KILT Decentralized Identity Provider (DIP) - Polkadot Medium Spender Proposal
Polkassembly discussion post can be found at this link.
BOTLabs GmbH, the initial developer of KILT Protocol, is requesting funds from the Polkadot Treasury for work on the Decentralized Identity Provider (DIP), which has been ongoing for a few months now.
The KILT Decentralized Identity Provider (DIP) brings an OpenID-like authentication flow into Web3 by providing the building blocks to establish an open cross-chain identity ecosystem using a combination of on-chain and off-chain mechanisms, initially based on XCM v3. The DIP is a protocol whose initial design has been carried out by BOTLabs, the initial developer of KILT, and which results in infrastructure work (i.e., pallets and crates) that other projects can integrate into their runtimes. The protocol allows any chain to become an identity provider, with other parachains able to choose the identity providers they want to cooperate with, opening up a free market for identity rather than a monopoly. KILT will be the first mover, but it is opening up space for other identity projects to enter the ecosystem and use DIP, beyond contributing to the overall DIP vision.
The full proposal with the history of changes can be found here (read-only access): https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-04dherCsMCDqVfwnGF8ZzCI1cOfSjbaBe4Jv4ilcjY.
How to verify the document integrity
The current version of the proposal document has been digitally signed with one of the DIDs that BOTLabs GmbH controls. To verify the signature:
- Download the PDF version of the Google Document linked above.
- Download the DID signature of the file from IPFS, with CID QmfDECBY1c7BCTR2A6QVfQPnrjQ6V4jdw2EmnWjYhs2on1 (e.g., ipfs.io). Save the file with dip-proposal.didsign.
- Visit didsign.io, and upload both the PDF file and the downloaded signature. The signature should verify correctly and link to the KILT tx in which the timestamp was generated.
- To verify the back-link from the DID to the account to which the funds must be sent if the Proposal is accepted, copy the account in the Proposal (15oXzySe6tjF2MumHfUodH8pFQWjy2hraRmXUJXXMKKY6p3F for quick reference) and paste it in w3n.id. The account must be linked to the same web3name that signed the proposal document, i.e., w3n:botlabs_dip.
Further Discussions
Please post any questions/concerns/feedback in one of the following ways:
- In the comments section below
- In the Polkadot Direction Element channel
- Using one of the contacts included at the end of the proposal document
Comments (19)
Requested

Proposal Passed
Summary
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Aye
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Nay
Aye (82)0.0 DOT
Support0.0 DOT
Nay (86)0.0 DOT
And why should the Polkadot treasury fund this? Unsure why well funded teams with live tokens are allowed to take funds from the treasury? Keep the treasury for supporting infrastructure and new ideas and projects. If you have launched your token, and made money, then better use that for building things, rather than asking money from treasury. I think community will still vote aye for this and it hurts to see governance downgrading every day
@72e116ffdb204062b8d753445
Thanks for your comment.
In fact this proposal is exactly about infrastructure. The two pallets we ask funding for enable all parachains to either use or become a decentralized identity provider, in essence creating an identity infrastructure for the Polkadot ecosystem.
Without this infrastructure, any parachain that requires some kind of digital identity would need to build their own infrastructure, leading to duplicate work, incompatibility, and a delayed and costly time to market for projects.
KILT normally provides DIDs (decentralized identifiers) and verifiable credentials for applications via RPC and extrinsics interfaces. Providing this functionality for other parachains via XCM, and opening it in a way that other parachains can also become identity providers, was not on the KILT roadmap, but was requested by the fellow parachains. We tried to make this clear by quoting six ecosystem projects in the document.
We think the DIP will be a valuable accelerator for the whole ecosystem, will provide an excellent showcase for the power of XCM, and will help Polkadot to prove the power of a collaborative ecosystem.
In regards to the monetary aspect: The funds requested make up roughly 3% of the total spending we had for KILT in the past 5 years (not counting KSM and Polkadot slots). And it is our first Polkadot Treasury proposal ever. So please rest assured: this is not KILT‘s new business model.
Best,
Ingo
This kind of feels like very basic functionality / core feature for Kilt that should be covered by your own development budget. Not sure the treasury should be paying for a parachain to integrate their tech with other projects.