Indicio, Idemia PS see opening for reusable digital identity after Treasury endorsement

Indicio and Idemia Public Security strategically partnered to bring globally interoperable biometric identity verification software to markets around the world. The biometrics identity proofing company and decentralized digital identity provider want to shift the culture too.

During a recent webinar hosted by Indicio and Idemia PS, the two companies argued that reusable, cryptographically bound digital identity credentials can eliminate redundant checks and dramatically reduce onboarding times. But the pitch was also philosophical, about moving away from extractive models and elevating privacy to a national priority.

Their message comes on the heels of the U.S. Treasury signaling that verifiable credentials should play a central role in modernizing financial compliance. Treasury’s March 2026 report to Congress, mandated by the GENIUS Act, emphasizes digital identity to curb illicit finance in the digital asset economy.

The report lists verifiable credentials alongside AI, blockchain analytics and APIs as technologies that regulated institutions should adopt to strengthen oversight. This follows Treasury’s 2025 request for comment, which had already identified digital identity verification as one of the key pillars for addressing illicit finance risks. The latest report goes further, suggesting the infrastructure is ready for real‑world deployment.

Indicio and Idemia PS say they have already built such a system. Their model allows an individual to verify their identity once, bind it cryptographically to a real person in a way resistant to AI‑driven impersonation, and then reuse that credential with any counterparty. Instead of repeatedly handing over documents, the individual presents a verified credential that institutions can trust without re‑running the entire process.

Amit Sharma, who leads global digital strategy at Idemia PS, described the shift as a fundamental rethinking of how institutions treat personal data. He argued that organizations must begin viewing identity and privacy as assets that belong to individuals and deserve the same protection as national security infrastructure.

He also criticized the current compliance model for rewarding institutions for spotting suspicious activity rather than sharing trustworthy identity signals. Reusable credentials, he said, reverse that logic by allowing people to prove who they are without exposing unnecessary personal information.

Heather Dahl, Indicio’s CEO and a cofounder, saw it as a long‑overdue correction. She said that in the future it will seem obvious that individuals should be able to define their identity to a financial institution rather than relying on third‑party databases to do it for them. She also pointed to the widening gap between the speed of digital life and the slow, document‑heavy processes of consumer banking, arguing that verifiable credentials finally close that mismatch.

Sharma noted that traditional retail KYC checks cost institutions between $50 and $100 per customer, dropping to $15 to $30 with partial automation and as low as a few dollars with full API‑based workflows. What currently takes three to ten days, often with multiple manual reviews, could be reduced to minutes.

He argued that this acceleration does not come at the expense of security. “You can actually enhance security by enabling a cryptographical way for me to prove who I am with key pairs, with cryptographical representation, and verifiable digital credentials that are unbound by a biometric that I expose,” Sharma said.

Indicio and Idemia PS are already working with financial institutions on reusable KYC credentials, embedded identity in payments and cross‑industry consortia. They are also contributing to regulatory and legislative discussions, including those tied to the Clarity Act and broader digital asset market structure reforms.

Both companies emphasized that the shift is not only technical but cultural, requiring institutions to rethink long‑standing assumptions about data ownership and risk. The emerging model positions identity as something individuals control and reuse, rather than something repeatedly surrendered.

A philosophical shift from big tech’s use of personal data

Sharma also highlighted the broader societal implications, arguing that the current data economy — particularly the monetization of children’s information — has normalized the extraction of personal attributes for commercial gain.

“We need to make it harder, costlier, and quite frankly, illegal, unless consented, to monetize my data. That’s mine. Which means elevating identity and privacy to a critical national security asset,” he said.

“It’s identity at the crossroads. Identity and personal privacy must now be elevated not just as a simple consumer protection issue, but a national security asset worth protecting.”

Sharma argued that institutions should treat identity and personal data as assets that belong to individuals and deserve the highest levels of protection. In his view, the real value lies in sharing trustworthy identity signals rather than collecting and monetizing personal information.

If the system shifts in that direction, he said, companies would no longer profit from extracting data. Instead, they would innovate around empowering people to prove who they are on their own terms, accessing services without surrendering unnecessary personal details.

“And that’s an incentive structure that, from a monetization perspective, also needs to shift. And that’s more philosophical than anything else,” he said.

Whether that vision takes hold remains to be seen, but the growing support for verifiable credentials from both industry and policymakers suggests digital identity is increasingly moving toward reusable, privacy-preserving models that give individuals greater control over how they prove who they are.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  data privacy  |  Idemia Public Security  |  Indicio  |  reusable digital ID  |  verifiable credentials