New research and tools from Credential Engine and the Digital Credentials Consortium help ensure digital credentials can be trusted and verified.
(June 9th, 2025) – In today’s growing digital world, learners deserve credentials that are trusted and systems that can verify them efficiently. As digital credentials become an essential part of how people prove their skills and competencies, the need for reliable systems to make sure those credentials can be verified quickly is more urgent than ever. However, verifiable credentials’ (VCs) authenticity is only half the task; we must also ensure that the issuer has been substantiated by a trusted entity.
To help meet that need, Credential Engine and the Digital Credentials Consortium (DCC) have released two resources designed to guide the development and testing of tools that confirm whether a credential comes from a trusted source. These issuer identity registries are especially important as digital credentials become more common in learning and employment records (LERs).
The Issuer Identity Registry Research Report explores the trust challenges, standards, and governance essential for scalable, privacy-preserving credential ecosystems, highlighting how issuer identity registries enable trusted, portable LERs, and offering practical guidance on implementing W3C Verifiable Credentials and Open Badges 3.0 using OpenID Federation, DIDs, and the Credential Transparency Description Language (CTDL).
Governance Framework for Issuer Identity Registries
The Governance Framework, co-developed through extensive stakeholder collaboration, provides clear, adaptable practices to help implementers establish transparent and accountable registry operations, aligning with community expectations and technical reliability through the Integrative Model of Organizational Trust: ability, integrity, and benevolence.
Trust Is the Foundation: In a decentralized digital environment, verifying that a credential is real is only half the equation. We also need to know that the organization issuing it is legitimate, governed, and trusted.
Issuer identity registries make that possible. These registries confirm the legitimacy of credential issuers using structured, machine-readable linked open data. They are designed to work seamlessly with the W3C VC specification to support privacy-preserving, efficient verification, and they’re already being implemented.
The figure below illustrates the intended flow of a verifiable credential from issuance to the holder, then to a verifier, who queries the issuer identity registry to confirm the issuer’s authenticity.
Taking Action: This is a research milestone and an implementation opportunity to support a trusted and secure ecosystem.
Together, Credential Engine and DCC are equipped to support others in issuing verifiable credentials, running or integrating with trusted registries, and sharing data in ways that serve learners, employers, and ecosystems alike. If your organization issues credentials, verifies them, or builds the systems that make them work, this is for you!
Learners deserve credentials they can trust and control. Employers and institutions need fast, reliable ways to verify them. And everyone benefits from systems that work seamlessly together and are built on clear, accountable practices.
DCC offers open-source software, support, and a membership model for organizations ready to issue W3C VCs today. Credential Engine brings standards-based infrastructure to the table through CTDL and the Credential Registry, and is now moving forward with an advisory group opportunity to integrate its issuer identity registry and implement governance for participation.
We call on institutions, governments, technology providers, employers, and community leaders to issue verifiable credentials using the W3C VC standard, participate in issuer identity registries that make trust scalable, and use open governance frameworks to build trustworthy, transparent systems.
We are grateful for the support of the Issuer Identity Registry research project and the Issuer Registry Advisory Group’s guidance. We also thank Walmart and the many stakeholders across education, workforce, and technology sectors, as well as the broader community of practitioners and advocates, whose insights and efforts continue to shape secure, interoperable, and user-centered digital credentialing systems.
When we act together, with open standards and shared commitment, we build a digital future where credentials are not only verifiable but truly trusted.
View the Report and Governance Framework here.
Contact Information:
Info@credentialengine.org and digitalcredential@mit.edu to learn more about these resources and how you can get involved.
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About Credential Engine:Credential Engine is a non-profit whose mission is to map the credentials, qualifications, and skills landscape with clear information, fueling the creation of resources that empower people to discover and pursue the learning and career pathways that are best for them. Credential Engine provides a suite of web-based services and a Credential Registry to house up-to-date information about all credentials, the Credential Transparency Description Language (CTDL) a common description language to enable credential comparability, and a platform to support customized applications to search and retrieve information about credentials. Learn more: credentialengine.org.
About DCC: The Digital Credentials Consortium (DCC) is a global network of postsecondary education institutions working together to advance the use and understanding of privacy-enhanced, portable, verifiable digital credentials in higher education through technology development and research, leadership and advocacy. The DCC offers a suite of free, customizable, open source software for issuing, sharing and verifying W3C Verifiable Credentials (VCs) and Open Badges 3.0 available on Github and engages in research and collaborative projects to further the adoption of VCs in service of equity and opportunity.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. We encourage the reuse and remix of this resource with attribution to Credential Engine and Digital Credentials Consortium.