Posted by Rohey Livne – Group Product Supervisor
In in the present day’s interconnected world, managing digital id is important. Android goals to assist open requirements that guarantee seamless interoperability with varied id suppliers and providers. As a part of this objective, we’re excited to announce that Android, through Credential Supervisor’s DigitalCredential API, now natively helps OpenID4VP and OpenID4VCI for digital credential presentation and issuance respectively.
What are digital credentials?
Digital credentials are cryptographically verifiable paperwork. The most typical rising use case for digital credentials is id paperwork reminiscent of driver’s licenses, passports, or nationwide ID playing cards. Within the coming years, it’s anticipated that Android builders will develop progressive purposes of this know-how for a wider vary of private credentials that customers might want to current digitally, together with schooling certifications, insurance coverage insurance policies, memberships, permits, and extra.
Digital credentials may be offered by any put in Android app. These apps are often called “credential holders”; usually digital pockets apps reminiscent of Google Pockets or Samsung Pockets.
Different apps not essentially regarded as “wallets” may have a use for exposing a digital credential. For instance an airline app may wish to provide their customers’ air miles reward program membership as a digital credential to be offered to different apps or web sites.
Digital credentials may be offered by the consumer to another app or web site on the identical gadget, and Android additionally helps securely presenting Digital Credentials between gadgets utilizing the identical trade customary protocols utilized by passkeys (CTAP), by establishing encrypted communication tunnels.
Customers can retailer a number of credentials throughout a number of apps on their gadget. By leveraging OpenID4VP requests from web sites utilizing the W3C Digital Credential API, or from native apps utilizing Android Credential Supervisor API, a consumer can choose what credential to current from throughout all accessible credentials throughout all put in digital pockets apps.
How digital credentials work
Presentation
To current the credential, the verifier sends an OpenID4VP request to the Digital Credential API, which then prompts the consumer to pick out a credential throughout all of the credentials that may fulfill this request. Observe that the consumer is deciding on a credential, not a digital pockets app:
As soon as the consumer chooses a credential to proceed with, Android platform redirects the unique OpenID4VP request to the digital pockets app that holds the chosen credential to finish the presentation again to the verifier. When the digital pockets app receives the OpenID4VP request from Android, it could actually additionally carry out any extra due-diligence steps it must carry out previous to releasing the credential to the verifier.
Issuance
Android additionally permits builders to subject their very own Digital Credentials to a consumer’s digital pockets app. This course of may be carried out utilizing an OpenID4VCI request, which prompts the consumer to decide on the digital pockets app that they wish to retailer the credential in. Alternatively, the issuance could possibly be carried out instantly from throughout the digital pockets app (some apps won’t even have an express consumer going through issuance step in the event that they retailer credentials based mostly on their affiliation to a signed-in consumer account).
Over time, the consumer can repeat this course of to subject a number of credentials throughout a number of digital pockets apps:
Observe: To make sure that at presentation time Android can appropriately listing all of the credentials that digital pockets apps maintain, digital wallets should register their credentials’ metadata with Credential Supervisor. Credential Supervisor makes use of this metadata to match credentials throughout accessible digital pockets apps to the verifier’s request, in order that it could actually solely current a listing of legitimate credentials that may fulfill the request for the consumer to pick out from.
Early adopters
As Google Pockets introduced yesterday, quickly customers will be capable to use digital credentials to recuperate Amazon accounts, entry on-line well being providers with CVS and MyChart by Epic, and confirm profiles or id on platforms like Uber and Bumble.
These use instances will reap the benefits of customers’ digital credentials saved in any digital pockets app customers have on their Android gadget. To that finish, we’re additionally joyful to share that each Samsung Pockets and 1Password will maintain customers’ digital credentials as digital wallets and assist OpenID requirements through Android’s Credential Supervisor API.
Be taught extra
Credential Supervisor API lets each Android app implement credential verification or present credentials on the Android platform.
Try our new digital credential documentation on methods to turn into a credential verifier, benefiting from customers’ current digital credentials utilizing Jetpack Credential Supervisor, or to turn into a digital pockets app holding your personal credentials for different apps or web sites to confirm.
