Re: Introduction and update on Universal DID-Native Addressing (UDNA)

Kindly find attached is another screenshot of how UDNA header works.

On Sat, 20 Sept 2025 at 07:18, Amir Hameed <amsaalegal@gmail.com> wrote:

> Thanks again for the references—they’re really helpful. I wanted to
> clarify how *UDNA* relates to *did:nostr*, since they actually operate at
> different layers.
>
> At a high level:
>
>    -
>
>    *did:nostr* is a DID Method. It defines how a DID is created,
>    resolved, and managed on the Nostr network. It’s all about identity—proving
>    who you are and which keys belong to you—not about routing data.
>    -
>
>    *UDNA* is a networking framework. It treats DIDs as first-class
>    primitives for *addressing and routing*, effectively replacing IPs. It
>    doesn’t care how the DID is created—you could use did:nostr or any other
>    DID—but focuses on how to send messages to that DID across the network.
>
> You can think of it like this: a did:nostr is a “phone number” you
> control, and UDNA is the “phone network” that actually routes the calls.
>
> A UDNA packet uses DIDs in its header and can include fields like
> RouteHint, KeyHint, Nonce, and Signature. Routing and discovery are handled
> dynamically via a *DHT overlay*, so the underlying IPs can change without
> affecting reachability.
>
> UDNA and did:nostr aren’t competing—they’re complementary. UDNA could even
> use did:nostr as its identity layer while providing a *secure,
> transport-agnostic, identity-native network layer*.
>
> Best,
> Amir Hameed
>
> On Sat, 20 Sept 2025 at 07:04, Manu Sporny <msporny@digitalbazaar.com>
> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, Sep 20, 2025 at 9:41 AM Amir Hameed <amsaalegal@gmail.com> wrote:
>> > At a high level, the minimal viable implementation of UDNA would focus
>> on addressing and routing based on cryptographic identities (DIDs) rather
>> than network locations. This doesn’t require building a full alternative to
>> TCP/IP or UDP, but rather an overlay layer on top of existing transport
>> protocols in a transport-agnostic way.
>>
>> Got it, the screen shots helped. That makes sense.
>>
>> The work you're doing reminds me a lot of Telehash, which we built the
>> first DID implementation on top of many years ago:
>>
>>
>> https://github.com/telehash/telehash.github.io/blob/master/v3/spec/v3.0.0-stable.pdf
>>
>> It also reminds me of what the did:nostr folks are trying to do, some
>> of whom are on this mailing list. How would you characterize what you
>> are working as it relates to nostr?
>>
>> -- manu
>>
>> --
>> Manu Sporny - https://www.linkedin.com/in/manusporny/
>> Founder/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
>> https://www.digitalbazaar.com/
>>
>