Trinsic counts 2.5B digital IDs issued; now to make them more useful

Nearly half of the adults in the world appear to have digital ID already, but identity verification is often still performed for each and every new account and service people sign up for. Trinsic is attempting to bridge the gap between existing IDs and the situations where they can be used, and Co-founder and CEO Riley Hughes presented The Digital ID Adoption Report and discussed how businesses and other relying parties can realize the value of reusable digital IDs in an online presentation.

Numerous digital IDs in several flavors

There are at least 146 digital identity networks now operating around the world, and roughly 2.5 billion digital IDs created.

Hughes began by talking about the downsides of identity verification carried out with document scans and selfie biometrics, which he says typically take around 90 seconds, and create friction in the user experience. Digital ID, in contrast, takes closer to 10 seconds to verify.

This begs the question of why the 2.5 billion digital IDs already out there aren’t used more often. The answer, according to Hughes, is fragmentation. The market is split between the many different schemes, with differ in adherence to standards, openness, levels of assurance and whether they are issued by the public or private sector.

Hence Trinsic’s aggregation platform, which is intended to deliver “identity acceptance” rather than identity verification. The company provides an API for businesses to build that aggregation into their existing app and workflow, to essentially “check with us first,” Hughes says.

“For us to accomplish our objective,” he says, “we need to be aware, and we need to understand really well what digital ID ecosystems are out there; what they do, what kinds of verifications they accomplish, which industries are allowed to use them, which geographies they cover and much, much more.”

Digital IDs can be subdivided into government issued “eIDs,” private sector-issued and reusable “reIDs” like those from Clear, Airside and Yoti, and “BankIDs” issued by bank apps or private partners, usually using open banking rails, according to Hughes. He further breaks eIDs down into those based on apps, government databases, and physical ID cards that contain biometric data.

BankID connections and digital IDs based on physical cards are not included in Trinsic’s adoption figures.

A world of digital IDs

In North America, some 30 digital ID schemes cover around 124 million people, which is roughly 21 percent of the adult population if they are all unique. There is likely some overlap, however. A way to deduplicate between schemes and geographies is not readily available.

Hughes reviewed the status of mobile driver’s license implementation. Only about 2 percent of Americans have an mDL so far, despite them being available in states where 44 percent of the population lives. The company projects mDL adoption to approach 200 million people in the U.S. in or around the late 2020s, following an acceleration in 2025.

In the meantime, more standardization is needed for mDLs to be verified by different relying parties. That process is underway, with ISO/IEC 18013-7 for online identity verification expected to reach implementation later this year.

Closer to 35 percent of Europe’s population has a digital ID, or 210 million people, under about 45 different schemes. There is wide distribution in adoption rates between EU countries, however.

EUDI Wallets and acceptance of digital IDs are mandated for 2026, but Hughes says “the reality is that things will take a little longer than I think people expect here.”

There are only 12 digital ID schemes tracked by Trinsic, but they may reach over half of the total population, largely due to the reach of Aadhaar in India.

In Africa, 10 schemes provide digital ID to 135 million people, or a little above 22 percent of the adult population.

Six digital ID schemes in South America cover nearly 40 percent of the population; 125 million people.

Oceania has 9 schemes covering 17 million people, which is close to half the eligible population.

There are another 25 schemes Trinsic tracts that are global, like Worldcoin and Microsoft Entra.

Hughes concluded with a summary of Trinsic’s workflow, in which users select an ID provider from the list provided, authenticate with that provider, and then the data is shared with the relying party.

Article Topics

digital ID  |  digital identity  |  digital wallets  |  identity acceptance  |  identity verification  |  ISO 18013-5  |  ISO 18013-7  |  ISO standards  |  reusable digital ID  |  Trinsic