Currently the primary way to proof ownership of NFT is to login to a target web application with a crypto wallet (for example Metamask) that holds NFT. This is a direct method that exposes the content of the wallet to the target application. There are a few common inconveniences with this approach:
- The holder of NFT must trust target web application. The more different web sites/applications they have to access, the higher risk it will introduce to their crypto wallet. This is a security risk as user might be tricked into doing something inappropriate with NFTs in their crypto wallet.
- The holder of NFT needs to have access to their crypto wallet when they need to present it to the target web application. If they have multiple wallets on different devices or hardware-based wallets, it is very likely they are not going to have it with them all the time. At the same time holding all of their NFTs in the same wallet on the phone (device that most people would usually have on them at most times) is not a good idea as it is a security risk as well.
- You might have NFTs on different blockchains (for example Ethereum, Polygon, Solana, Tezos and other), presenting NFT from different collections on different blockchains to target application might be a challenge, as all of them might be using different wallets.
- Businesses that need to validate NFTs from multiple blockchains have to worry about integration of different wallets and the potential liability with any security issues in their applications that might do something inappropriate with content of user crypto wallets.
- As NFT adoption becomes more mainstream, the traditional way to present ownership of the NFT becomes less practical and potentially less secure.
With Decentralized Identity implementation, which is based on the open standards and uses ION or WEB for proofing of the verified credentials, user can get a verified credential card on their phone, which will state that at the time of issuance of this card, they had access to their crypto wallet.
User then can present this verified credential card to web application, which will validate that this credential is issued by a trusted issuer, ie, DID:VERIFIEDNFT.ID, and referenced crypto wallet address has access to specified NFT on a blockchain and then web application can make business logic decisions on what to do with the user session.
In this model, user can create as many verified credentials for as many wallets/NFTs they need to have. They don’t need to worry about security of their crypto wallets being opened by multiple 3rd party web applications, they don’t need to worry about having access to their wallets, they don’t have to carry their hardware wallets with them. Their verified credentials are always on their phone and ready to be presented.
We are combining the physical world, security of the decentralized credentials and best of web3 to make a practical mechanism to proof ownership of the NFTs.
VerifiedID Documentation and Blog 