Decentralized Identity Verification using Zero-Knowledge Proofs: A Privacy-Preserving Authentication Framework

Abstract

In the contemporary online interaction, digital iden- tity is central, but most systems follow a centralized provider like Google or Facebook. Although convenient, these models pose ma- jor risks to data breach, surveillance, and single point of failure. The proposed paper proposes a privacy-sensitive decentralized identity verification system that uses Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs) to allow users to make it through claims (e.g., age, citizen- ship, or enrollment) without any personal data being provided, thereby solving the challenges outlined in the paper. Our architecture integrates verifiable credentials, zero-knowledge-SNARKs and an issuer trust registry that is maintained on blockchain smart contracts to guarantee trustless verification and eliminate dependence on centralized authorities. Its system gives its users full control over credentials, allows reuse across applications, and does not expose data.A proof-of-concept implementation has shown the approach to be feasible with Circom and SnarkJS to generate proof, Solidity smart contracts to verify them, and a user interface implemented in React. Results of the evaluations showed that determination of the verification latency is low, the overhead to generate proofs is moderate, and no privacy leakage occurs. It can be used in potential applications such as education, e-governance, healthcare, finance, and online voting.