will identify the needed improvements and work with the lawmakers, regulators and politicians to develop and promote the required changes.
This is one of the core missions of DIDAS – drive Thought Leadership and remove barriers to implementation of SSI and Verifiable Claims technology in Switzerland.
If you are interested and want to bring your technical, business, legal and/or creative skills and ideas into the effort, even if you know nothing about the SSI yet, we are looking for you!
