Identity Management is Broken
How do you prove your identity — to access an account, enter a venue, board a plane, buy a house? You reach for your passport, driver’s license, proof of address and other documents. Not only do you need to establish your identity each time for each separate service, but you also have to take the same steps every time you use the same service. What’s more, if you’re like the average person, you could have approximately 150 login accounts to manage. It’s no wonder people resort to using the same password over and over again (which of course makes them more vulnerable to identity fraud and identity theft).
But, still today, once you proffer your document of choice, chances are the vendor you are doing business with will put them into their own silo or some sort of aggregate centralized database. And, despite considerable investment in cybersecurity, cybercriminals continue to breach systems to impersonate you and/or steal your information. The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center received more than 450,000 complaints in 2019 with reported losses exceeding $3.5 billion.
The internet itself, with its myriad social networks, has led to the pervasive use of consumers’ personal information in ways that are often unknown to the consumer. This phenomenon has spawned legislation, such as GDPR and CCPA, to attempt to put control back in the hands of users. For businesses, complying with these laws is quite cumbersome and expensive.
Clearly, the current paradigm simply does not work. Not for consumers, and not for businesses.
There is a Better Way
What if there were another approach to establishing identity? One that is digital and consumer-centric and actually enhances the customer experience?
Airside has built the foundation for a new digital identity experience. The required elements are in place: decentralized architecture, access to ground truth data for verification, a mobile app experience to prove identity, and the core principle of requiring user-consent to govern the sharing of user data. This approach is in the market and is enjoying considerable success. Our Mobile Passport App has been used by over 9 million people to speed through U.S. customs. We see Mobile Passport as just the beginning.
Airside is creating a digital identity verification network that will enable seamless travel, more secure financial services, remote identity transactions and more. Recently, showing personal health status, such as the result of a COVID test, has become essential to obtaining entry.
The company recently released the Airside Digital Identity App for in-person biometric identity verification. Use of this app will enable contactless travel, digital sharing of COVID lab test results to gain access to places and events, and remote identity verification for online account management. As transactions increasingly become mobile, virtual, and touchless, it’s clear to me that Airside’s vision is brilliantly suited to addressing critical identity and access problems.
