Degree verification process using blockchain

Question

This question is specifically related to blockchain use case. I want to implement degree verification process using blockchain . I just need to know whether I am approaching my objective in a right direction or not or any advice to better this approach. I am considering three main entities in this process.

1. Students
2. University
3. Central authentication party(For example in Pakistan there is Higher education commission which authenticate every degree from every university).

Below down is the workflow.

1. Student will login using his enrollment number or something else. He will be given his public-private keys.
2. Student will fill degree template on his portal with necessary information like GPA etc.
3. Student will sign this template using private key for authentication purposes.
4. Now university will assess this template and if everything is correct will add its digital signature using its private key.
5. Now template will go to third party which authenticate university digital signature and if university is recognized then it will add its signature . and push this certificate to blockchain (public repository) so that anyone can verify.

One of my main concern is this approach still leads me to centralized approach.

Any suggestions please regarding this.

Answer 1

The concept of "degree verification" is a very cool idea. It's a subset of a larger idea called "attestations," and is pretty similar to what you describe.

An attestation, in it's most simple form, is a claim about you. Your college could attest to the fact that you are a student, your bank could attest that you are a "qualified investor," your co-workers could attest that you are skilled with Excel, etc. These attestations could be created in some standardized format and signed by the publicly known (and probably attested to) keys of others, as you describe.

These attestations you describe could underlie the basis of self-sovereign identity - where users could have complete control over their own data/identity. They could manage attestations made about them by a variety of third parties - disclosing only what they want to the parties who they want to know.

With the specific scheme you explore, I agree there might be some degree of unnecessary centralization. For example, it may be better to let the user generate the pub/priv key themselves. Even better, let them hold + manage all these attestations from with one key.

If users choose who to get attestations from and who to share these attestations with, users will have complete control over their own data and identity. I'd argue this is incredibly decentralizing.

Full disclosure, I'm an intern for uPort currently, which is a self-sovereign identity platform doing exactly this.

If you want more info and/or to chat, check out the uPort website, Gitter, or Github :~)

Answer 2

I think its an excellent idea. There is certainly a need for it. I was just thinking the same thing after reading this article.http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42579634