The Future of Identity

In this episode, we sit down with Harrison Tang, Co-founder and & CEO of Spokeo, which is a “people search engine”. Spokeo aggregates many sources of data about people and sells that data to verifiers. So at first blush, Harrison is an unlikely person to be a massive advocate for SSI and co-chair of the W3C Credentials Community Group.We dig in to why Spokeo cares about verifiable credentials, and how verifiable credentials represent the opportunity to deliver more trust to Spokeo’s customers and how they allow Spokeo to participate in the next wave of digital identity innovation. We also explore complex concepts like negative reputation and how AI will impact the personal data landscape. We finish out by talking about what current IDtech companies can learn from Spokeo’s early go-to-market and what it will take to get verifiable credential adoption.To learn more about Spokeo visit https://www.spokeo.com/ or follow Spokeo on social media (@Spokeo). You can find Harrison on social media as well (@tang_talks) and keep up with his latest thinking through his podcast ‘Tang Talks’.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

In this episode, we chat with Carlos Korten, Co-founder & Chief Product Officer of Bindle Systems. Bindle built one of the largest private-sector deployments of decentralized identity in the USA, and Carlos shares tons of stories from the trenches of getting hundreds of thousands of consumers on board.We dive in to the go-to-market strategies Bindle employed, including how they sold directly to verifiers, and how if they could do it over again, Carlos would focus even more narrowly on verifiers. We talk about their business model and what they learned about making money with verifiable credentials. And we talk about some of Carlos’ hard-earned lessons that he recommends to anyone building an IDtech product.From discussing the founding of Bindle, its journey through the pandemic, and then the decision to pivot away from a COVID product, Carlos and Riley’s discussion makes for an engaging episode.To contact Carlos or to learn more about Bindle’s current focus, reach out to carlos@bindlesystems.com.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

In this episode, we sit down with Nate Soffio, Co-founder and & CEO of Portabl. Nate is applying decentralized identity to fintech and open banking, which is such an important but also challenging use case.We discuss the ins and outs of Portabl’s user experience and how it differs from other reusable KYC products. Nate also provides insight into lessons learned, deliberate product decisions Portable has made, and common mistakes he has seen IDtech founders make.This episode should be useful for anyone interested in fintech or adding SSI to their identity stack.To contact Nate or to learn more about Portabl, reach out to hello@getportabl.com.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

In this episode, we speak with Andrew Black, Managing Director of ConnectID, which is part of Australian Payments Plus. Andrew, who is an expert in the convergence of IDtech and open banking, sheds light on a unique approach to building bank-backed digital identity and the user experience that it enables. It was fascinating to unpack the role governance plays in ConnectID with some tangible examples, and analyze how the UX of an identity exchange differs from that of an identity wallet.We also speculate a bit on why both true open banking and true interoperable digital identity have weaker-than-expected adoption, and how to balance solving business problems with building a future we all want to live in.To contact Andrew, you can reach out on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-black-a5118239/. Learn more about ConnectID at https://connectid.com.au/.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

Sarah Clark, SVP of Digital Identity at Mastercard, discusses Mastercard's ID network and the challenges and opportunities in the reusable identity space. The conversation includes go-to-market strategies, collaboration for a global ecosystem, use cases of reusable identity, decentralized identity approaches, and the future of digital identity in Web3.

In this episode, we sit down with Keith Uber, VP of Sales Engineering at Ubisecure, to discuss the role of verifiable credentials in identity and access management.Keith shares his insights on Organizational Identity and how vLEIs change the game, create new business opportunities, and unlock efficiencies for representatives of businesses to transact more seamlessly.Keith also shares his perspective on how Ubisecure is engaging with the eIDAS 2.0 and European Identity Wallet initiatives on the consumer identity side.We explore the fascinating overlap between Organizational Identity and Consumer Identity. While Ubisecure’s focus is in the EU market, there are loads of insights that will be helpful to people building IDtech products around the world.To learn more about Ubisecure, visit https://www.ubisecure.com/.Be sure to check out Ubisecure’s podcast titled ‘Let's Talk About Digital Identity’ at https://www.ubisecure.com/lets-talk-about-digital-identity-podcast/.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

Today’s guest is Ankur Patel, Head of Product at Entra Verified ID which is Microsoft’s decentralized identity product. We begin the conversation by reviewing Microsoft’s storied history of identity initiatives, and why one of the world’s most valuable companies made decentralized identity one of their major focus areas.We dive into the recent announcement about verifiable credentials on LinkedIn, which allows companies to issue employment credentials, so LinkedIn members can truly prove they actually work at the organization listed on their LinkedIn profile.Ankur is one of the pioneers in decentralized identity and his perspective on why enterprises are adopting decentralized identity is fascinating.Reach out to Ankur on Twitter (@_AnkurPatel) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/4ankurpatel/). To learn more about Microsoft Entra Verified ID visit the following two links:https://aka.ms/verifyoncehttps://aka.ms/didfordevsReach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

Today’s guest is Eric Starr, Co-founder & CEO of UltraPass ID—an IDtech product for governments.Eric shares his story trying to solve civic problems through the political system via Andrew Yang’s presidential campaign and how he ended up starting a company to reimagine how citizens interact with government.We go through the problem caused by many government silos of personal data, why Eric landed on verifiable credentials to solve the problem, and why governments are a challenging but super important segment to target because they hold the keys to verifiable credential adoption.Eric is convinced that solving problems for government stakeholders with real solutions, not with technological dogma, is the way verifiable credentials will be adopted.Reach out and connect with Eric and his team at https://www.ultrapassid.com/.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

Today’s guest is Timothy Ruff, General Partner at Digital Trust Ventures. Timothy is an early pioneer of self-sovereign identity as a co-founder of Evernym, a co-creator of Sovrin, and an advisor to several IDtech startups. Timothy has countless battle scars from being on the ground floor of so much innovation in the decentralized identity space.In this episode, we discuss the difference between a use case and a business case and how to bridge the gap. We also talk about the humility required to change your mind about your idea when you’re wrong. And one of the most pivotal things Timothy has changed his mind about in recent years is that blockchain isn’t needed for SSI. We close by talking about where Timothy thinks the most ripe path to verifiable credential adoption lies in the near term.Multiple resources for SSI entrepreneurs are recommended within the episode and are listed below:The Cold Start Problem - Andrew Chen (Book)Running Lean by Ash Maurya - (Book)Disciplined Entrepreneurship by Bill Aulet - (Book)Without Their Permission by Alexis Ohanian - (Book)To reach out to Timothy, email him at timothy@digitaltrust.vcReach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.

Today’s guest is Manny Nijjar, co-founder and CEO of Truu, which is a healthcare-focused IDtech product that’s been involved in one of the most impressive production verifiable credentials rollouts to date. Their platform, alongside a handful of other vendors, helped the largest health system in the world respond to the COVID-19 pandemic—all while Manny was also serving on the front lines as an infectious disease doctor, leading his hospital’s COVID-19 response.The main takeaway from this episode is that involving end-users in your product development is key. You’ll hear how the biggest barriers for the NHS staff passport were not technology problems but user experience and adoption problems. And as an end-user of his own product, nobody can speak better about these points than Manny. He then breaks down those learnings and how he’s applied them to adjust both the product and go-to-market approaches he’s taking at Truu.This is an amazing opportunity for IDtech builders to shortcut the trial-and-error process of launching a product, by hearing what worked, what didn’t, and what Truu is doing about it next.To learn more about Truu or to contact Manny, email manreet@truu.id. Visit Truu’s website at https://www.truu.id/.Reach out to Riley (@rileyphughes) and Trinsic (@trinsic_id) on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you.