Digital Identity Infrastructures: a Critical Approach of Self-Sovereign Identity

Abstract

The shift from electronic identification to digital identity is indicative of a broader evolution towards datafication of identity at large. As digital identity emerges from the fringes of technical challenges towards the legal and socio-technical, pre-existing ideologies on the reform of digital identity re-emerge with a newfound enthusiasm. Self-sovereign identity is one representative example of this trend. This paper sets out to uncover the principles, technological design ideas, and underlying guiding ideologies that are attached to self-sovereign identity infrastructures, carrying the promise of user-centricity, self-sovereignty, and individual empowerment. Considering the flourishing of digital identity markets, and the subsequent institutional interest on a European level in the techno-social promises that this identity architecture carries, this paper explores how the implementation of EU-wide self-sovereign identity shifts the already existing historical power balances in the construction of identity infrastructures. In this contribution, we argue that the European-wide adoption of self-sovereign ideals in identity construction does not address the shortcomings that identity and identification have historically faced and that instead of citizen empowerment, it puts individuals (a category broader than citizens) in a rather vulnerabilized position.