London completes blueprint for reusable digital IDV orchestrator

The UK’s capitol is not waiting for its national government to enable digital identity sharing and verification, releasing a blueprint for the infrastructure that it says can make identity checks faster, safer and reusable. While the project is being carried out at the municipal level, the announcement is framed in terms of benefits to the UK economy.

The City of London introduced the Digital Verification Orchestrator (DVO) Initiative earlier this year to provide a connection between identity providers and financial services that require identity checks. The potential benefit, in improved efficiency and reduced fraud, could reach £5 billion (US$6.7 billion), it said at the time. The City took the next step on Tuesday with the publication of its blueprint, developed in consultation with the government and regulators, and working with EY, “venture builder” Collectively Better and law firm Hogan Lovells.

The 24-page paper on “A Digital Verification Orchestrator (DVO) blueprint: scalable infrastructure for UK economic security” sets out a vision for identity data providers and relying parties to exchange verified identity and attribute data through a secure connection. It defines roles and responsibilities, core capabilities and governance and liability considerations.

The DVO is intended to function a neutral orchestration layer, which could be embedded into the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology’s (DSIT’s) Digital Verification Services (DVS) Trust Framework.

There are 13 certified orchestration providers currently on the DVS Register, including Experian, iProov, Daon, Yoti, Select ID, Luciditi and OneID. Private sector DVS providers have worried that the Trust Framework could undermine its stated goals by limiting their role.

The paper describes a model for digital verification, from binding individuals to their identity and attribute claims using biometrics, through the orchestration layer to consented sharing of data and verifications.

A DVO Initiative Working Group has been established to guide the project, and the Steering Committee (referred to as SteerCo) is set up to oversee it.

In addition to alignment with the DVS Trust Framework, the DVO must integrate at least three digital identity providers and verification services, adhere to audit and compliance processes and support broad interoperability, including with eIDAS. It should also have “awareness” of agentic standards Model Context Protocol (MCP) and Agent Communication Protocol (ACP), as well as post-quantum cryptography (PQC).

KYC and customer onboarding, access to credit, ongoing verification to protect against fraud and reuse and portability across institutions are the initially prioritized use cases for the DVO.

“Trusted digital verification is a critical enabler of the UK’s digital economy,” says CFIT CEO Anna Wallace in the announcement. “Through CFIT’s work on Corporate Digital Verification, we’ve seen how reusable digital identity has the potential to simplify how directors and businesses are verified, reducing friction while strengthening trust across financial services and supporting wider efforts to streamline how SMEs interact with government.

“The Digital Verification Orchestrator has the potential to become an important piece of national digital infrastructure.”

Recommended next steps for the Initiative include launching a DVO pilot within the next 12 months, confirming the use of verifiable credentials within the UK’s existing KYC, AML and consumer protection requirements. The government and industry should embed the capabilities outlined in the DVO blueprint into the DVS Trust Framework, and industry should develop a playbook for liability, participation and dispute resolution.

Article Topics

digital verification service (DVS)  |  DVS Trust Framework  |  identity orchestration  |  Identity Service Providers (IDSP)  |  London  |  reusable digital ID  |  UK digital ID