From Paper to Plastic to Silicon based Credentials

Digital Wallets are the new Identity battleground, who can get you to put more of your Identity into their Digital Wallet?... Google's "Wallet" , Apple's Passbook, to be launched in their new iPhone next month, or Microsoft's relaunched e-Wallet with their new Windows 8 Phone this Autumn. NFC will become just the underlying technology.  Mastercard and Visa are both getting in on the act with with Digital Wallets, though mostly payment focussed. 

Initial Reactions

What do you mean I can't get digital receipts? 
How can I stop stores from rifling through my Digital Wallet and harvesting info? 
How do I know what information they did get? 
Can they keep all the info or did they just get a "One Time" glimpse? 

These are just a few of the natural questions people will ask in order to get an understanding of the state of the key elements of Agency, Trust, Useability and Manageability in the Digital Wallet space. It is early days and there is a lot of issues to resolve, barriers to remove and most importantly cash flows to figure out. 

The Bottom Line of the Digital Wallet Service Provider:   Who is going to get paid for what?

Contents of a Leather Wallet

As you can see I had 17 "Paper and Plastic" credentials" in one of my Leather Wallets, that I'd want to include in a Digital Wallet with a few more that I don't normally carry around with me that I would happily include.

My Bottom Line: 

My wallet supports more than simple cash transactions

I don't want a Wallet Service for every Identity I own

I want ONE "Virtual Wallet" that is secure and very easy to control, but I want access to it on every device I own.

A few important architectural questions :

When will Ubiquity occur?
A difficult one to answer!

Are the better solutions Proprietary or Open?
I have my bias!

Can "credentials" be easily moved from one Digital Wallet to another?

Today.. no! Tomorrow.. a must have!

Will users want to trust their device as the sole credential repository?

Would you?

Will digital wallet silos, ie a wallet service that only stores ONE credential, really work?

Some are betting yes, at least in the short term.

Things to watch:

The Trust Nexus A network of cloud based identity repositories

Square & Starbucks An innovative location based Identity approach

Question for Organisations to ask themselves

Will my organisation have the ability to enact transactions with these emerging Digital Wallets?
Will my organisation have the ability to put "credentials" into these emerging Digital Wallets?
What will be the advantages of doing so?
What will be the disadvantages of not being able to do so?
Are the solutions adhering to the Jericho Forum IdEA Commandments?

Question a smart consumer should ask: 

Why didn't the organisations making the shift to Silicon based Identity know about the Jericho Forum Identity, Entitlement and Access Management Commandments or watch the Jericho Forum IdEA Videos?


Identity Video #1 - Identity First Principles.   
Identity Video #2 - Operating with Personas.    
Identity Video #3 - Trust and Privacy.    
Identity Video #4 - Entities & Entitlement.   
Identity Video #5 - Building a Global Identity Ecosystem.   


Is this the beginning of the end of Paper/Plastic Credentials for your organisation, or the beginning of the end of your organisation? For there are some very raw and powerful tectonic identity forces at work under the covers of this simple sounding shift. Do you understand them?