Setting Credentials Free: Bridging the Gap to Everyday Trust
Jelle Millenaar
17 Dec 2025
At Impierce, we believe that for digital identity to truly thrive, its benefits must be accessible to everyone, everywhere, without installing complex software. We are incredibly excited to share that Impierce, alongside our trusted design partner Yummygum (a digital product agency), has won both the Digital Identity and the Open Advanced Tracks at the IOTA Movathon Europe by delivering exactly that vision. In this blogpost, we dive deeper into our first winning project, "Setting Credentials Free," solving a core challenge in the world of verifiable credentials.
At Impierce, we believe that for digital identity to truly thrive, its benefits must be accessible to everyone, everywhere, without installing complex software. We are incredibly excited to share that Impierce, alongside our trusted design partner Yummygum (a digital product agency), has won both the Digital Identity and the Open Advanced Tracks at the IOTA Movathon Europe by delivering exactly that vision. In this blogpost, we dive deeper into our first winning project, "Setting Credentials Free," solving a core challenge in the world of verifiable credentials.
Trapped Credentials
Currently, Verifiable Credentials are trapped within the user's digital wallet (e.g. UniMe). To share a credential, the user must initiate a presentation, and the relying party must have dedicated digital identity software installed to receive and check that credential.
This means you cannot simply post your certified degree on LinkedIn or email proof of a license to a potential employer and have it instantly verified. The security is excellent, but its usability is limited by this friction. We needed to set credentials free.
Trust Ecosystems
Delivering a seamless and trustworthy solution required the advanced Trust Ecosystem capabilities of our UniTrust platform. UniTrust established the necessary Trust Ecosystem with our partners to ensure that credentials issued by one organization can be reliably verified by another, leveraging established relationships and reputations.
Trust Anchors: Publicly trusted organizations (e.g. De Examenkamer) set up validation services via UniTrust, providing the ultimate root of trust.
Issuers: Credential providers (e.g. EVC Nederland) onboard into the ecosystem. UniTrust monitors and manages the relationship between these Issuers and the Trust Anchor, ensuring policies and credential templates are standardized.
This architecture ensures that even if an Issuer is a smaller, less globally recognized entity, the credential's verification is instantly strengthened if the Verifier trusts the overarching Trust Anchor's perspective.
The Verifiable Link
This foundation allowed us to deliver our hackathon result: the Verifiable Link. This feature breaks the barrier of traditional SSI presentation flows by leveraging a simple link to enable instant, third-party verification within the established Trust Ecosystem.
How the Verifiable Link Works:
User Empowerment: A user creates a secure, unique link for a credential via their UniMe wallet, including consent for data sharing.
Instant Sharing: The user can share this link anywhere: on a public social media profile, in an email, or via a messaging app. We showcased how it could even be embedded into your LinkedIn profile directly!
Third-Party Verification: When clicked, the link directs the viewer to a dedicated verification page hosted by a trusted organization (the Trust Anchor) linked through UniTrust.
The Trust Ecosystem Validates: UniTrust instantly orchestrates the complex validation, verifying the signature, issuer, and data integrity using the IOTA Ledger, all without the viewer needing any special software.
Clear Result: The viewer sees an immediate, clear confirmation backed by the authority of the trusted organization.
This eliminates the need for the user and Verifier to be present, online, or possess specialized identity software just to confirm authenticity.
Real World Impact
The true significance of the Verifiable Link lies in its ability to remove the adoption barrier of needing specialized software, fundamentally transforming the utility of verifiable credentials for all stakeholders.
This innovation is immediately relevant to critical challenges like the one facing the EVC system. In the Netherlands, certain parties, called EVC providers, can validate someone's work experience and knowledge into a diploma, enabling further growth in their career.
Unfortunately, recent reports from the Dutch Ministry of Education show that the EVC ecosystem is currently struggling with fraud of their credentials that are supposed to prove people have sufficient experience and knowledge to work in sectors such as healthcare. The EVC process needs strengthened verification to ensure the legitimacy of credentials to combat fraud cases that have led to inexperienced people working in healthcare. Our hackathon solution provides a direct answer.
The EVC Providers can join De ExamenKamer Trust Ecosystem, who also offers the Verifiable Link service. The Verifiable Links give viewers, whether healthcare providers, examination committees, or educational institutions, an easy, digital method to instantly check if an EVC certificate is authentic and whether the issuing EVC Provider is currently accredited and trusted by De ExamenKamer.
For Educational Institutions & Registered Training Organisations
The Verifiable Link allows institutions to protect their assets while reducing administrative load:
Protecting Institutional Integrity: By enabling instant, trusted, third-party verification, institutions eliminate the need to manually respond to verification requests, safeguarding the reputation and value of the credentials they issue against fraudulent copies.
Increased Credential Utility: The credential is no longer trapped. Its instant verifiability via a simple URL means the credential is more actively used by the user, increasing the institution's visibility and relevance in the job market.
For Employers & Hiring Managers
The solution provides critical risk mitigation and efficiency for relying parties:
Instant, Trustworthy Hiring: HR teams and hiring managers no longer need to call or email institutions, reducing the cost and time spent on background checks. They get an instant, cryptographic assurance of the credential's authenticity, directly backed by the Trust Anchor.
Mitigating Fraud Risk: Because the verification is orchestrated by a trusted ecosystem using the immutable IOTA Ledger, it provides the highest level of defense against fraudulent credentials, which is critical in sectors like healthcare and finance.
Next Steps
The success of the Verifiable Link at the Movathon confirms the strategic necessity of frictionless identity, proving we can untrap the credential and enable instant, verifiable sharing across public channels like LinkedIn and other social media channels. While the hackathon provided a clear, viable blueprint, we are now dedicating resources to integrating this essential functionality into UniMe and UniTrust. This step ensures the Verifiable Link transitions from a proof-of-concept into a market-ready feature, complete with enhanced features, aiming for deployment in Q1 2026.
Together, Impierce and Yummygum designed, implemented, and delivered the results of this hackathon. We would like to thank both De ExamenKamer and EVC Nederland for their continued interest and support in exploring how our solutions and innovations can address real challenges with a meaningful impact.
Trapped Credentials
Currently, Verifiable Credentials are trapped within the user's digital wallet (e.g. UniMe). To share a credential, the user must initiate a presentation, and the relying party must have dedicated digital identity software installed to receive and check that credential.
This means you cannot simply post your certified degree on LinkedIn or email proof of a license to a potential employer and have it instantly verified. The security is excellent, but its usability is limited by this friction. We needed to set credentials free.
Trust Ecosystems
Delivering a seamless and trustworthy solution required the advanced Trust Ecosystem capabilities of our UniTrust platform. UniTrust established the necessary Trust Ecosystem with our partners to ensure that credentials issued by one organization can be reliably verified by another, leveraging established relationships and reputations.
Trust Anchors: Publicly trusted organizations (e.g. De Examenkamer) set up validation services via UniTrust, providing the ultimate root of trust.
Issuers: Credential providers (e.g. EVC Nederland) onboard into the ecosystem. UniTrust monitors and manages the relationship between these Issuers and the Trust Anchor, ensuring policies and credential templates are standardized.
This architecture ensures that even if an Issuer is a smaller, less globally recognized entity, the credential's verification is instantly strengthened if the Verifier trusts the overarching Trust Anchor's perspective.
The Verifiable Link
This foundation allowed us to deliver our hackathon result: the Verifiable Link. This feature breaks the barrier of traditional SSI presentation flows by leveraging a simple link to enable instant, third-party verification within the established Trust Ecosystem.
How the Verifiable Link Works:
User Empowerment: A user creates a secure, unique link for a credential via their UniMe wallet, including consent for data sharing.
Instant Sharing: The user can share this link anywhere: on a public social media profile, in an email, or via a messaging app. We showcased how it could even be embedded into your LinkedIn profile directly!
Third-Party Verification: When clicked, the link directs the viewer to a dedicated verification page hosted by a trusted organization (the Trust Anchor) linked through UniTrust.
The Trust Ecosystem Validates: UniTrust instantly orchestrates the complex validation, verifying the signature, issuer, and data integrity using the IOTA Ledger, all without the viewer needing any special software.
Clear Result: The viewer sees an immediate, clear confirmation backed by the authority of the trusted organization.
This eliminates the need for the user and Verifier to be present, online, or possess specialized identity software just to confirm authenticity.
Real World Impact
The true significance of the Verifiable Link lies in its ability to remove the adoption barrier of needing specialized software, fundamentally transforming the utility of verifiable credentials for all stakeholders.
This innovation is immediately relevant to critical challenges like the one facing the EVC system. In the Netherlands, certain parties, called EVC providers, can validate someone's work experience and knowledge into a diploma, enabling further growth in their career.
Unfortunately, recent reports from the Dutch Ministry of Education show that the EVC ecosystem is currently struggling with fraud of their credentials that are supposed to prove people have sufficient experience and knowledge to work in sectors such as healthcare. The EVC process needs strengthened verification to ensure the legitimacy of credentials to combat fraud cases that have led to inexperienced people working in healthcare. Our hackathon solution provides a direct answer.
The EVC Providers can join De ExamenKamer Trust Ecosystem, who also offers the Verifiable Link service. The Verifiable Links give viewers, whether healthcare providers, examination committees, or educational institutions, an easy, digital method to instantly check if an EVC certificate is authentic and whether the issuing EVC Provider is currently accredited and trusted by De ExamenKamer.
For Educational Institutions & Registered Training Organisations
The Verifiable Link allows institutions to protect their assets while reducing administrative load:
Protecting Institutional Integrity: By enabling instant, trusted, third-party verification, institutions eliminate the need to manually respond to verification requests, safeguarding the reputation and value of the credentials they issue against fraudulent copies.
Increased Credential Utility: The credential is no longer trapped. Its instant verifiability via a simple URL means the credential is more actively used by the user, increasing the institution's visibility and relevance in the job market.
For Employers & Hiring Managers
The solution provides critical risk mitigation and efficiency for relying parties:
Instant, Trustworthy Hiring: HR teams and hiring managers no longer need to call or email institutions, reducing the cost and time spent on background checks. They get an instant, cryptographic assurance of the credential's authenticity, directly backed by the Trust Anchor.
Mitigating Fraud Risk: Because the verification is orchestrated by a trusted ecosystem using the immutable IOTA Ledger, it provides the highest level of defense against fraudulent credentials, which is critical in sectors like healthcare and finance.
Next Steps
The success of the Verifiable Link at the Movathon confirms the strategic necessity of frictionless identity, proving we can untrap the credential and enable instant, verifiable sharing across public channels like LinkedIn and other social media channels. While the hackathon provided a clear, viable blueprint, we are now dedicating resources to integrating this essential functionality into UniMe and UniTrust. This step ensures the Verifiable Link transitions from a proof-of-concept into a market-ready feature, complete with enhanced features, aiming for deployment in Q1 2026.
Together, Impierce and Yummygum designed, implemented, and delivered the results of this hackathon. We would like to thank both De ExamenKamer and EVC Nederland for their continued interest and support in exploring how our solutions and innovations can address real challenges with a meaningful impact.
We consider Impierce's solutions and the results of this hackathon a perfect fit for ensuring our credentials are not only secure, but also accessible and shareable.
