Fake certificate generation is on the rise. The contributing factor behind this isn’t just the ease of acquiring one—both in terms of money and time and effort—but also the time, effort, and cost involved in verifying the authenticity and validity of a digital and paper certificate. However, there’s a way to instantly verify credentials. Wondering what it is and how is it possible? Keep reading to find out.
What are Verifiable Credentials, and How Do They Support Instant Verification?
Verifiable credentials are either a digital copy of paper-based certificates or are generated digitally to help authenticate the validity of the information claimed on the credential. They are hosted on the blockchain and as such are immutable and tamper-proof.
Moreover, only organizations complying with the rules and regulations laid down in the Verifiable Credentials Data Model 1.0 by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) can issue verifiable credentials.
Further, while all verifiable credentials can be called digital certificates, the same can not be said for all digital certificates. For a digital certificate to be deemed as verifiable credential, it must be secured cryptographically, immune to alterations, and verifiable by machines. They must also employ privacy enhancing technologies like decentralized identifiers (DIDs) to provide the maximum security to an individual.
While it might seem like there are a lot of hoops to jump through, these credentials are the future of digital certificates and make it painless to authenticate the stored information.
Verifiable Credentials Support Instant Verification
The process of issuance and authentication for verifiable credentials is quite simple.
The journey of verifiable credentials begins from its issue. An authorized organization or entity uses their cryptographic keys to digitally sign and issue a verifiable credential and awards it to another organization or individual, as the case may be. The issued certificate gets stored on the blockchain. At this stage, if they employ credential verification services like that of ProofEasy, it makes the issuance, sharing, and verification process smoother and faster.
Once issued, they share this with the intended recipient or holder. If they use ProofEasy, they can share the issued certificate directly through the platform. The holder is now responsible for the safe storage of the credential and they have complete authority over how they would like to share it and with whom.
Once they share it with another organization or individual, they give them the right to validate the information. The verifier checks if the credential comes from an authorized source, if it’s relevant, and whether or not it’s tamper-proof. While the process may sound long and tedious, it all happens within seconds on the blockchain.
In case the verifiable credential was issued using ProofEasy, the verifier would have to just scan the associated QR code on the document. Since each document has a unique QR code, the scanning process will help you verify the authenticity of the verifiable credential within seconds of the user granting you permission to access the credential.
So what are you waiting for? Check out ProofEasy today to begin issuing and verifying verifiable credentials within seconds.