Re: Dealing with the NASCAR Syndrome for Web Payments

On 04/15/2014 11:40 AM, Jorge Zaccaro wrote:
> I'd love to learn more about the group's opinions and vision on 
> wallets for the Web.

You'll find that the opinions vary from individual to individual. So,
this is just my opinion:

I think wallets are a bad name for what we're talking about, but many of
the fundamental things this mechanism must do are the same. I think we
have consensus that the solution:

1. Must be able to store personal information "in the cloud" (login
credentials, payment mechanisms, coupons, receipts, etc.) in a way where
the customer controls access to the information.
2. Must be portable across payment and identity providers.
3. Must not be tied to the browser, but could be enhanced by certain
browser features (such as 2-factor auth, better security sandboxing,
NFC, etc.)
4. Must address the NASCAR problem wrt. login and payment provider
selection.

Formulating a Wallet API may not be the best way to approach the
problem. Solving the problem in a more modular way would probably be
more beneficial. For example:

1. Create a mechanism for storing credentials in the cloud:
   https://web-payments.org/specs/source/identity-credentials/
2. Use the credentials in the cloud to solve the Web login
   NASCAR problem:
   http://manu.sporny.org/2014/credential-based-login/
3. Use the credentials in the cloud solution to solve the
   payment provider selection NASCAR problem.
4. Standardize payment initiation:
   https://web-payments.org/specs/source/web-commerce-api/
5. Standardize digital receipts:
   https://web-payments.org/specs/source/web-commerce/

... and so on. When you put all of these base technologies together, you
get a wallet, but the benefit of approaching the problem in this way is
that even if the end goal (creating a wallet API) fails, you're still
left with a bunch of technology that is still useful in other areas.

-- manu

-- 
Manu Sporny (skype: msporny, twitter: manusporny, G+: +Manu Sporny)
Founder/CEO - Digital Bazaar, Inc.
blog: The Marathonic Dawn of Web Payments
http://manu.sporny.org/2014/dawn-of-web-payments/

Received on Wednesday, 23 April 2014 01:25:40 UTC