Web4: A Seven-Layer Sovereign-Ownership Architecture for the Next Generation of the Internet

Abstract

The evolution of the World Wide Web is conventionally described in three eras-Web1 (read), Web2 (read-write), and Web3 (read-write-own)-each of which relocated a distinct form of power along the value chain: from publishers, to platforms, to ledger-anchored token holders. This paper introduces and defends a fourth: Web4 (read-write-own-act), in which sovereign ownership is not confined to tokens or ledger records but is co-specified across every operational plane of the network-identity, physical connectivity, compute, naming, developer tooling, application delivery, and consumer hardware-and in which autonomous agents act on behalf of that ownership under cryptographic, time-boxed capability grants. The central original contribution is the Ownership Thesis: the axiom that every layer of the stack must be reducible to a claim controlled by a decentralized identifier the subject holds directly, not one that is issued or held by an operator on the subject's behalf. From this axiom we derive a seven-layer reference architecture and formalize the Synthetic Web as the class of network activity structurally defined by agent-executed action under such capability grants. We position each layer against the relevant standards (W3C DID Core v1.1, W3C Verifiable Credentials Data Model v2.0, Model Context Protocol, Agent-to-Agent v1.0.0, NIST CAISI AI Agent Standards Initiative) and provide a security analysis covering key management, alias unlinkability via BBS+ selective disclosure, Sybil resistance, delegated-authority scope creep, and data-sovereignty enforcement, with explicit identification of open problems that require further verification.