Rebooting Web-of-Trust

Mission

The Web of Trust is a buzzword for a new model of decentralized self-sovereign identity. It’s a phrase that dates back almost twenty-five years, the classic definition derives from PGP.

But some use it as a term to include self-sovereign identity authentication & verification, certificate validation, and reputation assessment, while the vibrant blockchain community is also drawing new attention to the concept we aim to reboot it.

Purpose

This facilitated design workshop ("DesignShop"), hosted by Christopher Allen, is focused on the creation of the next generation of decentralized web-of-trust based identity systems. The goal of this event is to generate 5 technical white papers on topics decided by the group that will have the greatest impact on the future, followed by a hackathon early in the new year to implement those ideas.

Topics include: lessons from PGP, progressive trust, hierarchical identity keys, perfect forward secrecy, blockchain identity, thin client security, decentralized e-commerce, self-validating scripts in certificates, unbundling certification from revocation, attribute certificates, linked local names, link contracts, capability security, smartcontract PKI, selective disclosure, multisig+group+ring signatures using Schnorr, reputation and trust metrics.

Objectives

• Build the next generation of Web-Of-Trust based identity systems.
• Showcase the scope of potential applications for decentralized trust models.
• Bring together the top contributors in web of trust and simlar applications.
• Explore developing tools that might be useful to funders and researchers.
• Discuss and suggest requirements to drive adoption in the Web-of-Trust model.

Outcomes

• Build the next generation of Web-Of-Trust based identity systems.
• Showcase the scope of potential applications for decentralized trust models.
• Bring together the top contributors in web of trust and simlar applications.
• Explore developing tools that might be useful to funders and researchers.
• Discuss and suggest requirements to drive adoption in the Web-of-Trust model.

Conduct

This community strives to encourage diversity, cohesion, and safety in all of our interactions. As such, we are currently codifying our code of conduct, incident handling process, and ensuring that we continually refine these documents and processes as the community grows. For further information on the current state of activities, please see the open letter to this community on the topic of community diversity, cohesion, and safety.