Startup Interview With Fraser Edwards, CEO & Co-founder, of cheqd, A London Startup

Hey Hackers,

cheqd has been nominated in HackerNoon's annual Startup of the Year awards in London, UK.

Please vote for us here: https://hackernoon.com/startups/europe/europe-london-england-uk

Read more about us below to understand why we deserve your vote👇

Meet Fraser Edwards, CEO & Co-founder at cheqd

cheqd (cheqd.io) is a privacy-preserving payment network that allows users and organizations to gain control and portability of their data.

cheqd builds upon Decentralised Identity, Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), and Verifiable Credentials (VCs) with payment infrastructure to create Trusted Data markets as an entirely new industry category.

Put simply, you can issue credentials and get paid to do so.

My Role

As CEO and co-founder at cheqd, I’m tasked with – this sounds ambitious – creating an entirely new paradigm for data and a new industry category: Trusted Data Markets. Trusted Data Markets are markets where data has portability, verifiable provenance, and hence, value.

By blending a privacy-preserving payment network with a decentralized/self-sovereign identity, cheqd allows users and organizations to gain control and portability of their data whilst establishing clear economic benefits for all involved.

I oversee the company’s strategy and development, as well as investor and stakeholder relations.

Prior to cheqd, I led a digital identity pilot for the World Economic Forum and the Dutch and Canadian governments.

I also have patents together with my former colleagues in cross-ledger payments, having worked with the Singaporean and Canadian Central Banks on cross-blockchain payments.

How We're Disrupting/Improving the Crypto Industry

The sheer volume of data, the advent of generative AIs like ChatGPT, and a prevalence of fraud are shifting the value from generic data to “trusted data” – data that has cryptographically verifiable provenance and traceability.

For individuals, this could be as low value as receipts, through gym memberships and preferences, e.g., dietary restrictions or avatar appearance, up to high trust and therefore valued items such as passports or driving licenses which could be used as re-usable know your customer (KYC) credentials.

For organizations, these could be business licenses, invoices, or endorsements from other entities.

Decentralized identity protocols enable the creation of trusted data.

Founded in 2021, cheqd is building the infrastructure required to support “Trusted Data” ecosystems. It has created a privacy-preserving data network for trusted data owned by their users, who have selective control over how that data is shared, used, and transacted upon.

cheqd provides the tools, infrastructure, and security to support a new paradigm where users are empowered at the center of their own data universe and can transact in new Trusted Data Markets.

cheqd is powered by SSI, also known as a decentralized identity. It is a disruptive new technology that empowers consumers, organizations, and even objects to verify just once and prove their identities everywhere, with full ownership, portability, interoperability, and control of their data.

It’s a user-centric and user-controlled approach with almost limitless applications, stretching from Banking and the Metaverse, DeFi, and Crypto Lending to Healthcare and Travel.

Standing Out from The Crowd

What makes us really special is that we’re the only ones focusing on the economics of trusted data and/or self-sovereign identity. As a result, by developing payments for digital credentials, we’re the first ones to create a new category – trusted data markets.

While decentralized identity technology has been there for a while, it’s the economic incentives that have been missing for the trusted data market to take off. That’s why we focused our efforts on introducing payment rails for trusted data – the first project of its kind.

It creates new revenue models for organizations and individuals. One can now issue credentials and get paid to do so. cheqd technology empowers consumers and businesses with full ownership, portability, and control over their data and identities.

As an open-source network with an associated suite of tools, cheqd makes exchanging and paying for trusted data easy and secure. Payments for credentials underpin all cheqd offerings and is a critical element for the adoption and scaling of decentralized identity.

Our Thoughts on the Data Industry in 2023

There’s definitely a shift from data to trusted data. Similarly to the point above, with the advent of the likes of ChatGPT and neural networks, the availability of data is no longer the problem, but proving its trustworthiness and credibility is the next big thing.

In relation to trusted data, which would include identity data too, we also see a transition from identity verification to reputation depending on an individual’s activity. The idea that one needs to overshare their personal data to prove something is unacceptably outdated.

With a decentralized identity, thanks to digital credentials, individuals can keep their identity private yet prove certain claims, such as being an admin of a certain community or proving that they’ve completed a certain course, etc.

While this could be an individual’s creditworthiness or social reputation, this is especially relevant in the context of community management and protection from scammers.

As we all know, one of the biggest challenges in Web3 is security. Crypto scams wiped out nearly $150M in a single week and created a mass-scale distrust in communities. The way to combat this issue is through trust and reputation.

Meaning that individuals should be able to build their verifiable reputation and port it across different communities and platforms.

Finally, we certainly expect wider adoption of decentralized identity solutions, given how active big tech is getting involved in the space.

What word defines the state of identity data in 2023?

Can’t answer with one word – I’d say, “It’s happening!” It seems the market is finally aware that decentralized identity solutions are sorely needed across a variety of use cases – from Web3 community management and reputation to high-security identity verification, such as KYC.

With tech giants such as Block’s TBD, Microsoft, Salesforce, and others actively developing decentralized ID solutions, we can confidently say the time has come.

The awareness is there, the technology is there; what is missing most of the time is a commercial angle – making it easy to integrate and use and beneficial for customers.

That’s why cheqd is very much focused on delivering these solutions for adoption through our product suite – cheqd network and payments for credentials, Credential Service, and Creds.

Why we decided to participate in HackerNoon's Startup of the Year awards

HackerNoon is a great community for all things tech and Web3, and we were thrilled to be nominated as a startup of the year! We’re also in a great company as there are many other amazing projects taking part. Thanks for the nomination!

Final Thoughts

Data verification and decentralized identity are growing immensely, and it’s powered by a need to verify a growing number of online interactions in both Web3 and Web2 spaces.

The proliferation of the likes of ChatGPT and neural networks is creating a further urgency for the trustworthiness and credibility of data.

Private and secure solutions that help to verify data and enable users to be in charge of their data are required, and that’s what cheqd is building.

If you managed to read that far, please make sure to vote for us today! https://hackernoon.com/startups/europe/europe-london-england-uk/