Blockchain standardisation: Commission’s webinar

On 17 June, the European Commission organised a webinar on blockchain standardisation. This event tackled a wide range of issues from digital identity management to smart contracts.

The main conclusion is that more standards are needed to ensure a large adoption of blockchain technologies.

The standardisation process is ongoing at ISO TC307, CEN-CENELEC JTC19, ITU, INATBA, IEEE, but remains at an infancy stage. Coordination between these standardisation activities is crucial.

Please find below some key points from this webinar, and the slides that were presented.

Standardisation landscape: overview

Marc Taverner, from the International Association for Trusted Blockchain Applications (INATBA), explained that the lack of standardisation is an obstacle to the massive adoption of Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT). Customers might be reluctant to opt for these technologies if they fear those might not interoperable. INATBA recently created a standardisation committee, and is working with ISO, ITU, CEN-CENELEC and IEEE.

Ramesh Ramadoss, co-chair of the IEEE Blockchain Initiative, presented the evolution of blockchain, from blockchain 1.0 cryptocurrencies to blockchain 2.0 programmable chains in 2015 (Ethereum, Corda, Hyperledger), to the current blockchain 3.0 applications in sectors like finance and energy. According to Ramesh Ramadoss, blockchain has passed the hype peak, it is now a matter of adoption.

Three actors work on blockchain standardisation: 1) international/regional SDOs, 2) alliances and consortia, 3) open source community.The biggest challenge is to bring these actors to work together.

Ramesh Ramadoss presented IEEE working groups on blockchain standards (interoperability, healthcare etc. see slides 10-11). He underlined that there is overlapping work between ISO TC307, IEEE, ITU, INATBA (see table slide 25).

Craig Dunn, member of ISO TC307, gave a presentation on ISO TC307’s work on blockchain developments. He called for experts to join this working group. Experts can get involved through their national bodies. The first international standard developed by ISO TC307 should be published later this year, it will tackle terminology. The second international standard would be on architecture.

Privacy, digital identity management

Ignacio Alamillo, General Manager of Astrea, focused on trust anchors for decentralised identity management (TADIM). There is ongoing work on this issue within ISO TC307 JWG4, notably the publication of a study report (TADIM report).

Ignacio Alamillo explained that all the rules in place for PKI should probably be re-used for trust anchors. Even when identity management is not based on PKI, you still have trust anchors (DDI).

More trust anchors are needed. It is important to have a look at legal trust anchors, for instance for KYC, GDPR etc.

Paolo Campegiani, Bit4id, presented the Technical Report TR23249, which is defined in the context of ISO TC307 JWG4, a joint working group with ISO IECJTC1 SC27. The scope of the report is to describe how DLT systems are used for identity management (actors, architectures etc.).

The report is not available yet. It is necessary to join the working group in order to have access to the report.

Once the technical report is published, the joint working group will start working on technical specifications. This is a first step towards an international standard on blockchain and identity management. Cooperation with CEN CENELEC JTC 19 is envisaged.

Paolo Campegiani advised companies to follow this standardisation work in order to go in the same direction. “Companies should not put money on the wrong horse”.

Carlos Pastor, EBSI-ESSIF Convenor, explained that the European Self-Sovereign Identity Framework (ESSIF) is one of the use cases of the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI). EBSI will provide a complete blockchain available for public services. A few new use cases will be selected and added to EBSI.

ESSIF provides a layer of identity for the participants (see slide 7). This use case needs to be compliant with GDPR and fully interoperable with eIDAS. ESSIF v1 has just been released. All the documents are already available.

The model is aligned with current standards (W3C Verifiable Credentials Data Model 1.0, and W3C Decentralised Identifiers (DID)). ESSIF participants collaborate with CEN-CENELEC JTC19 in setting up an identity group, as well as with ISO etc.

Cohesion in global blockchain standardisation

Andrea Caccia, CEN/CENELEC JTC19, explained that CEN/CENELEC JTC19 tries to align with the work done at international level. They draft guidelines that explain how to use international standards in Europe. However, in some specific cases, there is a need for specific European standards. CEN/CENELEC JTC19 is a bridge between Europe and the international level. They do not want to invent in Europe something that is already at the global level.

Suzana Moreno, BNDES (Brazilian Development Bank), presented the example of blockchain used to track development money. The main goal is to increase trust in the society. Standards would be useful to make the technology more understandable in this context. They are also helpful to ensure compliance with laws.

The slides from this session were not shared with the participants.

Interoperability, governance and smart contracts

ISO TC307 is also developing standards on interoperability, governance and smart contracts.

On governance:

-ISO TC307’s work is essentially about decision rights and accountability.

-P2145 group at IEEE is specifically working on blockchain governance.

-Thomas Cox, IEEE, warned against premature standardisation, that could stifle innovation.

-Simon Seiter, Deutsche Börse AG, underlined that those who organise the market should not take part in the market itself, there would be a conflict of interest. Private market organisers should not intervene on the market itself.