Circle and Industry Leaders Have Built the First Decentralized Identity Proof-of-Concept for Crypto Finance using Verite Credentials

Ecosystem adoption will advance wider mainstream usage of crypto payments and decentralized finance

 SAN FRANCISCO, September 30, 2022 — Together with Archblock, the team behind the TrueFi protocol, MetaMask Institutional and Parallel Markets, Circle Internet Financial has built the first proof-of-concept for “know your business” (KYB) verification using Verite for decentralized digital identity credentials.

Verite credentials are portable, interoperable and easily stored in a crypto wallet. Critically, these privacy-preserving credentials eliminate the need for sharing personally identifiable information and users have total control over when and how their identity attestations are accessed by different organizations or protocols that accept the credential. 

The same credentials can also make it simpler for protocols to protect against bad actors in their networks and can help ensure the integrity of a community by providing KYB requirements.

“Circle believes in the value of open software on the Internet and that the preservation of privacy should be enshrined as a design principle,” said Jeremy Allaire, Co-Founder and CEO of Circle. “Using Verite to build an open network for decentralized identity is an important step toward bridging the compliance requirements of financial regulations with the Web3 ethos of decentralization, privacy preservation and user ownership.” 

Circle intends to issue KYB credentials free of charge to its customers and accredited institutions. Web apps, mobile apps, and smart contracts will get the benefit of identity-verified participants from the simple check of a KYB credential, without needing to collect or store sensitive user information. 

“Decentralized identity has the power to provide organizations and their members with direct control over how, when and where their information is shared,” said Johann Bornman, Global Product Lead at MetaMask Institutional. “Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) standards could enable various on-chain use cases while preserving the values of permissionless innovation and respecting privacy. We are excited to partner with Circle, Verite, and TrueFi to explore ways for businesses to more seamlessly interact within Web3.”

“Archblock believes in paving the way for institutions to onboard into DeFi and Web3,” stated Bill Wolf, Chief Investment Officer at Archblock. “Working with Circle to leverage the Verite credential provides critical infrastructure needed to guide Institutions into the decentralized world with confidence. As we continue to drive adoption, working with Verite will help us reach our goals in a faster, more frictionless way.”

Circle joined other crypto and blockchain companies in February 2022 to introduce Verite as a open-source framework for decentralized identity credential issuance, custody and verification. Verite is designed to help make it safer, easier and more efficient to do business across the transformative worlds of DeFi and Web3 commerce. Unlike alternative approaches to digital identity that involve proprietary tokenization or centralized approval mechanisms, Verite is decentralized, open-source and free for anyone to build upon.

Developers interested in incorporating decentralized identity into their apps can begin building on Verite today and explore our open-source verification APIs.

Businesses interested in receiving KYB credentials can request early access here.