The Special Network Effects of
Ayra Network Credentials

ABSTRACT: The mission of the Ayra (eye-rah) Trust Network is to enable global interoperability of verifiable data—especially verifiable digital credentials—across digital trust ecosystems of any size, type, or location. Those credentials will fall into three categories:

1) ecosystem-specific credentials that are designed only for use within a single ecosystem,

2) cluster-specific credentials that are designed to work across the group of ecosystems participating in a trust cluster; and

3) Ayra Network Credentials that are explicitly designed to be issued and accepted across any Ayra-recognized ecosystem that needs them.

Ayra Network Credentials follow seven design principles that uniquely apply to digital credentials intended for nearly universal adoption: global interoperability, global governance, simplicity, extensibility, privacy preservation and progressive disclosure, “minimum viable friction” for acceptance, and—most importantly—they must be carefully designed as a family.

The four foundational credentials in the Ayra Network Credential family are:

1) Organization ID (“Org ID” for legal entities),

2) Community ID (for any other type of group that is not a legal entity but still needs verifiable trust relationships,

3) First Person Credentials (privacy- preserving proof of personhood for individuals), and

4) Verifiable Relationship Credentials (proofs of verifiable trust relationships that underpin First Person Credentials).

If these four credentials are very carefully designed together—in Ayra Network Credential Projects and Working Groups hosted by the Ayra Association—they can produce not just one but four compounding network effects—network effects that can catapult adoption of open standard digital wallets and digital credentials into the mainstream.

The Special Network Effects of Ayra Network Credentials Whitepaper