A Survey on Decentralized Identifiers and Verifiable Credentials

IF 34.4 1区计算机科学 Q1 COMPUTER SCIENCE, INFORMATION SYSTEMS IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials Pub Date : 2025-02-18 DOI:10.1109/COMST.2025.3543197

Carlo Mazzocca;Abbas Acar;Selcuk Uluagac;Rebecca Montanari;Paolo Bellavista;Mauro Conti

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Abstract

Digital identity has always been one of the keystones for implementing secure and trustworthy communications among parties. The ever-evolving digital landscape has undergone numerous technological transformations that have profoundly reshaped digital identity management, leading to a major shift from centralized to decentralized identity models. The latest stage of this evolution is represented by the emerging paradigm of Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), which gives identity owners full control over their data. SSI leverages Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs) and Verifiable Credentials (VCs), which have been recently standardized by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). These technologies have the potential to build more secure and decentralized digital identity systems, significantly strengthening communication security in scenarios involving many distributed participants. It is worth noting that use of DIDs and VCs is not limited to individuals but extends to a wide range of entities including cloud, edge, and Internet of Things (IoT) resources. However, due to their novelty, existing literature lacks a comprehensive survey on DIDs and VCs beyond the scope of SSI. This paper fills this gap by providing a comprehensive overview of DIDs and VCs from multiple perspectives. It identifies key security threats and mitigation strategies, analyzes available implementations to guide practitioners in making informed decisions, and reviews the adoption of these technologies across various application domains. Moreover, it also examines related regulations, projects, and consortiums emerging worldwide. Finally, it discusses the primary challenges hindering their real-world adoption and outlines future research directions.

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分散式标识符和可验证凭据研究综述

数字身份一直是实现各方之间安全可靠通信的基石之一。不断发展的数字景观经历了许多技术变革，这些变革深刻地重塑了数字身份管理，导致了从集中式到分散式身份模式的重大转变。这一演变的最新阶段是新兴的自我主权身份（Self-Sovereign Identity， SSI）范式，它使身份所有者能够完全控制自己的数据。SSI利用分散标识符（did）和可验证凭据（VCs），它们最近已被万维网联盟（W3C）标准化。这些技术有可能建立更安全和分散的数字身份系统，大大加强涉及许多分布式参与者的场景中的通信安全性。值得注意的是，did和vc的使用并不局限于个人，而是扩展到广泛的实体，包括云、边缘和物联网（IoT）资源。然而，由于它们的新颖性，现有文献缺乏对SSI范围之外的did和vc的全面调查。本文通过从多个角度提供did和vc的全面概述来填补这一空白。它确定了关键的安全威胁和缓解策略，分析了可用的实现，以指导从业者做出明智的决策，并审查了这些技术在不同应用程序领域的采用情况。此外，它还研究了全球范围内出现的相关法规、项目和财团。最后，讨论了阻碍其在现实世界中应用的主要挑战，并概述了未来的研究方向。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials COMPUTER SCIENCE, INFORMATION SYSTEMS-TELECOMMUNICATIONS

CiteScore

80.20

自引率

2.50%

发文量

审稿时长

6 months

期刊介绍： IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials is an online journal published by the IEEE Communications Society for tutorials and surveys covering all aspects of the communications field. Telecommunications technology is progressing at a rapid pace, and the IEEE Communications Society is committed to providing researchers and other professionals the information and tools to stay abreast. IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials focuses on integrating and adding understanding to the existing literature on communications, putting results in context. Whether searching for in-depth information about a familiar area or an introduction into a new area, IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials aims to be the premier source of peer-reviewed, comprehensive tutorials and surveys, and pointers to further sources. IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials publishes only articles exclusively written for IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials and go through a rigorous review process before their publication in the quarterly issues. A tutorial article in the IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials should be designed to help the reader to become familiar with and learn something specific about a chosen topic. In contrast, the term survey, as applied here, is defined to mean a survey of the literature. A survey article in IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials should provide a comprehensive review of developments in a selected area, covering its development from its inception to its current state and beyond, and illustrating its development through liberal citations from the literature. Both tutorials and surveys should be tutorial in nature and should be written in a style comprehensible to readers outside the specialty of the article.