Consumable identity: reflections from EIC 2026 on building digital solutions people actually use

It is 2030, and I am preparing to leave for Berlin to attend EIC once again.

At the airport, I open my European Digital Identity Wallet and share only what is needed: confirmation that I am the ticket holder, that my travel credentials are valid, and that I am cleared to board. No repeated form filling. No juggling between passport, boarding pass, and payment cards.

While waiting for my flight, I read a story about families displaced by a hurricane who lost their physical documents. Through portable digital credentials issued and verified by trusted organisations, they were able to prove who they were, access emergency accommodation, and receive financial assistance within hours instead of weeks.

When I arrive in Berlin, the hotel already knows that I prefer decaf coffee because I chose to share that preference during a previous stay. Check-in takes seconds. No photocopying of passports. No repeated data entry. No unnecessary disclosure of information.

The experience feels almost invisible.

And perhaps that is precisely the point.

At the European Identity and Cloud Conference 2026 in Berlin, held between 19 and 22 May, many conversations revolved around a simple but powerful idea: identity should not feel like infrastructure. It should feel consumable, understandable, useful, and human.

Not identity as a compliance burden, or as an endless collection of login screens and verification prompts. But identity as an enabler of trust that solves real problems for citizens, businesses, vulnerable communities, and increasingly, machines acting on our behalf.

The vision presented at EIC was not one of futuristic perfection detached from reality. Most of the building blocks already exist: passkeys, verifiable credentials, digital wallets, selective disclosure technologies, interoperable standards, and emerging governance frameworks. The challenge now is making them work together in ways people can trust and want to use.

So where do we want to get to? What would ‘perfect’ look like in digital identity?

Perhaps it would look less like a technology stack and more like a seamless layer of trust woven into everyday life.

From digital identity to consumable identity*

One of the strongest themes across EIC 2026 was that digital identity cannot remain a niche topic understood only by technologists, regulators, or security teams. Identity needs to become consumable.

That means solutions must solve tangible pain points, communicate value clearly, and fit naturally into people’s lives and business processes. Consumers do not wake up wanting a digital identity wallet. They want easier travel, safer banking, quicker onboarding, fraud protection, or access to services during emergencies.

As John Erik Setsaas, Principal Advisor and Founder at Setsaas Trust Advisory, put it during his session, people do not really care about digital identity. They simply expect to be recognised. That observation captures a broader shift happening across the industry. The discussion is moving away from technical terminology and towards outcomes: reducing friction, improving trust, enabling portability, and creating systems resilient enough to work across borders, organisations, and crises.

The examples discussed throughout EIC reflected this evolution.

• A European digital identity wallet that allows citizens to travel, book hotels, prove qualifications, or access healthcare without repeatedly exposing unnecessary personal data.
• Identity systems for refugees and vulnerable populations that help people prove who they are even after losing physical documents.
• Business wallets that reduce onboarding friction, simplify KYC and supplier verification, and create trusted digital interactions between organisations.
• Agentic commerce models where AI assistants can purchase goods on a consumer’s behalf within clearly defined trust boundaries.

These ideas are no longer theoretical exercises. Pilot programmes, regulatory frameworks, and large-scale implementations are already underway across Europe and beyond. The challenge now is ensuring these systems become trustworthy, interoperable, and human-centred.

The personal identity wallet: useful, invisible, trusted

One of the clearest messages throughout EIC was that digital identity solutions will only succeed if they become genuinely useful in daily life.

John Erik Setsaas repeatedly returned to this idea of ‘invisible identity wallet’ during his presentation. In an ideal world, identity should appear only when needed, quietly enabling interactions rather than interrupting them. Today, many identity systems still create friction. Consumers repeatedly upload documents, re-enter information, or expose far more personal data than necessary just to complete simple transactions.

The pain point is not a lack of technology, but a lack of trust, simplicity, and compelling use cases.

Several speakers highlighted how selective disclosure could fundamentally change this dynamic. Instead of proving full identity, users could simply prove specific rights or attributes: being over a required age, holding a valid driving licence, or possessing professional qualifications.

This becomes particularly important in sectors where fraud carries real-world consequences. John Erik referenced cases of qualification fraud involving medical professionals operating across borders, illustrating why verifiable credentials matter far beyond the digital sphere.

Another growing concern is asymmetric trust. Today, individuals are constantly asked to verify themselves to institutions, yet they often cannot verify whether a caller, website, or service is legitimate. With AI-powered voice cloning and impersonation fraud increasing, this imbalance creates new vulnerabilities.

The proposed future state is one of two-way verification, where consumers can verify organisations just as organisations verify consumers.

Nishant Kaushik, CTO of the FIDO Alliance, framed this challenge as part of a broader effort to create ‘trustworthy digital identity’. According to Nishant, the foundations are already emerging through passkeys, verifiable credentials, and wallet technologies that minimise unnecessary data exposure while improving security.

But technology alone is insufficient. For digital identity to become consumable, it must satisfy what Nishant described as broader ecosystem requirements: dignity, resilience, interoperability, scalability, and utility.

In practice, this means giving users real choices, ensuring systems remain operational during outages or emergencies, supporting multiple wallet providers, and enabling experiences simple enough for mainstream adoption.

Perhaps most importantly, it means making identity understandable to ordinary users rather than overwhelming them with technical complexity.

Identity for vulnerable communities: designing for dignity and resilience

Some of the most emotionally powerful discussions at EIC focused on the role identity systems can play for vulnerable populations.

Elizabeth Garber, Founder of Humanitech Consulting, delivered a sobering reminder that identity systems are never politically neutral. The same infrastructure that enables access and inclusion can also become a tool for surveillance, exclusion, or harm when governance shifts.

Her presentation challenged the audience to think beyond technical implementation and consider long-term societal consequences.

The pain point is profound: millions of people worldwide still lack reliable forms of identification, limiting access to banking, healthcare, housing, education, and humanitarian aid. At the same time, poorly governed identity systems can expose already vulnerable individuals to additional risks.

Elizabeth highlighted situations where immigration status changes, political decisions, or surveillance capabilities transformed identity databases into enforcement tools.

This creates a difficult but necessary balancing act. How do we build systems that increase inclusion without increasing vulnerability?

The proposed answer lies in rights-enhancing identity systems that prioritise privacy, selective disclosure, decentralisation, and data minimisation from the outset. Rather than collecting as much information as possible, future systems may increasingly follow the principle of sharing only what is necessary, when necessary.

Sebastian Rohr from IDPro brought another important dimension into the conversation by focusing on foundational identity challenges in lower-income regions. In many parts of the world, the issue is not sophisticated wallet infrastructure but basic birth registration. He highlighted initiatives such as Aadhaar, MOSIP, and OpenCRVS as examples of large-scale efforts attempting to address foundational identity gaps in different regions.

Without civil registration systems, people effectively remain invisible to governments and institutions. This affects everything from access to education and healthcare to national crisis planning and humanitarian response.

Overall, the most impactful innovation is not always the most technologically complex. Sometimes it is simply making identity accessible, portable, and usable for people who have historically been excluded from formal systems altogether.

Business wallets and the future of trusted commerce

Digital identity conversations often focus on consumers, but businesses face equally significant trust and verification challenges.

Florin Coptil, EU Digital Identity and Business Wallets Expert at Robert Bosch GmbH, argued that digital identity is evolving into a foundational trust layer for the digital economy itself.

Today’s business onboarding processes remain fragmented, slow, and document-heavy. Organisations repeatedly exchange PDFs, registry extracts, shareholder documentation, invoices, and supplier credentials across disconnected systems.

The result is operational friction, compliance complexity, and increased costs.

The proposed solution is the European Business Wallet: a framework where organisations can exchange trusted verifiable credentials issued by authoritative sources. In practical terms, this could simplify KYC, supplier verification, VAT reporting, onboarding, and cross-border collaboration. Instead of manually validating static documents, organisations could instantly verify trusted attestations about company registration, ownership structures, banking information, or sustainability credentials.

Florin also introduced a broader vision involving four interconnected actors: people, organisations, products, and agents. In this model, products themselves may eventually carry verifiable identities and attestations throughout their lifecycle. Connected vehicles, for example, could interact securely with manufacturers, insurers, charging stations, service providers, and public authorities.

The idea moves beyond the Internet of Things towards what Florin described as an ‘Internet of Trusted Things’.

Meanwhile, the WeBuild consortium demonstrated how these concepts are already moving into large-scale implementation. Bringing together more than 750 participants across Europe, the initiative focuses on practical business wallet use cases involving payments, procurement, tax reporting, and supply chains.

One particularly important theme was avoiding ‘empty wallets’.

Identity systems only become useful when trusted data sources actively participate. That means involving banks, trade registries, tax authorities, and notaries from the beginning rather than treating identity as a standalone technology project.

AI agents and delegated trust in ecommerce

One of the more forward-looking discussions at EIC explored what happens when AI agents begin participating directly in commerce.

If a digital assistant buys concert tickets, books travel, or completes online purchases on behalf of a user, how does a merchant know the request is legitimate? And how do we preserve fairness and accountability in increasingly automated environments?

A joint proof of concept presented by Queue it, SVX, and Dai Nippon Printing explored these questions through the lens of delegated digital identity.

The pain point is already visible today. Ecommerce platforms struggle with bots, queue manipulation, and automated purchasing systems that distort fairness during high-demand events.

Traditional distinctions between ‘humans’ and ‘bots’ are becoming increasingly blurred as legitimate users deploy AI-powered assistants. The proposed solution does not eliminate automation, but introduces trusted delegation.

Using verifiable credentials and digitally signed mandates, users could authorise AI agents to act on their behalf within clearly defined boundaries, such as transaction limits, approved merchants, or specific purchases. Instead of impersonation, systems would rely on transparent delegation and cryptographic accountability.

This may eventually enable agentic commerce ecosystems where trusted digital assistants perform transactions while preserving consumer control and merchant confidence.

Importantly, the discussions also acknowledged that fairness does not necessarily mean identical treatment. Humans and agents may follow different verification flows depending on context and risk.

Once again, the focus returns to consumability: reducing friction while maintaining trust.

Conclusion: from infrastructure to human experience

Eve Maler’s keynote brought many of these themes together into a broader organisational perspective. Her central argument was that digital identity remains misunderstood because it is treated as a technical control rather than a strategic trust capability.

Inside many organisations, identity sits awkwardly between security, compliance, fraud, product, marketing, and customer experience teams. As a result, ownership becomes fragmented and progress slows.

But identity is no longer simply about login systems, as it shapes customer experience, fraud prevention, operational efficiency, revenue generation, and increasingly, trust itself.

That is why the conversations at EIC 2026 felt particularly important.

The industry is beginning to move beyond asking whether digital identity technology works. The technology largely exists already.

The real question is whether we can make identity consumable.

• Can we design systems people understand and trust?
• Can we create identity experiences that reduce friction instead of adding complexity?
• Can we ensure that privacy, resilience, interoperability, and inclusion become practical realities rather than conference terminology?
• Most importantly, can we build systems that solve real human problems?

Because ultimately, the future of digital identity will not be determined by protocols alone. It will be determined by whether people feel safer, more empowered, and more recognised when using them.

Congratulations to the KuppingerCole Analysts team for organising such an inspiring and thoughtfully curated event, and thank you for inviting The Paypers to be part of it 💙

* A special thank you to Juliana Cafik, who, during a post-EIC conversation, helped me better understand the real purpose behind these technologies.

About author

Mirela Ciobanu is Lead Writer at The Paypers, focusing on following the latest trends and developments in fraud, cybersecurity, and technology (generative AI, blockchain analytics, data, etc.). Topics related to compliance, risk management, and balancing those with a great user experience play an important role in her expertise.

Mirela is particularly passionate about the importance of having interoperable digital identity solutions that help not only to secure payments but also transactions in other areas of life (travel, health, education). She is a strong advocate for online data privacy and protection. As a skilled writer, she strives to deliver accurate and informative insights to her readers, always in pursuit of the most compelling version of the truth. To share more ideas and get inspired, connect with Mirela on LinkedIn or reach out via email at mirelac@thepaypers.com.