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Polygon launches decentralized ID product powered by ZK proofs

The public launch of Polygon ID comes 12 months after it was first launched in a closed-environment to a select group of builders.

Polygon, a layer-2 scaling protocol for Ethereum, has launched a zero-knowledge decentralized identity solutionto the public nearly a year after announcing its development.

The Polygon ID service uses zero-knowledge proofs (ZK proofs) that use cryptographic techniques to allow users to verify their identity online without having their sensitive information passed or potentially stored with a third party.

Polygon Labs publicly released Polygon ID on March 1, almost 12 months after the project was officially launched in a closed-source environment.

The Polygon team says Polygon ID was built to “solve the issue of digital trust.”

“What sets Polygon ID apart from most other decentralized ID frameworks is its implementation of zero-knowledge technology, allowing users to verify their identities or other credentials without necessarily revealing sensitive information,” Polygon said.

The public release introduces four new tools to the Polygon ID toolset — Verifier SDK, Issuer Node, Wallet SDK and Wallet App — that will allow Polygon developers to integrate decentralized identity into their applications.

A simple chart explaining how Polygon ID interacts with user credentials. Source: Polygon

Users will be able to produce zero-knowledge proofs using off-chain credentials — such as their passport, national ID or a bachelor's degree — to interact with smart contracts and verify information on-chain.

“This means that off-chain data can now be used for trustless on-chain verifications in the widely-supported Verified Credential format.”

Polygon claims it’s also the first ZK-based digital ID tool that allows users to hold credentials locally on handheld devices such as smartphones, and that users will no longer need passwords:

“Passwordless logins exchange encrypted verifiable credentials by simply scanning a QR code or connecting to a desktop wallet. Organizations can benefit from improved security, a better user experience, and productivity of their system administrators whose time is not taken up by password resets.”

The co-founder of Polygon ID, David Schwartz, said in a March 1 tweet that the product was built “on the latest decentralized identity standards” which will help protect developers and users against unauthorized access from third parties.

"Providing identity in a way that the average consumer can use is the holy grail of digital ID adoption,” he explained in a separate press statement.

Related: Decentralized finance to be examined at inaugural CFTC tech advisory meeting

Multiple projects have already committed to integrating Polygon ID upon launch, such as Web3 infrastructure provider Kaleido, ID verification solution Fractal and Web3 community management system Collab.Land. Together they have a user base of over 4 million, according to Polygon.

Other Web3 projects, such as metaverse platform The Sandbox and blockchain builder community Guild.xyz, are in the process of integrating Polygon ID too.

Following the news, the price of Polygon’s native token, MATIC (MATIC), increased 2.5% from $1.22 to $1.25 in a matter of hours before falling back to $1.23.

Other blockchain-based ID products out in the space today include Quadrata and IDNTTY.

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Polygon Announces Zero-Knowledge Identity Platform for Web3

Polygon Announces Zero-Knowledge Identity Platform for Web3On March 29, Polygon, the layer two (L2) scaling solution that runs parallel with the Ethereum blockchain, has announced a new identity platform called Polygon ID. While the protocol is is still under development, Polygon ID is powered by zero-knowledge (ZK) cryptography and Polygon expects a public version of the ID wallet app and software […]

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Polygon ID platform seeks to enhance self-agency and privacy in the Web3 space

The zero-knowledge-based platform is expected to be fully operational in Q3 of 2022.

Layer-2 Ethereum scaling solution, Polygon (MATIC) has announced the establishment of Polygon ID, an identity platform designed to complement the decentralized finance and decentralized application (DApp) economies by providing users greater privacy and sovereignty within Web3.

Professed to be the first identity platform of its kind to adopt cryptographic-based zero-knowledge technology, the platform will utilize Iden3’s Circom ZK toolkit, including zkSNARK cryptography for the generation and the zkProof Request Language protocol to verify the authenticity of the proposed claim.

Users of the platform can provide proof of their identity when engaging in activities such as initial coin offerings, token airdrops, decentralized exchange, or DEX, trading, or those in which strict Know Your Customer (KYC, requirements apply.

With the capacity to introduce a Sybil-resistant one-vote-per-person mechanism, the use-cases can also expand beyond the DeFi sector, to the metaverse, gamify and nonfungible token (NFT) industries whereby asset authenticity is verified via on-chain, privatized claims.

The team is expecting to deploy the public version of the ID wallet app during Q2 of 2022, alongside features such as “Claims Issuance, Private Authentication, zkProof Generation and Verification,” with the full platform release and accompanying SDK functionalities scheduled for the following quarter.

Source: Polygon

Related: Here's how Polygon is challenging the limitations of Ethereum, as told by co-founder Sandeep Nailwal

In November 2021, Polygon made a concerted effort to expand its zero-knowledge-proof development by pledging over $1 billion towards the technology, a sum that included 250 million MATIC tokens for startup firm Mir.

On a video call with Cointelegraph, Rafal Nazarkiewicz, the product manager at Polygon Hermez and Polygon ID shared exclusive insights into the technicalities and purported benefits of the technology for blockchain advocates and consumers alike.

Speaking on the importance of identity ownership within the Web3 space, Nazarkiewicz argued that "identity is fundamental for many use-cases within digital inclusion, and for the right to be recognized," and that "in Web3, it's supposed to be private by default and decentralized," before affirming that none of the content of the claims, for example, their personal information, will be transacted or stored on-chain, only the proof of validity.

The use-cases of identification systems are not wholly limited to on-chain activities, but can also be utilized in the interaction of traditional contract agreements, as Nazarkiewicz reveals, such as "legal ownership for the propose of transfer of tokenized assets such as securities, intellectual property and land titles."

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