What it’s good to know
- Android now natively helps OpenID requirements for digital credential presentation and issuance.
- Customers can securely retailer and ship cryptographically verifiable digital paperwork throughout totally different apps.
- This replace permits wider use of digital credentials for numerous functions, together with account restoration and id verification on totally different platforms.
Google just lately expanded its Digital ID entry by way of its Pockets app for residents within the U.Ok. And to additional broaden the interoperability throughout totally different apps that retailer digital identities, the search large is aiming to help open requirements by way of numerous id suppliers and providers by way of the Android working system.
Final week, by way of an Android Builders weblog put up, the corporate has introduced that, “Android, by way of Credential Supervisor’s DigitalCredential API, now natively helps OpenID4VP and OpenID4VCI for digital credential presentation and issuance respectively.”
Because the search large additional explains, the Digital Credentials are cryptographically verifiable paperwork. They’ll embody paperwork like driver’s licenses, passports, or nationwide IDs. And, by way of Android apps and with the assistance of the respective app builders, extra will be integrated and submitted digitally like training certifications, insurance coverage insurance policies, permits, for instance within the close to future.
At present, the supported digital paperwork will be saved in “credential holders” apps like Google Pockets and Samsung Pockets. Some apps like banking or airline apps would, nonetheless, typically require the digital doc for verification, which isn’t essentially saved within the respective banking app.
Since Android helps safe sharing between units by way of CTAP protocols. Customers will be capable of retailer a number of credentials throughout apps and select which one to select utilizing OpenID4VP requests from web sites or Android Credential Supervisor API.
The method includes verifier sending an OpenID4VP request to the Digital Credential API, prompting the consumer to pick a credential. The consumer right here solely chooses a credential, not a digital pockets app. Android then redirects the request to the digital pockets app holding the credential to finish the motion. The app can additional carry out further due diligence earlier than releasing the credential.
Per the latest Google Pockets announcement, quickly customers can use digital credentials to get well “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.”
Subsequent to Google Pockets, Samsung Pockets and 1Password will even be capable of maintain individuals’s digital credentials as digital wallets and help OpenID requirements by way of Android’s Credential Supervisor API.
