# "EuroID Connect" Project Idea (Draft) **Version:** 0.4 (11 Sep 2025) **Author(s):** Stefane Fermigier ([Abilian](https://abilian.com)) **Target Call:** HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16, Area 1: Identity management **History**: - v0.1: initial draft - v0.2: added points on self-sovereign identity - v0.3: added points on user provisioning and SCIM - v0.4: Re-aligned project to target HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16 (Web 4.0 / Virtual Worlds) > *Caveat: This document outlines a vision and plan; deep expertise in all technical facets will be drawn from the consortium.* --- ## Executive Summary: EuroID Connect – An Open Source Identity Layer for Web 4.0 and the EUDI Wallet **The Challenge:** The upcoming European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDIW) is a landmark initiative for EU digital sovereignty. However, its success is not guaranteed. Without a rich, accessible, and comprehensive ecosystem of **Open Source tools and services**, the EUDIW risks failing to achieve the widespread adoption and developer-friendliness needed to compete with the convenience of non-European "Login with..." services. This would leave Europe's citizens and businesses dependent on non-EU gatekeepers for their digital identity, especially in the emerging landscapes of **Web 4.0 and Virtual Worlds**. ### The Vision: EuroID Connect The EuroStack Initiative proposes **EuroID Connect**, a project dedicated to building the foundational Open Source identity layer for Web 4.0, designed to **accelerate the deployment and adoption of the EU Digital Identity Wallet**. EuroID Connect will deliver a diverse range of Open Source solutions for the issuance, verification, and practical use of electronic attestations and eIDAS trust services, empowering citizens and enterprises alike. By creating robust, reusable, and community-driven **Open Source stacks for issuers and relying parties**, we will provide the critical missing link for the EUDIW ecosystem to thrive. ### Core Principles (aligned with HUMAN-16, Area 1) - **EUDIW-Centric:** Our primary goal is to support and facilitate the deployment and adoption of the EUDI Wallet, making it the preferred choice for digital identity in Europe. - **Open Source & Digital Commons:** All core components—libraries, SDKs, reference implementations—will be developed as transparent, auditable, and reusable Open Source solutions to prevent lock-in and foster a vibrant community. - **Citizen Empowerment & Choice:** We will deliver a diversity of secure digital identity solutions, including wallet implementations for various platforms (desktop, cloud, Open Source mobile OS), giving citizens genuine freedom of choice in how they manage their identity. - **Enterprise-Ready:** We will provide the tools, such as standardized user provisioning (SCIM) and easy-to-integrate libraries, that enterprises need to harness the benefits of the EUDIW and eIDAS trust services. - **Interoperable & Standards-Based:** Built on open standards like OpenID Connect for Verifiable Presentations (oidc4vp) and DID/VC specifications to ensure seamless interoperability across the Web 4.0 and Virtual Worlds. - **Trustworthy & Secure:** Aligned with European digital rights and principles, ensuring privacy-by-design and the highest levels of security. ### The Plan – Leveraging Horizon Europe HUMAN-16 The immediate strategy is to leverage the **Horizon Europe call HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16, Area 1: Identity management.** 1. A strong European consortium of Open Source IAM leaders, SMEs, research institutions, and eIDAS experts will target this call. 2. The project will deliver a comprehensive suite of **Open Source building blocks**, including: * **Stacks for Issuers & Relying Parties:** Cloud-native and easy-to-deploy Open Source solutions for issuing and verifying electronic attestations. * **EUDI Wallet Implementations:** Reference implementations and components for EUDI wallets on diverse platforms, such as Linux desktops/servers, cloud environments, and Open Source mobile operating systems. * **Libraries & SDKs:** Tools to simplify the integration of EUDIW functionalities (e.g., oidc4vp) into new and existing applications. * **Secure Payment Solutions:** Components for secure and anonymous digital payments and transfers, as envisioned in the call. 3. EuroID Connect will actively collaborate with other projects under the `HUMAN-16` call and align with the strategic roadmap from the `HUMAN-17` CSA to ensure a coherent and interoperable Web 4.0 framework. ### Conclusion & Call to Action EuroID Connect is a strategic imperative to ensure the success of the EUDI Wallet and secure Europe's digital sovereignty in the Web 4.0 era. By targeting the `HUMAN-16` call, we can build the foundational Open Source ecosystem that empowers citizens, enables businesses, and provides a credible, powerful European alternative to non-EU identity oligopolies. This requires immediate action from the European Open Source and tech ecosystem to form a winning consortium. We are determined to deliver the tools needed to reclaim control over our digital identities. --- ## The Problem: The "Login With..." Oligopoly and the EUDIW Ecosystem Gap Our digital lives are increasingly gated by non-European tech giants. Services like "Login with Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft, X, GitHub, etc." offer superficial convenience but exact a heavy price on European digital sovereignty. This centralized control leads to massive data concentration outside the EU, subjects European citizens to foreign legal frameworks, and creates deep vendor lock-in. The **European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDIW)** is the EU's strategic answer to this challenge. However, the EUDIW framework alone is not enough. To compete with the seamless developer experience and network effects of Big Tech, a vibrant, accessible, and comprehensive ecosystem of **Open Source tools, libraries, and services** is essential. This is the critical gap EuroID Connect will fill. ## The Vision for a European Identity Layer: EuroID Connect We envision **"EuroID Connect"**: a project to build the open, interoperable identity layer for **Web 4.0 and Virtual Worlds**, specifically designed to catalyze the success of the **EUDI Wallet**. It will empower citizens by providing choice and control, and empower developers and businesses by making the integration of EUDIW and eIDAS trust services simple, secure, and standardized. EuroID Connect will be a cornerstone of the [EuroStack](https://eurostack.eu/) vision, delivering the **digital commons** for identity management as called for in `HUMAN-16`. ### Core Principles of EuroID Connect 1. **EUDIW-Centric & Privacy-by-Design:** The user is sovereign over their identity via their EUDI Wallet. EuroID Connect provides the open source tools to make this a practical reality, ensuring GDPR compliance and beyond. 2. **Open Source Stacks for the Ecosystem:** We will develop and package **complete Open Source solutions** for both issuers (to provide attestations) and relying parties (to verify them), lowering the barrier to entry for participation in the EUDIW ecosystem, especially for SMEs. 3. **Federated & Interoperable by Default:** Our solutions will be built on open standards to ensure that the network of trusted issuers and relying parties is resilient, interoperable, and avoids new forms of lock-in, which is crucial for the open vision of Web 4.0. 4. **Universally Accessible & User-Friendly:** We will focus on creating wallet components and SDKs that enable a seamless user experience, rivaling the convenience of dominant login services while offering superior privacy and control. 5. **Trustworthy & Secure:** Incorporating cutting-edge European cybersecurity expertise to ensure the highest levels of security for all developed components. 6. **Public Good Foundation with Private Sector Innovation:** The foundational Open Source components will be stewarded as digital public goods, enabling a competitive ecosystem of accredited European entities to offer compliant services. ## The Plan: Building EuroID Connect – Leveraging the Horizon Europe "Web 4.0 / Virtual Worlds" Call The Horizon Europe call **HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16** offers the perfect opportunity to fund and develop the foundational ecosystem for the EUDI Wallet. ### Phase 1: Proposal Development and Foundational Open Source Creation 1. **Form a "EuroID Connect" Consortium:** EuroStack, alongside APELL, CNLL, leading European Open Source IAM providers, and eIDAS experts, will form a world-class consortium. 2. **Target HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16 (Area 1: Identity management):** Secure funding to develop, test, package, and support the community around: * **Core Open Source Stacks:** Develop and maintain high-quality Open Source solutions for issuers to provide eIDAS-compliant attestations and for Relying Parties (RPs) to easily request and verify them, with a focus on cloud-native deployment. * **Diverse EUDI Wallet Components:** Create reference implementations of EUDI wallets or key components for platforms critical to European sovereignty, such as **Linux desktops/servers, cloud-based wallets, and Open Source mobile operating systems.** * **Developer-Friendly SDKs:** Build libraries for various programming languages to make the integration of EUDIW login flows (e.g., using `oidc4vp`) as simple as integrating existing Big Tech logins. * **Standardized Provisioning:** Develop and promote Open Source libraries for **SCIM** to allow for standardized, consent-based user account creation and management at relying parties. 3. **Establish Strategic Cooperation:** Institute robust mechanisms for cooperating with other `HUMAN-16` projects and aligning with the architectural framework from the `HUMAN-17` CSA, ensuring a cohesive European approach to Web 4.0. ### Phase 2: Community Building, Piloting, and Ecosystem Growth 1. **Agile Development & Community Building:** Develop all components through a transparent, agile, Open Source community-driven process. 2. **Large-Scale Validation:** Test and validate the Open Source stacks and wallet components in real-world scenarios with consortium partners from key sectors (e.g., public administration, finance, virtual worlds platforms). 3. **Establish Governance:** Formalize a lightweight governance structure for the Open Source projects to ensure their long-term sustainability and community health. 4. **Promote Broad Adoption ("Sell European Identity"):** Provide documentation, training, and technical support to drive the adoption of our Open Source tools by developers, companies, and public services across Europe. ### Phase 3: Pan-European Ubiquity and International Leadership (Post Horizon Project) 1. **De Facto Standard Tooling:** Aim for the EuroID Connect Open Source components to become the recognized, gold-standard toolset for anyone working with the EUDI Wallet in Europe. 2. **Policy Integration ("Buy European Identity"):** Advocate for public services and EU-funded projects to use and prioritize EUDIW-based identity solutions built with certified Open Source components. 3. **Global Model:** Promote the EuroID Connect ecosystem internationally as a blueprint for a privacy-preserving, user-centric, and open digital identity framework. (TODO: sustainability model). ## Leveraging Existing Assets & Initiatives ### Assets - **eIDAS Regulation & EUDIW:** EuroID Connect's entire purpose is to **operationalize the EUDIW vision**. We will build the tools that implement the EUDIW Architecture Reference Framework (ARF), providing the dynamic, user-controlled layer for presenting credentials to relying parties. - **European Telcos & Banks:** Can act as **trusted issuers of Verifiable Credentials** using the Open Source issuer stacks we develop. - **Existing Open Source IAM & SSI Solutions:** Mature European OSS projects will provide the foundation and expertise for the new libraries and stacks we will create, ensuring we don't reinvent the wheel. ### Who Needs to Be on Board? * **European Open Source IAM Providers & Communities:** The core technical leaders. * **SMEs and Start-ups specializing in Identity, VCs, and PETs.** * **European Telecommunications Operators & Banks:** As key potential issuers. * **Academic and Research Institutions:** For expertise in cryptography, standards, and UX. * **National eID Agencies & eIDAS Implementers:** To ensure perfect alignment. * **Standardization Bodies Representatives (ETSI, CEN/CENELEC, W3C/IETF).** * **Data Protection Authorities & Legal Experts.** * **Representatives from Key Vertical Sectors (including Virtual Worlds platforms).** * **The EuroStack Initiative (and allied organizations).** * **European Commission (DG CNECT).** ## Key Success Factors for EuroID Connect 1. **Exceptional Developer & User Experience (DX/UX):** Our tools must be easy for developers to integrate, and the resulting user experience must be seamless and trustworthy. 2. **Perfect Alignment with EUDIW ARF and eIDAS 2.0:** All components must strictly adhere to the emerging European standards. 3. **High-Quality, Secure, and Well-Maintained Open Source Code:** This is critical for building trust and ensuring long-term adoption. 4. **Robust, Genuinely Open Standards and Transparent Governance:** Essential for preventing new forms of lock-in. 5. **Broad Ecosystem Participation and Collaboration.** 6. **Compelling Value Proposition for All:** Citizens get control; businesses and developers get easy, secure, and compliant identity integration. 7. **Strong, Coordinated Project Management and Community Leadership.** ## Conclusion EuroID Connect is the strategic enabler required for the EUDI Wallet to succeed and for Europe to establish digital sovereignty in the era of Web 4.0 and Virtual Worlds. By seizing the opportunity of the **`HUMAN-16`** call, our consortium will deliver the foundational Open Source infrastructure to empower citizens, support businesses, and decisively break the dominance of non-EU identity providers. We are not just seeking funding; we are determined to build the open tools needed to reclaim control over our digital identities for good. --- Of course. Merging and revising these annexes into a single, cohesive document will create a much stronger and more focused technical argument for the proposal. The new annex will tell a clear story: here is the current landscape, here is how the dominant players operate, here is Europe's superior model (EUDIW), here is the critical tooling gap preventing its success, and here is exactly what EuroID Connect will build to fill that gap. Here is the merged and revised annex. --- ## Annex: Technical Landscape, the EUDIW Ecosystem Gap, and EuroID Connect's Role This annex provides the technical and strategic context for the EuroID Connect project. It outlines the current digital identity landscape, the standards used by dominant non-EU providers, the superior user-centric model enabled by the EUDI Wallet, and the critical Open Source tooling gap that EuroID Connect is designed to fill. ### I. The Current European Digital Identity Landscape Europe's digital identity ecosystem is a mix of powerful but fragmented assets and the overwhelming presence of non-EU gatekeepers: * **eIDAS Regulation & National eIDs:** Legally recognized and secure, these are primarily used for public services but have struggled with fragmented adoption and usability for everyday private sector logins. * **European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDIW) Initiative (eIDAS 2.0):** This is the EU's strategic future—a framework for user-controlled wallets holding verified attributes. It is foundational for credential management but requires a rich ecosystem of tools to become a practical, universal login replacement. * **Bank-led & Telco Identity Solutions:** These are trusted by consumers but are often limited to national or regional ecosystems and are not built on a common, open, and interoperable framework. * **Organizational Open Source IAM Solutions:** Europe has powerful tools (Keycloak, etc.) for enterprises to manage their *own* users and customers, but these are not designed to be a federated *public good* for individual identity. * **The "Login With..." Oligopoly:** The de facto reality for most users and developers, creating the deep digital sovereignty risks that EuroID Connect and the EUDIW are designed to solve. ### II. The Technology Behind the Incumbents: The Federated Identity Baseline Non-EU hyperscalers built their ubiquitous "Login with..." services by mastering a set of open standards, creating a baseline for developer and user expectations: 1. **OAuth 2.0:** The core **authorization framework** that allows a user to grant an application limited access to their data on another service without sharing their password. 2. **OpenID Connect 1.0 (OIDC):** A simple **identity layer built on top of OAuth 2.0**. It provides the core "Login with..." functionality, allowing an application to receive a verifiable assertion (an `ID Token`) about the user's identity from an Identity Provider (IdP). 3. **JSON Web Tokens (JWT):** The compact, digitally signable token format used to represent the `ID Token` and, often, the `Access Token` in OIDC/OAuth 2.0 flows. 4. **Proprietary SDKs and Centralized Systems:** While based on open standards, each hyperscaler locks developers and users into their ecosystem with proprietary SDKs and massive, centralized user account databases. This is the source of their network effect and the core of the sovereignty problem. ### III. The European Evolution: EUDIW and Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI) Principles The EUDIW moves beyond the centralized OIDC model by embracing a more modern, secure, and user-centric approach rooted in Self-Sovereign Identity principles. The key enabling technologies are: * **Decentralized Identifiers (DIDs):** User-controlled, persistent digital identifiers that do not depend on a central authority. * **Verifiable Credentials (VCs):** Digitally signed, tamper-proof, and machine-verifiable claims (e.g., a diploma, an age verification, a professional license) that a user stores in their wallet. * **OpenID Connect for Verifiable Presentations (oidc4vp):** The crucial emerging protocol that bridges the old and new worlds. It allows a user, via their EUDI Wallet, to selectively present VCs to a relying party within a familiar OIDC login flow, giving them fine-grained control over their data. ### IV. The Critical Gap: Why the EUDIW Framework Needs an Open Source Ecosystem The eIDAS 2.0 regulation and the EUDIW Architecture Reference Framework define *what* needs to happen, but they do not, by themselves, provide the **readily available Open Source tools** for the ecosystem to build with. This creates a critical tooling gap that prevents widespread adoption. Without these tools, integrating the EUDIW will be too complex and costly for the vast majority of European SMEs and developers. This is the gap EuroID Connect will fill by developing the following missing pieces, directly aligning with the objectives of `HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-16, Area 1`. ### V. The EuroID Connect Solution: Delivering the Digital Commons for Identity EuroID Connect will develop, package, and maintain a comprehensive suite of high-quality, European-stewarded Open Source components to activate the EUDIW ecosystem. 1. **Turnkey Open Source Stacks for Issuers & Relying Parties:** * **The Gap:** A university, bank, or public body wanting to issue VCs, or a startup wanting to verify them, currently faces a significant and costly custom development burden. * **Our Deliverable:** We will build and maintain **turnkey Open Source solutions** for both issuing and verifying electronic attestations. These will be cloud-native, secure, easy to deploy, and will dramatically lower the barrier to participation in the EUDIW ecosystem. 2. **Developer-Friendly SDKs for EUDIW Integration:** * **The Gap:** The `oidc4vp` protocol, while powerful, is complex to implement correctly and securely from scratch. Developers need simple, high-level tools. * **Our Deliverable:** We will create **high-quality, secure SDKs for popular programming languages** that make requesting verifiable presentations from an EUDI Wallet a simple function call, making integration as easy as the current "Login with..." SDKs. 3. **Reference Wallet Components for Open Platforms:** * **The Gap:** While Member States will provide mobile wallets, citizen choice and digital sovereignty require implementations on all platforms, especially open ones. * **Our Deliverable:** We will develop **Open Source EUDI Wallet components and reference implementations** targeting critical platforms like **Linux desktops, servers, and cloud-based systems**, ensuring the EUDIW is a truly universal solution. 4. **Standardized Libraries for User Provisioning (SCIM):** * **The Gap:** Beyond login, services need to create and manage user accounts. There is no standard, consent-based way to do this using trusted attributes from the EUDIW. * **Our Deliverable:** We will develop and promote **Open Source SCIM libraries** for provisioning and synchronizing user accounts at relying parties using EUDIW-provided attributes, with explicit, attribute-level user consent. 5. **Privacy-Enhancing Toolkits:** * **The Gap:** Standard protocols must be carefully implemented to deliver on the privacy promises of the EUDIW. * **Our Deliverable:** We will integrate **privacy-by-design principles** directly into our Open Source stacks, enforcing best practices like **selective disclosure and pairwise pseudonymous identifiers by default** and exploring the integration of Privacy Enhancing Technologies (PETs). By delivering these essential digital commons, EuroID Connect will bridge the critical ecosystem gap, empowering developers and organizations to build on the EUDIW and providing a truly sovereign, open, and user-centric identity layer for Europe's Web 4.0.