Internet Identity Workshop

The Internet Identity Workshop (IIW) is a semi-annual conference focused on the development and evolution of open standards, protocols, and technologies for user-controlled digital identity. Since its inception in 2005, IIW has served as a gathering for developers, policymakers, and organizations working on identity-related standards and protocols. It provides a forum for participants from technology, academia, and government to discuss and advance digital identity systems. The workshop operates as an open space unconference, allowing participants to set the agenda each day. During the event, they share the latest developments in emerging identity technologies and collaborate on their implementation.

Internet Identity Workshop

Abbreviation	IIW
Formation	2005
Founders	Doc Searls, Kaliya Young, Phil Windley
Location	Mountain View, California, United States
Website	www.internetidentityworkshop.com

History

IIW was founded in 2005 by Kaliya Young, Doc Searls, and Phil Windley with the goal of fostering collaboration in the field of digital identity. The event was established as a response to the growing need for open standards and interoperable identity solutions on the internet. Its goal has been to put people in control of their identities and private information.^[1][2] In 2006, IIW moved to the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California, a location still in use today.^[timeframe?] Over the years, IIW has played a significant role in the development of identity technologies such as OAuth, OpenID, Passkeys, Self-sovereign identity (SSI), and decentralized identifiers (DIDs). By the mid-2010s, sessions at IIW were also addressing the topic of establishing identity on the blockchain.^[3]

In 2020, in a Wired interview, Young described her goal as being able to take her identity with her "from Facebook to Google to her doctor's office to her bank, with the same ease she can plug any electrical device into any socket in any wall. And she doesn't want any company or government to have the authority to track, cancel or suspend her. But to get what she wants, Young needs to add a new layer to internet protocols. That's what she's been working on for the past 15 years."^[4]

In 2025, experts who participated in IIW scrutinized phone home surveillance features in mobile driver's licenses.^[5]

Objectives and key topics

The primary goals of IIW include facilitating discussions on digital identity issues, promoting the development of related open standards, and encouraging collaboration among diverse participants.

Some of the main topics covered at IIW^[clarify] include decentralized identity, self-sovereign identity, privacy and security in digital identity, and identity verification and authentication methods.

Format and structure

IIW follows an unconference format, which means there are no pre-planned keynotes or panels. Instead, attendees propose and lead discussions on topics of their choice, fostering an open and collaborative environment.

The event takes place twice a year in Mountain View, California and attracts a global audience of identity professionals, developers, and researchers.

Contributions to digital identity

IIW has been instrumental in shaping the landscape of digital identity. Many widely adopted technologies and standards have been influenced or incubated at IIW, including:

• OAuth – a protocol for secure authorization in web and mobile applications
• OpenID Connect – an identity layer on top of OAuth 2.0
• Self-Sovereign Identity – an approach to digital identity where individuals control their own credentials
• Verifiable Credentials (VCs) – a standard for cryptographically secure identity claims

Community and impact

The IIW community consists of technologists, policymakers, business leaders, and academics, all working toward the advancement of user-centric and privacy-preserving identity solutions. The workshop’s open nature allows for rapid iteration and collaboration among industry participants. Organizations such as the Decentralized Identity Foundation (DIF), the OpenID Foundation, W3C, and the Trust Over IP Foundation frequently participate in IIW, leveraging the event to refine and promote open identity standards.

In addition, a number of scholarly publications have referred to IIW presentations and sessions while reporting developments in self-sovereign identity and related topics.

In 2004, Microsoft computer scientist Kim Cameron proposed his Laws of Identity, which soon became guiding principles during the early years of the IIW, with Cameron actively participating in the discussions.^{[6][failed verification]} The inaugural IIWs in 2005 and 2006 provided a platform for participants to share a range of distributed identity^[clarify] concepts, including the preexisting version of OpenID. From these discussions, OpenID 2.0 was defined and gained widespread adoption among various companies and vendors.^[7]

A significant challenge in implementing distributed identity is the discovery of identities created with the Open ID 2.0 standard. A technique to address this challenge was demonstrated at a 2006 IIW, which helped establish the extensions that allowed this discovery method to spread widely.^[8] The Internet Identity Workshop has also been recognized as one of the first venues to propose and discuss the creation of decentralized identifiers, or DIDs. Following their introduction, DIDs were adopted by the Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) and have since found applications in various fields, including digital copyright and other areas that require digital identifiers.^[9]

In 2022, Chinese researchers presented a developing energy peer-to-peer network that interconnects a large number of distributed harvesting devices to achieve a two-way flow of energy. In the conference proceedings of that year's IEEE 2nd International Conference on Electrical Engineering and Control Science (IC2ECS), the authors referred to the introduction of enabling technology built on DIDs first formally proposed at a 2015 IIW.^[10]

A researcher from Mississippi State University highlighted IIW's crucial role in defining self-sovereign identity in his graduate thesis focused on implementing decentralized identities within state government.^[11]

Another area of intense interest for the IIW community is off-blockchain decentralized identity management for digital wallets. These identities can be managed using asymmetric cryptographic keys, eliminating the need for centralized management. The orchestration of such digital wallets is also being actively explored.^[12]

Furthermore, decentralized identifier methods described at a 2024 IIW are contributing to the development of self-sovereign identity wallets within data spaces. These data spaces aim to address challenges related to data sharing by balancing the needs for data exchange and data sovereignty.^[13]

Future directions

Since 2025, IIW has been operated by the IIW Foundation, a non-profit 501(c)3 organization dedicated to the continuing the work of IIW in providing a community for the development of digital identity technology.

See also

• Access control
• Identity and access management
• Identity driven networking
• Identity provider
• Identity threat detection and response
• Identity verification service
• Identity-based security
• Online identity management
• SAML 2.0
• XDI