Cardano NFT: IAMX – The Cryptonomist

This week’s guest on the Cardano NFT Column is a project that is helping NFT projects with its DID (Decentralized Identity) solution: IAMX.

The previous guest was a project launching a Play And Earn (P&E) mobile game on both Cardano and Solana.

This initiative is a point of reference for NFTs on Cardano and every week or two we will invite someone to answer some questions and give us an update directly from within the Cardano community.

Considering that many of our readers are new to the crypto space, we will have a mix of simple and technical questions.

Cardano NFT project: IAMX

Hey, glad to have you here. Please introduce your team, where are you from, what are your backgrounds?

Thanks for having us! So in terms of our team our two Co-founders Tim Heidfeld and Tim Brueckmann have a long experience within Telecommunications and Affiliate Marketing in Germany where they’ve helped build up and exited several companies. 

In total we’re 25 people on the team, more than half of whom are part of the development team and this is also where our current ongoing recruitment efforts lie. We’re also lucky to count amongst us several highly experienced professionals on the business development and marketing side, such as our Thomas Tallis, Nicholas Collinson, Andre Eilertsen, Andrew Forson and Lise Wessel who all, not only have a proven track record within the blockchain sphere, but who brings with them also an international business acumen needed to grow and deliver our services world-wide. 

Leading our development team is our highly experienced CTO Dennis Mittmann who has been in blockchain since 2012. He’s also an expert in high traffic environments which is essential for the massive scaling we’re planning. Markus Sabadello guides our efforts so we’re always aligned with the best research. Markus is considered one of the world’s most renowned SSI and DID experts serving as well as a leading researcher on W3C (The World Wide Web Consortium).

What is IAMX and why have you chosen the Cardano blockchain for your project?

IAMX is a token-based decentralised Identity and authentication protocol that empowers individuals with the means to own their identity. Adhering to the strictest of regulatory standards for identity protection, we provide a robust and secure system where individuals are able to take control and manage their identity. 

Users of IAMX will realise significant time and cost savings through novel approaches to identity management and ecommerce transactions, like 1-click fulfilment, which are legally binding and maintain local regulatory compliance. With users in control of their identity data, time-consuming processes like Form-Filling, Know Your Customer (KYC) or Know Your Business (KYB) become near instant, highly secure transactions.

We build upon the foundations of Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), blockchain, and DIDs, enabling individuals, organisations, or any entity to prove their identity independent of external parties or centralised authorities. This way, the authenticity of anything tied to an IAMX DID can be independently confirmed by the entity holding the DID. Our DID-method did:iamx was approved by the W3C in March 2022 and is fully GDPR and privacy compliant.

On top of all the time-saving and privacy benefits, the users of IAMX will be incentivized to use their identity benefitting from upgrades, discounts or cashbacks every time they use their IAMX Identity in an online transaction. The businesses using IAMX will also have significant upsides in terms of everything from significant cost savings compared with today’s solutions to an increase in conversion rates as a result of IAMX simplifying customer onboarding. Other business partners, such as Telecommunication companies or other organisations that are required to carry out customer KYCs, will be acting as verifiers of data and as such will be able to benefit from life-time-revenues as they will be awarded part of the affiliate marketing fees generated in the IAMX Marketplace.

We decided to launch on Cardano because we had a natural affinity to this blockchain as our team architect Tim Brueckmann was already running a stake pool. The more sustainable proof-of-stake that Cardano offers as well as the amazing Cardano Community were also deciding factors. However, IAMX’s solution is chain agnostic and we can already resolve on 50 ledgers and register on 8.

Tell us about your NFT Identity Verification solution and how that works? How does KYC fit into this?

So when it comes to NFTs, platforms like marketplaces manually assess NFT projects on a case-by-case basis for verification, which is not only time-consuming but also not scalable, as cross-platform verification has not been feasible for many because it demands too much work. This requires NFT project creators to go through similar rounds on different platforms, often leaving them frustrated. This is where DIDs come in. With a DID, project creators can prove their identity in a decentralized way, without needing to fill out personal information every time and then wait for manual verification.

So the way it works is that when you want to verify your identity and tie it to your NFT project(s) you create a DID by successfully logging in to various social media such as Twitter, Discord, GitHub, Facebook, Apple, Google etc. Take a look here for more information.

This DID is then added to your NFT-collection and future buyers can see that the NFT they are buying is verified. They can go here and find all the necessary information in the DID. So for example if the NFT creator is Snoop Dogg and the DID proves that the said NFT Creator has successfully logged into Snoop Dogg’s Twitter account this allows for an extremely high probability of the NFT being authentic. 

When it comes to the KYC aspect this has yet to be implemented into the vNFT but it’s coming. The KYC data will be stored in the Identity Wallet of the NFT Creator and the DID will show that the NFT Creator has carried out a KYC, but the actual KYC data will not be stored in the NFT. The point of having the KYC being part of it is so that again it gives the extra reassurance that the NFT Creator is who they say they are and helps avoiding scams.

What does the future hold? Where do you see IAMX in 1, 5 and 10 years respectively?

We see ourselves at the forefront of the Web3 revolution, bringing the world’s most secure, decentralized, and user-friendly Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) solution to the Internet. 

Within the next year the IAMX Identity Wallet will be launched and so will our iOS & Android Marketplace app. We will have already partnered with more than 50.000 companies.

Within 5 years IAMX will be the world leading provider of Identity solutions for Web3, connecting your IAMX Identity wallet will be as natural to the process of entering the internet as opening a URL is currently. We would in effect have added the layer of identity and authentication to the Internet, with IAMX in 5 years you will be able to treat the Internet like you are always logged in. 

Pursuant to our mission and vision, IAMX is working to solve the problem of providing an identity to the billions of people who do not currently have a state-recognised, legal identity. In 10 years we envision having made significant inroads in terms of creating identities for the more than 1 Billion people in the world that currently live without having an identity. Our dream would be to have reduced this number by more than 80% in the next 10 years. We think we can make it happen!

Great contribution. Any closing thoughts? Where can people get in touch?

Thank you! When it comes to closing thoughts we believe the era of your identity serving as the product, controlled and capitalised by corporates is coming to an end. It is time for you to take ownership of your identity. 

We hope you’ll join us on this journey and we can easily be reached both on Discord and Telegram. You can even drop us a line on [email protected] and we would also love it if you dropped by our Identity Lounge on Twitter which is every Tuesday at 7 PM CET/1PM EST. All links can be found here.

Disclaimer: The opinions and views of the people interviewed are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Cardano Foundation or IOG. Moreover, this content is for educational purposes, it doesn’t constitute financial advice.