169 - QR Code Specifications

CBOR Identity Data in QR Code

Tag: 169 (identity-data)

Data Item: JSON Object

Semantics: Identity Data of a Person in QR-Code

Point of Contact: Resham Chugani ([e-mail])

IANA Registration: IANA CWT Registry (Search Key: 169)

1. Introduction

This document specifies a generic data structure and encoding mechanism for storing the Identity Data of a registered person using any ID platform. It also provides a transport encoding mechanism in a machine-readable optical format (QR).

2. Rationale

Once a person is registered in an identity system, their data serves as the foundation for identification, granting them access to social benefits and government services. The level of assurance in this identification process varies depending on the authentication methods employed. Low assurance is achieved through basic identifiers like ID numbers, demographic data, passwords, or PINs. Conversely, higher assurance levels are attained through one-time passwords (OTP) and biometrics.

Among these methods, biometric-based authentication, such as facial authentication, offers the highest level of assurance as it assures the presence of the individual. While this is effective for online systems & personal phones where verification is conducted on a server or a personal device; offline authentication presents challenges in maintaining a similarly high level of assurance. The offline authentication mechanism should work for people with no phone.

For instance, in a cross-border scenario, remote areas often face significant internet connectivity issues. Even when internet access is available, server reliability may be inconsistent. In such circumstances, scanning a standard QR code containing the person's facial photograph and identity information, alongside assurance that the data is country-signed, provides an additional layer of security and affirmation for the countries involved.

Please note: The trust layers required to sync the country's key are beyond the scope of this document. We assume the app scanning the QR code already has the country's key to verify.

To tackle the aforementioned challenge, we propose a standard CBOR-based QR Code that involves embedding a low-resolution image of the person with a minimal demographic dataset within the QR code. This QR code would be digitally signed by the ID authorities (Issuer) and then printed on a physical card. Subsequently, the signed data within the QR code can be utilized for facial authentication. This approach also helps enhance interoperability. Note: It is essential to recognize that QR codes have limitations regarding size. We suggest leveraging CBOR Web Token (CWT) with ED25519/ECC keys to generate a smaller signature and more condensed data.

3. Semantics

Claim 169 represents a JSON Object that includes the following ID attributes, as outlined in the table. You can find an illustration of the ID structure contained within Claim 169, as stated below:

3.1 CBOR Map Structure Overview

Note: All the fields here are optional.

Attribute #	Type	Attribute Name	Description
1	tstr	ID	Unique ID to indicate the PII data
2	tstr	Version	Version of the ID data
3	tstr	Language	Language used in other attributes
4	tstr	Full Name	Full name of the person
5	tstr	First Name	First name of the person
6	tstr	Middle Name	Middle name of the person
7	tstr	Last Name	Last name of the person
8	tstr	Date of Birth	Date of birth in YYYYMMDD format
9	tstr	Gender	Gender with the following values: 1 - Male, 2 - Female, 3 - Others
10	tstr	Address	Address of the person - Separator character \n
11	tstr	Email ID	Email id of the person
12	tstr	Phone Number	Contact number of the person
13	tstr	Nationality	Nationality of the person
14	int	Marital Status	Marital status - Can contain the following values: 1 - Unmarried, 2 - Married, 3 - Divorced
15	tstr	Guardian	Name/id of the entity playing the role of a guardian, such as a mother, father, spouse, sister, legal guardian etc.
16	tstr	Binary Image	Binary image of the person's photograph
17	int	Binary Image Format	Binary image format. Can contain the following values 1 - JPEG, 2 - JPEG2, 3 - AVIF, 4- WEBP
18	[int]	Best Quality Fingers	An unsigned 8-bit number encoding the hand position of the finger. It must be in the range 0-10, where 0 represents "Unknown", 1-5 represents right thumb to little finger, and 6-10 represents left thumb to little finger in sequence
19.. 99	tstr	Reserved	Reserved for future attributes

3.2 CBOR Map Structure Example

{
   "1":"COUN",
   "6":1665980929,
   "8":{
      "3":"dfd1aa976d8d4575a0fe34b96de2bfad"
   },
   "169":{
        "1": "11110000324013",
        "2": "1.0",
        "3": "EN",
        "4": "Peter M Jhon",
        "5": "Peter",
        "6": "M",
        "7": "Jhon",
        "8": "19880102",
        "9": 1,
        "10": "New City, METRO LINE, PA",
        "11": "[e-mail]",
        "12": "+1 234-567",
        "13": "US",
        "14": 2,
        "15": "Jhon Honai",
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
        "17": 2,
        "18": [1,2],
}

4. IANA Considerations

4.1 Registry Contents

Claim Name: identity-data

Claim Description: Registering the claim for storing identity data of a person, which could be personally identifiable data (PII) mostly used in Foundational/National ID for cross-border interoperability.

Claim Key: 169

Claim Value Type(s): map

Change Controller: MOSIP

Specification Document(s): Section 3, Section 4

References

[1] C. Bormann, and P. Hoffman. "Concise Binary Object Representation (CBOR)". RFC 7049, October 2013.

[2] Mike Jones, Hannes Tschofenig, Ludwig Seitz "CBOR Web Token (CWT)". RFC 8392, March 2018.

Author(s)

Mahammed Taheer ([e-mail])

Resham Chugani ([e-mail])

Rounak Nayak ([e-mail])

Sasikumar G ([e-mail])

Sreenadh S ([e-mail])