Getting Started with Decentralized Identity: Five Things You Can Do with Your DID ABT Wallet

Author: Riley Shu (ArcBlock Data Engineer)

Starting today, any user can download the first of its kind ABT Wallet. This new wallet is the first to fully integrated features of DID and fully enable a user to benefit from decentralized identity. What’s that mean?

Anyone can now have a digital wallet to manage their digital selves securely, easily and completely under their control. You can download ABT wallet at https://www.abtwallet.io.

First: Manage your “digital” assets

Like many existing crypto wallets, you can use the ABT wallet to manage your crypto assets, including different types of cryptocurrency like ABT. Where the ABT Wallet is unique is that it views your digital interactions as assets. Here the definition of ‘asset’ is much broader than just money. With ABT Wallet, everything you own can be an asset, such as event tickets, movie tickets, certificates, licenses, as well as our digital data giving you the ability to approve and deny anybody who wants to see your information.

All of your possessions can now be in one place.

Second: Log in

ABT Wallet is one of the first applications that bring DID (Decentralized Identity) to the real world and is the first to fully realize a complete DID experience for a user. Any service, app or offering built on ArcBlock’s platform is instantly available for any ABT Wallet user.

What’s DID? In short, DID refers to a new type of identifier which is under full control of the owner, without other centralized authority. https://w3c-ccg.github.io/did-spec/ This means, any information about your identity is completely in your hands, and no one can get them without your permission.

Why do we need DID? DID protects your data, privacy, and data security. If you store your identity information in a centralized service, you have no control over your privacy or your data. That’s why each time when you want to login with that information, you have to make an extra request. With ABT wallet, you can just log in. Since you might want to have more than one online identity and profile, ABT Wallet lets you create as many as you want and helps you manage them. Each time you want to access a new app or service, all you need to do is to choose a profile when you want to log into a service. Moreover, you also have the ability to decide what information you are willing to share with that provider and can accept/deny any request. No more just giving your data for free. You can now control every interaction.

Third: Complete a transaction

ABT Wallet empowers you to do many things. It is built for the decentralized web and with it, you can do much more than just log in with your DID. You can use your DID to complete online transactions without even logging in if the other party doesn’t require your extra information.

For example, if you want to buy a ticket for a Hackathon event, all you need to do is just scan the QR code for that event.

Then confirm the transaction. By sliding through the bar, ABT wallet is generating your signature with your DID over this transaction, saying that you agree to pay 3 TBA for this ticket. Here, a ticket is also an asset.

After you confirm the transaction, ABT wallet will publish this transaction to the underneath blockchain for verification. The verification process is to make sure your signature is valid, your account has enough balance to pay for the ticket, and the ticket is still available, etc. A valid transaction means that everything is OK. If that’s the case, you will see the tickets appear in your wallet, because it’s now one of your assets!

Fourth: Proof of holding

Often in life, we found ourselves in the dilemma that we want to prove something without exposing our privacy or personal information to the world. For example, I want to prove that I own the ticket, but I don’t want to show my row or seat number to other people.

You don’t answer a True or False question with a paragraph of answer. If you want to prove you own this asset, just scan a QR code, and the other party can verify your asset address on the ABT blockchain that holds your ticket allowing you to instantly verify your details without giving aware any sensitive information.

Fifth: Consuming your asset

When you are in the Hackathon event, the staff needs to market your ticket as ‘used’. This is called ‘consuming your ticket’.

Like before, this is another transaction you need to confirm. Your ABT wallet will help you pick out the required asset. By sliding through the bar, ABT wallet is generating your signature verifying that you indeed want to use the ticket. Upon completion, you can not re-sell it to other people or re-use it for the event.

The used ticket will be marked as ‘used’ in your ABT Wallet.

The decentralized web is here. ABT Wallet helps you realize that there is no one better to manage your digital identity than yourself. Take back control and begin experiencing the future today. Download ABT Wallet and take back control!