Origin Protocol, an open-source blockchain platform for creating peer-to-peer marketplaces has announced its role in the creation of the ERC 725 Alliance, an initiative aimed at increasing adoption of the identification standard across decentralized applications. This follows the launch of its decentralized messaging service last week.

The ERC 725 is a new standard for managing user identity on the blockchain proposed by Fabian Vogelsteller—creator of the hugely successful ERC 20 token standard, who also works on the Ethereum project.

In a tweet shared with his followers, Vogelsteller said he was ecstatic about the presence of a community-driven effort behind ERC 725, saying it “works nicely and covers all the basics.” ERC 725 is designed to use smart contracts to manage and publish identities represented by wallet addresses on Ethereum.

Josh Fraser is the Co-founder of Origin. In an email correspondence with CoinJournal, he explained the idea behind the Alliance.

“We announced the launch of the ERC725 Alliance, September 6, 2018, Thursday evening at an Origin meetup in Berlin. Fabian Vogelsteller spoke on why he created the standard, shared some insight of his original design decisions and announced the launch of the ERC725 Alliance. Many of the founding projects behind the ERC725 Alliance and supporting developers were also in attendance. We’re excited to see so many other great projects working together towards making this open-standard a success.”

Origin claims to be the first marketplace DApp to build a working implementation of the ERC 725 standard, setting an all-time high standard for other blockchain decentralized messaging networks, such as Civic.

Following this announcement, seventeen other projects have joined the Alliance, with Key industry players such as Polymath and Status, committing to undertake efforts to secure widespread implementation of the ERC 725 standard.

The Origin DApp, which was built with special consideration for user anonymity and privacy, will connect users’ identities to their Ethereum wallet, enabling the ratings and reviews they receive on any Origin-powered marketplace to be leveraged on the DApp network.

The primary purpose of the Alliance is to extend these benefits beyond and across Origin marketplaces and decentralized networks, thereby making the standard highly valuable as the number of adopting projects multiplies and it becomes an established industry norm.

As other DApps make use of the ERC 725 standard, they will be enabled to leverage on the reputations cultivated by verified users on the Origin network. Actions of Users across applications can be compiled to create a comprehensive, interoperable system for trusted identities and reputations, without relying on a centralized authority.

Fraser believes a “widely-adopted identity standard” will be beneficial for the success of a range of blockchain services. He sees “ERC 725 is a bit like a social network: the more people use it, the more valuable it is to everyone.” ERC 725. however, differs from a social network as users get to “own and control their data.”

In addition to ensuring that identities on decentralized applications are not misrepresenting themselves, users will have more control over the management of their own identities.

Origin believes this Self-sovereign identity will not only replace the hassle of users having to undergo verification processes for each service engaged but will also provide them with choices of identification and utilization of information.