Insights from Jon Shamah: A Global Perspective on Digital Identity and Transformation
Jon Shamah
33 episodes
4 hours ago
This podcast series, as a series of discussions based on Jon Shamah’s Linkedin blogs, offers a thought-provoking exploration of key topics shaping the digital world today. Drawing from decades of hands-on experience and a strategic viewpoint, Jon delves into the evolving landscape of Digital Identity, the emergence and implications of Digital Wallets, and the broader currents driving digital transformation.
While much of the analysis is rooted in developments across Europe, the series adopts a truly global lens—examining international policy frameworks, technical standards, and cross-border interoperability challenges. Whether addressing the urgency for unified digital identity ecosystems or highlighting innovations that are reshaping user trust and data sovereignty, each episode offers practical insight informed by expertise and critical reflection.
By bridging strategic vision with real-world implementation, The podcasts invite listeners and readers alike to engage with the future of digital trust architecture—one informed by experience, enriched by collaboration, and poised for global relevance.
[Note that the discussions are by Jon Shamah’s favourite AI friends.]
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This podcast series, as a series of discussions based on Jon Shamah’s Linkedin blogs, offers a thought-provoking exploration of key topics shaping the digital world today. Drawing from decades of hands-on experience and a strategic viewpoint, Jon delves into the evolving landscape of Digital Identity, the emergence and implications of Digital Wallets, and the broader currents driving digital transformation.
While much of the analysis is rooted in developments across Europe, the series adopts a truly global lens—examining international policy frameworks, technical standards, and cross-border interoperability challenges. Whether addressing the urgency for unified digital identity ecosystems or highlighting innovations that are reshaping user trust and data sovereignty, each episode offers practical insight informed by expertise and critical reflection.
By bridging strategic vision with real-world implementation, The podcasts invite listeners and readers alike to engage with the future of digital trust architecture—one informed by experience, enriched by collaboration, and poised for global relevance.
[Note that the discussions are by Jon Shamah’s favourite AI friends.]
Establishing a formal, trusted assistance model to ensure that all European Union citizens can participate securely in an increasingly digital society is essential. Despite the convenience of digital transformation, a significant portion of the population faces exclusion due to limited digital skills, device access, or other barriers like disability. One solution is by leveraging the upcoming European Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallet and the expanded eIDAS 2 framework to create a ”Qualified Assistance Provider” model, which would enable trained, audited staff to help citizens perform secure digital transactions on their behalf. This structure aims to address the structural inequity arising from essential services moving online and suggests funding local assistance hubs, such as libraries and NGOs, to offer these auditable and legally equivalent assisted interactions.
By explicitly designing for permanent assistance to ensure resilience and universal inclusion in a fully digital EU, the future of each and every EU citizen is recognised equally.
Horizon Europe, the EU’s flagship research and innovation program, has been instrumental in advancing science and technology across Europe. Its structured approach—organized around predefined missions, thematic clusters, and detailed work programs—has ensured alignment with strategic priorities. However, this rigidity comes at a cost: it limits the ability to respond to emerging challenges, stifles high-risk research, and constrains creativity.
Navigating your social media feed can feel like walking through a maze of conflicting signals. Yet, behind the chaos, there is often a deliberate and surprisingly simple playbook used to engineer and spread false news. This article breaks down that predictable formula for deception, step by step.
For numerous organizations, including government authorities and private entities, to achieve Qualified Trust Service Provider (QTSP) status necessary for issuing Verifiable Credentials (VCs) under the EU’s eIDAS regulation is a difficult. Becoming a QTSP internally presents significant operational challenges, requiring complex compliance with mandatory standards for advanced cryptographic systems, interoperability schemas, and strict GDPR mandates concerning selective disclosure and real-time revocation. To bypass this resource-intensive internal burden, We identify four strategic alternatives, ranging from expensive, slow consultancy engagement to highly capital-intensive business acquisition. The analysis consistently favours the cloud services integration model, which offers inherent scalability, cost efficiency, and simplified regulatory compliance by utilizing specialised third-party components. Choosing the correct strategy depends on an organization’s internal resources, tolerance for third-party dependency, and the importance of rapid market deployment within the emerging EUDI Wallet ecosystem. (PS. I do use my AI friends to explain this in audio format.)
The pursuit of autonomous, conscious robotics remains one of the most ambitious goals in modern engineering. Popular culture, epitomized by Marvin the Paranoid Android from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, envisions machines with limitless computational capacity and self-awareness. However, this vision is fundamentally constrained by three interlocking barriers: the immutable laws of physics, the systemic reliance on centralized architectures, and the unresolved ethical dilemmas of codifying morality into non-human agents.
The increasing complexity of Artificial Intelligence Agents present major challenges within digital identity and signing systems. As AI agents evolve from simple programmed interactions to those involving complex, self-determining processes, issues of liability and risk will become paramount, especially when agents interact with counterparts, delegate tasks, or pursue open-ended missions. To resolve this increasing complexity and prevent the abandonment of advanced agents, a framework is proposed that mandates Terms and Conditions (Ts and Cs) for transactions, clearly defining liability boundaries and incorporating strict controlling algorithms.
As our world accelerates its transition towards a digital-first society, trust has emerged as the most critical component for stability, progress, and widespread adoption. True, sustainable trust is not a default state; it must be consciously built upon a deep foundation of mutual understanding. In Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the miraculous Babel fish, when placed in the ear, allows its user to instantly understand any language. It promises a world of perfect clarity and seamless comprehension. Yet, Adams offers a crucial warning: by removing all barriers, the fish inadvertently caused more conflict than ever before. This paradox serves as our central cautionary tale: creating a seamless digital identity infrastructure without a robust architecture of trust could amplify existing societal fractures rather than heal them.
Digital Wallets are a transformative technology for managing identity and transactions, highlighting their role in creating a more secure and efficient digital society. These wallets are presented as versatile tools capable of securely storing diverse credentials beyond payment information, offering users control over information disclosure. The European Union is leading this digital transformation, with plans to introduce Digital Wallets by 2026, supported by regulatory frameworks such as eIDAS 2.0 and the Digital Services Act.
Resilience is a topic that never seems to be solved. When one aspect of our lives has just been made more robust, yet another crops up that takes that feeling of security away again.
We all wish that life would be easy, and effort that is once expended does not recur over and over again. This utopia is a dream that rarely happens. Even more so if you are one of those organisations that do not see IT as your core functions but have decided that it is your decision that you need to be a Qualified Trust Service Provider (QTSP). There are hard ways to do it and there are easier ways......
A high-level workshop hosted in Ottawa, Canada, on October 6, 2025 took place, focusing on advancing digital collaboration, specifically regarding digital credentials and trust services, between the European Union (EU) and Canada. This event, which included policymakers and digital leaders, marked a significant step under the EU-Canada Digital Partnership and was informed by a new study comparing the EU and Canadian digital frameworks to identify areas for mutual recognition and interoperability. A reflection from Jon Shamah a co-author along with Keith Jansa, explains that while digital identity systems vary significantly across jurisdictions—notably due to differing legal traditions like the EU’s Napoleonic law versus Canada’s Common law—the foundational principles are aligned, creating a basis for cross-border interoperability. A key recommendation highlighted in the second source is using the UNCITRAL model as a flexible ”middleware methodology” for regulatory alignment to bridge these differences and facilitate technical collaboration, though success ultimately depends on sustained political will.
The integration of Artificial Intelligence into dispute resolution systems marks a pivotal shift in how justice is accessed and delivered. With the rise of On-Line Digital Resolution (ODR) platforms, AI technologies are increasingly used to facilitate intake, guide users, and predict outcomes. These innovations promise to streamline processes and reduce costs, but they also raise critical ethical questions. Mediators, as custodians of fairness and impartiality, must adapt to this evolving landscape while safeguarding the core values of justice.
The issue of sovereignty is raising its head across the globe, but more so in the Western Hemisphere. As nations show a growing distrust of others, there is a realisation that their respective national interests must be resilient to outside threats and geopolitics. This extends to national and national-critical data and the processing of that data.
A critical dimension of this evolving Wallet landscape is the emergence of agentic workflows—processes driven by autonomous or semi-autonomous agents. These workflows can be broadly categorized into closed and open models, each presenting distinct challenges and implications for responsibility and liability.
Think of trust on a unimaginable scale. Think about it. How does a massive organization like a huge bank or even an entire city handle the job of digitally signing thousands or even millions of documents. It’s a huge challenge and it’s forcing a major rethink of how we prove who we are online.
Examples such as a city government, a multinational corporation, or a big healthcare system. They’re constantly issuing official documents, you know, contracts, permits, credentials. So how on earth do they keep that process secure and trustworthy? Especially now when the people who need to sign off on things could be working from home, from an airport, from literally anywhere?
Australia’s Deepfake Dilemma and the Danish Solution
By Andrew Horton and Elizabeth Lawler
Countries need to move beyond simply pleading with internet platforms for better content moderation and instead implement new legal frameworks that empower citizens directly. For a model of how to achieve this, policymakers should look to the innovative legal thinking emerging from Denmark.
Andrew Horton is the Australian Strategic Policy Institutes chief operating officer. Elizabeth Lawler is a subeditor for The Strategist.
This article is published courtesy of the The Strategist and the original article can be found there.
The image of a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming car comes to mind whenever I remember the eIDAS deadlines for verifiable credentials to be made available by the end of 2027 for all regulated bodies in the EU, the end of 2026 for public administrations.
This podcast outlines the transformative potential of Digital Wallets, detailing their functionality, benefits, and the different models emerging, particularly within the EU. Digital Wallets are presented as a secure, efficient, and private means for managing various credentials and facilitating complex transactions. The EU’s proactive approach, coupled with regulations like eIDAS 2.0 and the Digital Services Act, positions Digital Wallets to become a cornerstone of digital interaction across the single market by 2026.
Governments are increasingly turning to digital platforms to deliver smarter public services, driven by the promise of significant efficiency gains and time savings for citizens. Yet, this transformation presents a critical challenge: how to ensure that these services remain accessible to everyone, regardless of their digital capabilities or circumstances.
There needs to be a comprehensive list of fundamental non-technical specifications to ensure a solid future Digital Wallet based society:
1) Function
2) Trust
3) Use
4) Automation
5) Confidentiality
6) Cost
7) Accessibility
8) Universality
9) Transferability
10) Resilience
Insights from Jon Shamah: A Global Perspective on Digital Identity and Transformation
This podcast series, as a series of discussions based on Jon Shamah’s Linkedin blogs, offers a thought-provoking exploration of key topics shaping the digital world today. Drawing from decades of hands-on experience and a strategic viewpoint, Jon delves into the evolving landscape of Digital Identity, the emergence and implications of Digital Wallets, and the broader currents driving digital transformation.
While much of the analysis is rooted in developments across Europe, the series adopts a truly global lens—examining international policy frameworks, technical standards, and cross-border interoperability challenges. Whether addressing the urgency for unified digital identity ecosystems or highlighting innovations that are reshaping user trust and data sovereignty, each episode offers practical insight informed by expertise and critical reflection.
By bridging strategic vision with real-world implementation, The podcasts invite listeners and readers alike to engage with the future of digital trust architecture—one informed by experience, enriched by collaboration, and poised for global relevance.
[Note that the discussions are by Jon Shamah’s favourite AI friends.]
