Terminology

App

A website, web service, or app (or the smartwallet of another holder) that communicates with the holder’s smartwallet.

Claim

An assertion made about a subject in a context.

Connection

A relationship between a smartwallet (acting on behalf of its holder) and an other which is represented by an app or another smartwallet. A connection’s state is stored by one or more contexts.

Connector

Code that implements one aspect of a connection. This code implements a Connector interface/abstraction at the core of the smartwallet. It is associated with a single context. It may receive data from the app and store it in this context, and/or it may read data from the context and transmit it to the app.

Context

A container of data that holds the state for one aspect of a connection. The container contains a person entity that represents the holder along with a set of claims about them. It may also contain entities representing other subjects along with their claims.

Cloud Wallet

A digital wallet that runs and stores all the holder’s information in the cloud.

Digital Wallet

A digital wallet is a software program or web service that securely stores and conveniently organizes a person’s payment methods, boarding passes, event tickets in one place. Recently the definition has expanded to include digital credentials like driver’s licenses, passports, and certifications usually packaged as Verifiable Credentials that can be issued to the wallet by an issuer and presented from the wallet to a verifier.

Edge Smartwallet

A smartwallet that runs on the holder’s device (e.g. smartphone, tablet, or laptop).

• Has features that offer privacy protection (e.g. implementing https://globalprivacycontrol.org).
• The state of a edge smartwallet may be replicated (i.e. copied and synchronized) across multiple physical replicas each within a different app. For example a holder could have an iOS smartwallet app whose state it replicated bidirectionally with their MacOS smartwallet app. This affords the holder the convenience of being able to pick up and use any of their smartwallet apps knowing that each has the same state (i.e. the same set of connections, etc.).

Edge Wallet

A digital wallet app that runs on the holder’s device (e.g. smartphone, tablet, or laptop).

Holder

The person that has installed and uses the smartwallet on one or more of their devices (e.g. phone, tablet, laptop, home server, etc.).

Human Information License

A data sharing contract between the business providing the app and The Mee Foundation (or delegate), acting on the holder’s behalf. This contract licenses the holder’s information under specific terms. The business or other kind of organization (i) must not collect, use, retain, or share the holder’s information with any other party without consent, and (ii) must implement APIs that enable the holder’s smartwallet to remotely control their data.

Mee-certified

An app offered by a business (or other kind of organization) (aka the relying party), that is interoperable with the smartwallet. In addition, the Mee holder’s information involved in a data sharing connection with this app is subject to the terms of a valid human information license agreement.

Mee-compatible

An app offered by an online service provider business (or other kind of organization) (aka the relying party) that is interoperable with the smartwallet. That is, there is at least one protocol that both can speak.

Other

A kind of subject that is the other party in a direct communication between the smartwallet and the app that is this other party. Following convention we sometimes refer to this as the relying party (RP), although this term implies an asymmetry that doesn’t exist in peer-to-peer interactions between two people.

Smartwallet

A smartwallet extends the concept of a digital wallet:

• It adds dynamic data sharing connections to other parties wherein information can be updated over time. This information can flow periodically or continuously from an external party to the wallet, in the reverse direction, or in both directions.
• It allows the holder to license their information to relying parties (RP) (e.g. external apps/sites) under the terms of a data sharing agreement, thereby allowing the holder to retain significant control over their information after it has been shared with the RP.
• It supports wallet-to-wallet messaging using very limited or no reliance on intermediary cloud-based services.

Person

A subject that represents a natural person.

Protocol

A communication protocol used between the smartwallet and an app.

Self

A singleton data container holding a single Person entity that represents the selfness of the person.

Selfness

The sameness of a person or a thing at all times or in all circumstances. The condition of being a single individual. The fact that a person or thing is itself and not something else. Individuality, personality.

Subject

A thing about which claims are made.

Whoness

Who or what a person or thing is. A distinct impression of a single person or thing presented to or perceived by others. A set of characteristics or a description that distinguishes a person or thing from others.