Goals of Aura

Privacy first

BrightID activity is a primary source of verification information in Aura. Aura inherits the same privacy rule as BrightID: no information should be shared with anyone that doesn't already know it.

Aura relies on verification by people that already know you. This is in contrast to privacy-invading verification methods which require providing personal information to agents of governments, corporations, or apps.

Sybil battleground

Aura hosts the best motivated, best equipped, and most capable sybil defenders. Sybil defense moves from casual BrightID users to elite Aura players. Sybil attackers are forced to target highly skilled Aura players rather than BrightID users.

Aura players have “skin in the game." Mistakes cost them energy, which is the potential to verify people.

Decentralized

Aura is resilient against fraud. If a team becomes corrupted, other teams are waiting to take its place. The market for apps needing uniqueness verification determines which teams' answers in Aura are used as part of a verification level.

Scalable

Apps seeking to expand into regions lacking verification can reward energy teams that cover those regions. On a local level, the need for uniqueness verification drives well-connected users to learn to become Aura players. Energy provides an easy metric for distributing monetary rewards to Aura players.