This use case was initiated in collaboration with the Data Sharing Coalition, one of the founding partners of the CoE-DSC.
Recently, the EU introduced the EU Digital Identity Wallet (EUDIW) to the European Union – facilitating trust in online interactions and transactions for both legal entities and natural persons. EU Data Sharing Initiatives (DSIs) could benefit from the EUDIW, but unclarities about the EUDIW need to be resolved to identify its value. In this use case, CoE-DSC worked closely together with eIDAS experts, the Company Passport initiative and the iSHARE foundation to describe the current situation of the EUDIW LEW, explore the impact of the EUDI LEW on iSHARE and its DVU use case – where the wallet could add value to existing trust infrastructure and what the current barriers are and provide next steps for CoE-DSC, iSHARE and Company Passport. The developed exploration can be re-used as a blueprint for other DSIs, to facilitate adoption of the EUDIW.
1. The EU introduced the EU Digital Identity Wallet for trust in online interactions and transactions
On 30 April 2024, Regulation (EU) 2024/1183 was published in the Official Journal of the European Union. It entered into force on May 20, 2024. This eIDAS2 regulation introduced the EU Digital Identity Wallet (EUDIW) to the European Union, a digital wallet that offers high level of assurance services for identification, authentication and authorisation for both legal and natural persons – Legal Entity Wallet (LEW) and Natural Persons Wallet, and the possibility to share verifiable credentials between them to create digital trust. EU Member States must provide the EUDIW to citizens before the ending of 2026. With the EUDIW, natural and legal persons in the EU will be able to prove their identity where necessary to access services online, to share digital documents, or simply to prove a specific attribute, such as age or an ISO certfication, without revealing all sensitive details. The legal entities and natural persons using the EUDIW will at all times have full control of the data they share and by whom.
2. EU Data Sharing Initiatives could benefit from the EUDI Legal Entity Wallet, but need clarification
EU Data Sharing Initiatives (DSIs) have already been releasing concepts and standards for digital trust for organisations that are now starting to incorporate the EUDIW. As the EUDIW and most DSIs are based on similar ways of thinking – namely focusing on self-sovereignty of its users and data decentralization – it would be interesting for DSIs to explore the value of the EUDI LEW. However, LEW developments lack behind, resulting in unclarities about e.g. mandating, adoption and DSI business value. These unclarities are not expected to be resolved soon, as timelines are already falling behind the expected schedule and more energy seems to be directed towards the natural persons wallet. Therefore, this use case aims to clarify the current EUDIW status, explore the potential value and identify current barriers of the use of the EUDI LEW for DSIs.
3. CoE-DSC, iSHARE and Company Passport explored the potential value and barriers of the EUDIW for DSIs
In this use case, CoE-DSC worked closely together with eIDAS experts, the Company Passport initiative and the iSHARE foundation to describe the current situation of the EUDIW LEW, explore the impact of the EUDI LEW on iSHARE and its DVU use case – where the wallet could add value to existing trust infrastructure and what the current barriers are and provide next steps for CoE-DSC, iSHARE and Company Passport.
During weekly collaboration sessions with iSHARE, CoE-DSC explored and portrayed the identification, authentication and authorisation processes that happen within the Datastelsel Verduurzaming Utiliteit (DVU) data space (an iSHARE-based data space). This is presented in the report by the example of an asset owner (organisation) sharing its energy data with a third party. It is visualized in three different interaction models: 1) the onboarding of the asset owner onto DVU; 2) the registry of the building of which the energy data is meant to be shared; and 3) the delegation of access to the energy data of the building to the third party. As a next step, the value of the EUDIW is explored by identifying the possible means of use of the EUDIW for all three transaction models. Via these EUDIW scenario’s the potential value and impact of EUDIW on DSIs and all parties involved in the transactions are explored.
During this exploration, certain challenges for implementation were identified. Together with iSHARE and Company Passport these challenges were further explored and a potential role for Company Passport to overcome these challenges was discussed. Finally, during the collaboration with iSHARE and Company Passport, new interesting research topics related to the EUDIW were uncovered for CoE to further dive into as next steps.
4. Findings of this use case
Do you want to learn more about the use case design, insights on the context of the use case and insights on how the use case can be implemented in a scalable way to other use cases with similar roles? Please download our report which includes our most important findings so far.
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