Biometrics are seen as a magic bullet to uniquely identify humans — but it is still new technology. Companies can experience growing pains and backlash due to incomplete thinking prior to implementation. Attackers do the hard work of finding every crack and vulnerability. Activists point out civil liberty and social…

Seven Reflections — On March 11, 2022, I was a panelist on The Metaverse: The Emperor’s New Clothes panel at the Vancouver International Privacy & Security Summit’s panel. Nik Badminton set the scene and led a discussion with myself, James Hursthouse and Kharis O’Connell. Here are seven reflections. Games are a playful way…

Since 2016, a growing number of digital identity experts have worked together to create privacy preserving, digitally native, trusted credentials, which enable the secure sharing of data from decentralized locations. U.S., Canadian, and European Governments see how this technology can provide superior data protection for its citizens, while enabling global…

The Supply Chain of You — As I dig into the Buddhist rabbit hole of emptiness, one thing comes up over and over — this idea of selflessness. As I struggled to understand the Buddhist description of selflessness, I realized I was limited by an existing indoctrination that had a very different (mis?) interpretation of selflessness…

I’ve been researching/writing a new book on spies and espionage. Much of my research has been around British-US-Soviet espionage during the cold war. The cold war provided one of the most amazing espionage love stories. The competition between the Soviets and US unleashed an explosion of creativity that developed new…

Below is my self-nomination for one of three Co-Chairs of the Credentials Community Group at the W3C. Anyone can be a member of the group. Only members can vote in the upcoming election. I hope you will choose me to help take this community — and our work — to…

The Role of Robust Government in Innovation — Greetings from the Covid-19 crisis. I’m sitting at home watching my country, The United States, try to get this pandemic under control, with some governments succeeding while others flounder. It reminded me of a piece I drafted earlier this year about the need for governments and the private sector to…

An Interview with Susanna Schick — In conducting our recent research on digital identity and the supply chain, it quickly became apparent that different industries deal with similar supply chain problems in markedly different ways. We wanted to understand these differences and similarities in such manufacturing industries as apparel, food, and pharmaceuticals, as well as in…

The Role of Counterfeiters in Innovation — For our recent report “Sensors, Identifiers, and Digital Twins: Tracking Identity on the Supply Chain,” we delved into the world of counterfeit manufacturing and supply-chain fraud. One recurring theme was the assumption that counterfeits are invariably bad. And indeed, our research turned up a number of examples to support this…