The Linux Foundation will host the Trust over IP (ToIP) Foundation, an independent project “to enable trustworthy exchange and verification of data between any two parties on the Internet”. The ToIP Foundation aims to provide a common standard that gives people and businesses the confidence that data is coming from a trusted source, allowing them to connect, interact and innovate at a speed and scale not possible today.

Founding Steering members of the ToIP Foundation include Accenture, Cloudocracy, Continuum Loop, CULedger, Dhiway, esatus, Evernym, Finicity, Futurewei Technologies, IBM Security, IdRamp, kiva.org, Lumedic, Mastercard, MITRE, the Province of British Columbia and SICPA. Contributing members include DIDx, GLEIF, The Human Colossus Foundation, iRespond, Marist College, Northern Block, R3, Secours.io, TNO and University of Arkansas.

According to Jim Zemlin, executive director at the Linux Foundation, “The combination of open standards and protocols, pan-industry collaboration and our neutral governance structure will support this new category of digital identity and verifiable data exchange.”

The ToIP Foundation will use digital identity models that leverage interoperable digital wallets and credentials and the new W3C Verifiable Credentials standard to address these challenges and enable consumers, businesses and governments to better manage risk, improve digital trust and protect all forms of identity online.

The ToIP Foundation will initially host four Working Groups. The Technical Stack Working Group and the Governance Stack Working Group will focus on building out and hardening the Technical and Governance halves of the ToIP stack, respectively. The Utility Foundry Working Group and the Ecosystem Foundry Working Group will serve as communities of practice for projects that wish to collaborate on the development of ToIP utility networks or entire ToIP digital trust ecosystems.

The ToIP Foundation is all set to host an all-digital launch event on May 7, 2020 at 9AM PDT.