Crypto Wallets and Web3 Identity

Currently, the way we identify ourselves online is through email addresses and social media IDs. It’s commonplace to be asked if you want to sign into a site with your Facebook or Google identities, and there are others. But when it comes to Web3, this is likely to change.

With Web3 there is an opportunity to rethink personalised experiences online, and as Michael Calce suggests in Cointelegraph, we should do this “with an eye to what did and didn’t work in the world of Web2.” As yet, we have no real concept of what ‘personal identity’ might be like for Web3, but it is likely that it will follow some of the procedures already being established in the metaverse.

A decentralised web

Web3 is predicted to be highly decentralised, with privacy and security front and center. We know this is important following all the hacks that have occurred in Web2, including the serious issue of identity theft, which has ruined the lives of numerous people. Web3 will be more geared up for user control, rather than control by intermediaries.

Calce suggests that a key way to ensure users’ privacy and security in Web3 would be the use of crypto wallets. Your crypto wallet could establish your identity and entry to the metaverse, whether for gaming or for collecting NFTs. In this respect, Calce says, “Crypto wallets will be connected to everything users already do on the Internet and in every online activity yet to come.”

Accepting a crypto-based identity

It is true that more than a few current Internet users will shy away from this. The idea of having a crypto wallet is intimidating to the general population. However, as with when email took over from posted letters and faxes, the public will gradually adapt to crypto-based ownership and identity, after all, it is just the means of identifying yourself that is changing.

Your crypto wallet may act like a key and could become an integral part of your online identity, and it could become integral to the purchase of all kinds of things online, from real estate in the metaverse to web domains. It’s also likely that a service such as PayPal will eventually be linked to your crypto wallet rather than an email address.

Ultimately, the use of a crypto wallet for identity in Web3 has the potential to remove the many tiresome steps needed to establish your identity in Web2, and that’s a bonus for everyone.