What is ID Karma?
Updated: Oct 18, 2022
In the previous article we discussed the motivation behind the ID Karma project, why SSI can fix some major issues in our world and the Internet in particular.
As I mentioned in the previous article, right now ID Karma is a mobile social network app. It allows sharing and consuming content in a private and secure manner only with intended people. But it’s a bit far from the whole story. Actually it’s not even a main feature of the final solution.
ID Karma — SSI Wallet…
Basically, ID Karma is a wallet application to store your cryptographic keys and SSI documents. The difference of the ID Karma wallet is, that it has an integrated communication network functionality, that allows you and your friends to establish your own network and communicate via it in an ultimately private manner.
As a result ID Karma may promise the following features and properties:
You create the account on your device to use the network. It isn’t stored in the ID Karma server database. You share your profile and identity only with those you decide to share it with.
Private and trusted exchange of content within your social circles — you and your friends store the content you create on your devices. This content will be shared with other parties only with your consent. Yes it also shouldn’t be stored on the ID Karma server — your is your.
The first intended application of the ID Karma app, is exchange of comments and reviews over existing internet resources — for example, product listings, blog articles, and other internet pages. Why? Such pages are usually sticky fly traps for fake reviews and trust and attention manipulations. Don’t you think that it's much better to leave reminders for you and your friends for later right there instead of that trash. Confess, that your bookmark lists and notes with comments are just dead lumber rooms that never see the light, aren’t they?
ID Karma will also allow you to generate proof certificates about your interactions and capabilities that can be used as non-discriminative social score. Social score is a China compromised term. But imagine that all your social score tokens are stored on your device and can be shared with 3rd parties only by your choice. You can quickly share and prove to a stranger your strong sides.
And of course, standard SSI wallet functionality. For example, it allows you to store your driving license and travel documents. But it’s not so interesting now, until the majority of us start to use apps like ID Karma.
Afterwards
In this article we briefly figured out what ID Karma is and how it relates to SSI.
As you understand, at the time of writing of this article (October 2022), we are just developing the MVP of this product. And this MVP is dedicated to one feature: ID Karma Social Network. I hope it sounds weird to you, cause why the hell do we need one more social network at all? Let's discover it in the next article...