Learning Digital Identity

Chapter 23. Generative Identity

Each semester, I challenge my students to “build the world you want to live in.” I believe that as technologists we have a duty to create systems that respect people, give them better lives, and help them realize their dreams. The designers, architects, product managers, and developers of identity systems make choices each day that impact the lives of the people who use them. Sometimes that impact is trivial or mundane, but often it is not.

As I said at the close of the last chapter, I take an optimistic view that people will choose systems that respect the Laws of Identity, and that the network effects of interoperable ecosystems will ensure their growth beyond those of systems that do not. But current implementations of digital identity have their dangers, especially when it comes to enabling a surveillance economy that commands enormous resources and reaps tremendous profits. The result is that technical systems have encroached on our private lives and administer the means by which we interact with each other. We cannot dismiss this as we contemplate what kinds of identity systems we should build.

Throughout this book, I’ve been asking you to consider how an identity metasystem that conforms to the Laws of Identity could overcome the problems of identity. Having read this far, you have learned a great deal about the philosophies, architectures, protocols, technologies, and social context comprising modern notions of digital identity. If you’ve ...