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Tuesday, November 29

Agenda:

• Discuss end-stage recommendations

Attending: Thomas, Eve, John W, Eve, John M, Jim

Next steps: What would a follow-on group work on? DG or WG? You'd normally expect a WG to deliver technical specs. Existing group (such as the IRM WG) or new group?

Blockchain has a challenge in that the "center is floating" but it still has one (a silo?). While the name of smart contracts is odd, the concept of joining identities in a legal sense to the code is valuable.

Jim suggests that if we have an identity (that is, start from the identity-centric view), then we necessarily have semantics. The legal layer of transactional semantics is "prose" (as R3 calls it), which allows incomplete statements that can gain clarity and interpretation over time. "Code", on the other hand, must be complete in some sense immediately (modulo machine learning inference stuff). We're saying "an identity" meaning a single digital identity; all identities meet in the meat! (See this...) In legal-land, think of "persons".

(sync (relationship (identity (person (meat)))))

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(sync (identities (relationship)))

(See the much nicer diagram JohnW sent to the list!)

Do we think the lowest-hanging fruit around our recommendations would be around the identity/smart contracts elements? Could the relationship elements be captured in a smart contract itself? The incompleteness of any contract means there are assumptions that lean on a legal framework. ("Can smart contracts be legally binding contracts?" In short, yes, if you reference both prose and code.)

Use cases that are real for many today:

• Smart home
  • Entities with identities, and their identities
    • Homeowner (primary), family member, AirBnB renters
    • Smart home devices
  • Contract conditions
    • Renters contracted through AirBnB are allowed to access the specified functions of the smart home devices, and only for a limited time
    • Family members can access the specified functions of the smart home devices until access is revoked
• Medical/telematics
  • Entities with identities, and their identities
    • Patient (primary), doctors, nurses (care team), administrative staff
    • Insulin pump, other devices
  • Contract conditions
    • Whoever is a member of the care team can control and access the insulin pump settings
      • Substitute nurses etc.
• Proxy powers
  • Entities with identities, and their identities
    • Mother, toddler, nanny
  • Contract conditions
    • The nanny can legally pick up the toddler from daycare and drive him around town

Looking at PSD2, the bank account is becoming the fundamental unit of identity. Actually, it sort of always was. The notion of an "identity account" came from more monetary notions of accounts.

Proposal: Add identity to the prose+code recommendations already extant for smart contracts. Jim sent this link to a CommonAccord contract.

AI: Jim: Send the Norton Rose paper to the list so we can bash it.

Thursday, November 17

Agenda:

• Aftrer After BSC-DG: what would be the next steps after BSC-DG? (Working Group?)
• Report writing – look at items that need text.

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Susan: how can identity of a person not be used against them, how can blockchain play a role. For example: decentralized platform, not controlled by any specific government. Susan: can;t separate architecture from governance from politics.

Thomas: this is good inoput.

Kathleen: choosing one salient issue would make a WG very relevant. Fed AuthZ touches blockchain, so is relevant.

Thomas: no meetings next week.

Thursday, November 10

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