Today, we celebrate one full year since the launch of Verified.Me – and what a year it’s been! Our leading digital identity network continues to experience amazing growth while showing value-add to countless industries and supporting today’s organizations, governments and consumers in changing the way we all look at digital identity. This milestone anniversary for our service also comes at a unprecedented time – one where the privacy, security and ease that Verified.Me offers is more important than ever.

Together with our network participants and consumers in mind, we launched Verified.Me in May 2019 recognizing that many legacy in-person, online and phone transactions to verify digital identities were often full of friction, security gaps and operated without the need for consumer consent.

In the past year, Verified.Me onboarded numerous network participants and expanded relationships with innovation partners, alongside strong collaboration with leading organizations in varied industries, demonstrating the global need for verified digital identity. Our pipeline of new network participants is full, and we’re proud that Verified.Me has become a leader in the identity verification space. We’re excited to continue exploring new ways to provide solutions to organizations, governments and consumers alike.

Celebrating milestones

As we look back on our first year with Verified.Me, here are some highlights of which we’re particularly proud:

• Launched Verified.Me alongside our founding network participants – BMO, CIBC, Desjardins, RBC, TD and Scotiabank, paving the way for a more secure Canadian identity ecosystem and our country’s innovation on the map.
• Expanded into the insurance, financial services and benefits space when Sun Life Financial joined as an early adopter
• Layered in free credit score solutions for users when Equifax become part of our ecosystem approach
• Forayed into the legal industry, as Notarius’ ConsignO Cloud solution integrated Verified.Me technology to provide secure and high-assurance e-signatures
• Collaborated for insurance alongside our innovation partner, Prodigy Labs, with a digital identity industry event
• Entered the healthcare space with Dynacare, making it easier for consumers to confirm their identity when accessing lab test results and health information and helping minimize in-person processes or appointments
• Welcomed FCT as our first real estate participant, to help lending professionals complete identity validation for borrowers in an efficient and secure way
• Ramped up our physical ID verification with Onfido, paving the way for strong, secure and seamless government-issued ID proofing in the future
• Celebrated North Shore Divisions of Family Practices in late April – our first family practice to join the network
• Had our work highlighted by the Digital ID and Authentication Council of Canada in their whitepaper, Consumer Digital Identity Leveraging Blockchain
• Shared our experience building Verified.Me in Canada with the U.S. Congress and House of Representatives’ Task Force on Artificial Intelligence

What we’ve learned

This year has been an incredible journey, with many key learnings along the way. Here are a few things Verified.Me has taught us about the digital identity landscape: 

• The intersection of self-sovereign identity (SSI) and blockchain adoption has proven to be beneficial in Canada
  • As we all shift to a more digital reality – especially amid the ongoing pandemic – SSI models that provide users with control over their digital identities become all the more important. When we layer on the privacy and security capabilities of blockchain, you get a powerful solution that makes consumer’s lives easier while respecting their right to control.

• Collaboration and interoperability are key to the success of any digital identity verification solution
  • Digital identity isn’t just a single industry or uniquely Canadian problem; the issues associated with digital ID span the globe and touch every organization. Key to solving these pervasive issues to the building of multiple party and cross-industry networks. Equally as important is building interoperable tools that can easily be applied to new industries, jurisdictions and organizational needs.

• Solutions like Verified.Me are the future of digital identity
  • The digital revolution is rapidly changing the world as we know it. By bringing together the strengths of multiple parties, such as financial institutions, credit bureaus and telecommunications companies, we can make identity verification more secure and safe for all consumers while improving digital capabilities on a global scale.

What industries can Verified.Me support?

What’s next for Verified.Me

As we continue to expand the Verified.Me network, I would like to personally thank SecureKey’s amazing employees. Verified.Me would not be possible without your dedication, hard work and commitment to building a solution for the greater good. You will always have my sincere gratitude.

I also want to thank all our network participants, innovation partners for their great collaboration over the past year. We look forward to continuing to show the world how identity verification is done together, while empowering consumers to better understand and manage their data.

As for what’s next? You’ll have to stay tuned – but watch this space.

Join us online on May 5, 2020, at 2 p.m. EDT for One World Identity’s KNOW Digital Forum, where we’ll be discussing healthcare and digital marketplaces. https://know.oneworldidentity.com

The Verified.Me app is available for all iOS and Android mobile phone users through the App Store and Google Play, in addition to our browser-based version Try it today and share your experience using #VerifiedMe on social media and join the Verified.Me community on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter. You can also check out our step-by-step tutorials on getting started with Verified.Me here: https://verified.me/getting-started/