Making Connections

You receive verifications on your BrightID based on your close alliances.

All BrightID verifications are a reflection of your relationships. If you do not have connections, there is nothing to reflect. So, by adopting BrightID as the public good to help you prove fair access to web3 properties, you are expected to make connections to people that mutually know you.

It is also based on the principle that your identity should be attested and secured by people that actually know and care about you rather than some distant and central authority.

So, unlike many other identity systems, In BrightID, your digital identity and its security, is in your own hand in maintaining your trusted relationships.

In that way BrightID is only a mirror to help you reflect your identity in a way that is self-sovereign, non-violent, and globally private. It reflects it through the verifications in a way web3 properties can deterministically check and see whether they are safe to allow you access to their goods and services. For the baseline rights of fair access, the apps do not need to know anything else about you.

Guidelines

It is very important to be careful when making connections. Here are some guidelines to follow:

1. Make connections only with people you know well or have agreed to get to know. This might include family, friends, or relationships in communities you care about.

2. Avoid making connections with random people. Reckless connection-making can expose you to social engineering attacks or loss of privacy.

3. BrightID connection party hosts are an exception. You will need to connect with a host at a connection party in order to receive the “Meets” verification.

4. Keep in mind that all connections you make are recorded in the BrightID social graph. While the graph is anonymous, and you can remove connections from your connection list, the connection you already made will remain in history in a “forgotten” state in the social graph.

5. Remember that the anonymous social graph is stored in BrightID nodes, but your profile name and photos are only stored locally on your and your connections’ phones. This helps to protect your personal information.

IMPORTANT: You will need at least three connections to close, trusted, and reliable people in your life to setup Social Recovery. More, trusted connections you make, the better the security. So do not settle on just three. Seven recovery connections is ideal. The Social Recovery doc also has the section titled "Who should be your recovery connections?".

The next section describes the details of the connection process.