The Trust Lifecycle
The UbID trust lifecycle connects identity proofing, authentication, credential issuance, holder custody, presentation, verification, status, recovery, and operational evidence.
Trust is not a single signature check. It is a sequence of governed decisions in which each participant has a defined responsibility.
End-to-end lifecycle
| Lifecycle domain | Trust objective | Evidence or control |
|---|---|---|
| Identity establishment | Determine whether the subject and claims satisfy an assurance policy. | Proofing result, policy version, reviewer or automated decision evidence |
| Authentication | Confirm control of an approved authenticator or session. | Challenge result, device and session policy outcome |
| Credential issuance | Bind approved claims to an issuer and governed credential. | Issuer identity, credential type, signing reference, validity, delivery outcome |
| Holder custody | Protect credentials and support meaningful consent. | Device lifecycle, local protection, authorized presentation action |
| Presentation | Disclose only what is required for the transaction. | Request purpose, audience, selected claims, holder approval |
| Verification | Evaluate whether evidence satisfies trust policy. | Signature and issuer result, status, freshness, holder relationship, policy verdict |
| Business decision | Apply institutional rules to the verification outcome. | Relying-party decision and accountable actor |
| Status and renewal | Preserve correctness as conditions change. | Suspension, revocation, renewal, replacement, and version evidence |
| Recovery and continuity | Restore authorized control without creating unrestricted custody. | Recovery authorization, staged release, restoration, rotation, and review |
| Operations and audit | Demonstrate that services and controls functioned as intended. | Health, alerts, decision references, audit events, and incident evidence |
Trust boundaries
Several boundaries must remain explicit:
- proofing establishes evidence but does not by itself authorize every transaction;
- authentication confirms control but does not prove every identity claim;
- a credential signature proves provenance and integrity but not universal trust;
- a wallet presents choices but does not own verifier policy;
- a verifier evaluates evidence but does not replace the relying party's business decision;
- recovery restores authorized control but must not become an administrative takeover path;
- operational monitoring explains state but should not silently alter trust decisions.
Evidence without unnecessary exposure
A trustworthy system needs evidence, but evidence records should not become another copy of every credential and document.
UbID's public architecture favors references to actors, policy versions, cryptographic operations, timestamps, status, disclosed claim sets, and outcomes. Secret material and unnecessary personal content should not be recorded in operational logs.
Change over time
The lifecycle must handle change:
- a person's attributes may be corrected;
- an institutional role may end;
- an issuer key may rotate;
- a credential may be renewed or revoked;
- a device may be lost;
- a verification policy may evolve;
- a jurisdiction profile may change.
Historical trust decisions should remain explainable using the policy and status that applied at the time.
The completion rule
A capability is not complete merely because an interface exists. It should also have enforced trust controls, recoverable deployment, lifecycle behavior, and evidence that can be independently reviewed.
This is why UbID treats identity, security, recovery, operations, and governance as one trust lifecycle rather than separate product features.