Use Case Feasibility Study: Decentralized Identity on Blockchain for Cultural Heritage Artifacts
Ivan Lambov · 2024
Preserving the authenticity and provenance of artifacts is crucial for our cultural heritage. This study explores the potential of Decentralized Identity on Blockchain for artifact identification and verification. A review of related work revealed a great body of standards and guidelines for identification, documentation and verification of cultural heritage artifacts, as well as various use cases for the application of Decentralized Identity on Blockchain in different industries. However, this is the first study that demonstrates that Decentralized Identity on Blockchain can be successfully used for artifact identification and verification. In order to gather pertinent information about underlying processes, attributes, credentials, roles, and behaviors and validate the applicability of the proposed model, we conducted face-to-face and phone interviews with experts from relevant businesses and institutions. We further proved our hypothesis by implementing a range of methodologies - comparative analysis, experimental research, functional mapping. Finally, we put the proposed use case to the test by implementing an experiment using existing tools and analyzing the results. We conclude the study by showing the potential challenges, limitations and future work.