Why Decentralized Identity Will Kill the Platform Monopoly

Every 'Sign in with Google' button is a data siphon, creating a ~$500B/year market for aggregated user data. Platforms extract value by owning the identity layer, forcing apps into their ecosystem and charging a 30%+ toll on discovery and transactions.\n- Data Lock-In: Your social graph and reputation are non-portable assets.\n- Platform Risk: De-platforming is an existential threat to users and builders.

W3C Verifiable Credentials and decentralized identifiers (DIDs) turn identity into a user-owned asset. Protocols like Ceramic, SpruceID, and ENS enable composable reputation that works across any app. This breaks the silo monopoly.\n- Sovereign Data: Credentials live in your wallet, not a corporate database.\n- Zero-Knowledge Proofs: Prove you're over 18 or accredited without revealing your passport.

The real unbundling happens when on-chain reputation becomes a financial primitive. Your Gitcoin Passport score, Aave credit history, or DAO contribution record can be used for undercollateralized loans, sybil-resistant airdrops, and trust-minimized governance. This moves value from the platform to the individual.\n- Capital Efficiency: Unlock $10B+ in latent social capital.\n- Anti-Sybil: Proof-of-Personhood protocols like Worldcoin become critical infrastructure.

Your social graph, reputation, and financial history are siloed within platforms like Facebook or Google. This creates vendor lock-in, stifles innovation, and forces you to re-prove your identity for every new app.

• Platforms extract ~30% rents by controlling access to your audience/data.
• Zero composability: Achievements on Platform A are worthless on Platform B.
• Centralized risk: A single ban or API change can erase your digital presence.

Ethereum Name Service provides a human-readable, user-owned identity primitive that is portable across any dApp or chain. It's the .com moment for web3, decoupling identity from any single application.

• 2M+ .eth names registered, creating a persistent identity layer.
• Universal resolver: One name works for wallets, websites, and avatars.
• Composable metadata: Attach profile data, avatars, and social links that you control.

Solves the Sybil attack problem without KYC by using orb hardware to generate a unique, privacy-preserving proof of humanness. This enables fair airdrops, governance, and universal basic income (UBI) experiments.

• ~5M verified humans creates a global, sybil-resistant dataset.
• Zero-knowledge proofs ensure privacy; the orb doesn't store biometric data.
• Critical infrastructure for democratic on-chain systems like Optimism's Citizen House.

A user-owned social graph on Polygon where profiles, follows, and content are NFTs. Creators own their audience and can port it to any front-end client built on the protocol.

• 500K+ profiles minted, decoupling social capital from apps.
• Monetization hooks: Direct fan subscriptions, collectible posts, and fee splits.
• Client agnostic: Use Phaver, Orb, or Buttrfly; your graph follows you.

Protocols like EAS (Ethereum Attestation Service) and Verax allow any entity (DAO, protocol, university) to issue tamper-proof attestations on-chain. This creates a portable, composable reputation layer.

• On-chain résumé: Prove your contributions to Gitcoin, Optimism, or a specific DAO.
• Trust minimized: Credentials are verified by the issuer's cryptographic signature, not a central DB.
• Modular design: Works with ENS, Lens, and traditional identity systems.

Just as 1inch aggregates liquidity, identity aggregators will emerge. Imagine a dashboard that pulls your ENS name, Lens followers, Gitcoin GR15 badges, and DAO voting power to compute a unified on-chain credit score or reputation score.

• Context-specific identity: Show your developer creds on a dev platform, your art collection on a gallery.
• New business models: Underwrite loans based on provable cash flow, not credit reports.
• Kills the profile: Your identity isn't a static profile; it's a live, aggregated feed of verifiable claims.