Identity and Reputation
Enhancing Trust and Reputation
As work becomes more decentralised, identity and reputation become central to how value is created and recognised.
DECaDE’s research explores self-sovereign identity (SSI), photo and data ownership, and privacy-preserving mechanisms across digital supply chains. We study how identity and reputation systems can support trust, enable fair participation in decentralised labour markets, and protect individuals’ rights in the data-driven future digital economy.
By resolving the tension between transparency and confidentiality, DECaDE research enables trust in complex supply chains while preserving data control.”
Research Highlights
Proving Ownership While Protecting Privacy
DECaDE researchers explore how creators can prove ownership of their work without revealing their identity. This is particularly important for citizen journalists, activists and whistleblowers, who may need to share images safely while retaining control over their rights.
Using Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) and Verifiable Credentials, DECaDE develops a privacy-preserving approach that enables creators to prove authorship and assert their rights while disclosing only the information needed for a particular interaction. The approach allows trusted verification without relying on centralised platforms or databases.
Developed and tested through DECaDE’s first distributed ledger technology field lab with industry partners, the research demonstrates how privacy, provenance and trust can work together to protect creators while enabling secure and transparent sharing of digital content.
Team: Ashley Fraser, Steve Schneider, Nick Frymann, Paul Haynes, Abubakar-Sadiq Shehu (University of Surrey), Rob Learney and Natasha Velasco (Digital Catapult)
Enabling Trust in Complex Supply Chains
DECaDE researchers explore how organisations can build trust across complex supply chains while protecting commercially sensitive information. As supply chains become increasingly global and interconnected, organisations need new ways to demonstrate reliability and compliance without exposing confidential business relationships.
To address this challenge, DECaDE develops a decentralised approach based on Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) and selective disclosure. By allowing organisations to securely prove key facts about their credentials, certifications and past performance without revealing unnecessary information, the approach supports trust while preserving privacy.
The research demonstrates how SSI technologies can help suppliers, regulators, auditors and buyers establish trust, verify compliance and strengthen collaboration across a wide range of supply chain contexts.
Team: Steve Schneider, Abubakar-Sadiq Shehu (University of Surrey), Rob Learney and Tim Wood (Digital Catapult)
Decentralised Reputation and the Future of Work
DECaDE researchers explore how privacy-enhancing digital technologies can give workers greater control over their professional reputation in an increasingly digital labour market. As gig economy work expands, reputation data is often fragmented across platforms, limiting workers’ ability to manage and reuse their employment history.
To address this challenge, DECaDE develops a decentralised framework that combines Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), blockchain and privacy-preserving technologies to enable workers to securely own and share their credentials and reputation across different platforms.
The research demonstrates how decentralised digital identities can improve transparency, portability and trust while supporting worker privacy. The findings also inform emerging digital identity policy, helping shape approaches that balance innovation, data protection and resilience in the future of work.
Team: Felipe Merlano, Glenn Parry, Abubakar-Sadiq Shehu and Steve Schneider
