Lindsey (Captain Parachute) and Jason ask:

1. Getting into government and healthcare has a ton of red tape and takes tons of cash to get anything done. How do you plan on getting into those industries?

Blockchain is still a very new technology. It’s only within the past couple of years that we’ve started to see tangible use cases that show applications beyond digital currency.

At Civic, we think it’s important to help educate people about blockchain. That’s why we’re focused on partnering with companies that can showcase practical, tangible use cases that make blockchain less intimidating and more exciting.

Through the Civic App and partners like Anheuser-Busch InBev, Brave, Telefonica, and wikiHow, we’re building a foundation that showcases how blockchain, and identity verification specifically, can benefit all different types of industries.

3. Healthcare also has loads and loads of regulation like HIPAA, do you feel you will be able to navigate all the regulations within that industry?

Civic is a digital identity company, and we’re focused on solutions that help people control and protect their sensitive personal data. Civic does not store personal data anywhere but on user’s mobile device and recommends partners only store minimum required information for their business operations.

Privacy and security are huge concerns for the healthcare industry. Modern Healthcare estimated that by 2024, everyone in the U.S. will have their data compromised if online theft keeps accelerating at the current pace. Civic can help address some privacy and security issues within these industries and focused specifically on identity verification, giving companies and individuals the tools to control and protect identity information.

4. Do you have certain countries or industries you are targeting first?

There are certain industries that have lower barriers of entry. We’re really interested in the possibilities of age verification. As you might have seen, we partnered with Anheuser-Busch InBev to introduce the world’s first crypto beer vending machine. Age verification and vending machines have really straightforward use cases and outcomes.

Take the crypto beer vending machine for instance. The process is simple and straightforward. You download the Civic App on your phone and verify your identity. This process might take around 2 minutes. Once you’re verified, you simply open the Civic App and scan the QR Code on the vending machine. Without sharing your age, name, birthday, or any information, the Civic App will simply share whether you’re over 21 or not, which is the only information the vending machine needs to know to dispense, or not dispense, a beer.

5. Early on in Civic most people will have to fill out their profile and a lot of companies won’t accept it yet since they are not integrated with Civic. How do you get past the hurdle of the initial adoption?

In Q3 2018, we surpassed 100 partners and brought on a total of 39 new partners, including Brave, a privacy-focused browser, and Rivetz, a mobily security company.

We’re excited about our rapidly expanding ecosystem because it means the Civic App can be used in more places by more people. We also recently announced our app to app integration, enabling any Android or iOS app to integrate Civic to authenticate users — no username and password required.

We’re continuing to make progress and big steps in the right direction: bringing on new partners and continuing to introduce product functionalities that make Civic identity verification more accessible.

6. How big is the SIP application already? Would the users on SIP be ported over to the token version automatically?

Civic’s Secure Identity Platform (SIP) is built on top of Identity.com. Identity.com is an identity ecosystem that Civic is spearheading, where any organizations that need to verify identity and any organization that can validate identity can transact for identity verification services. Currently, Civic is the only company in the Identity.com ecosystem, until the more toolkits are built and released as open-source in 2019 to allow for independent Requesters, Validators, and Credential Wallet providers to connect directly to Identity.com.

All identity verification checks that take place on Identity.com require the use of CVCs, even those with Civic as the Requester and the Validator.

We currently have 100+ partners that are leveraging SIP.

7. In your white paper you have already stated your SIP platform is already a well-used and proven piece of software that is decentralized on phones. Why the need to push towards a crypto version?

Civic’s Secure Identity Platform (SIP) is, and always has been, powered by blockchain technology. Blockchain technology, such as attestations, are what enables the SIP to be decentralized. It is the technology that allows a user’s information to remain stored only locally on their mobile device, rather than a centralized database. The advantage of having an identity.com independent marketplace is that Requesters, Validators and Users have access to more options when it comes to leveraging consent-based transferrable verified digital identity.

8. Lord Hades asks: Hi, Chris. What are the advantages of a paid Civic membership over a free one?

Civic does not have membership for SIP. Our Secure Login solution is free of charge, and KYC is free until the end of the year through our Civic Libre promotion. But generally, we charge Requesters per identity verification.

Civic also runs an identity theft protection plan — you can read more about it here.

9. Lindsey asks: Do you have any public plans to take on the big non-blockchain players in your space?

Our founders started Civic with a vision: to give everyone a digital identity that they control, and we’ve always recognized this as a long-term goal.

11. Abhijoy asks: Could you tell us a bit more on the newly announced partnerships with Rivetz and ElevenPaths? Will they be using CVC tokens in their security systems?

We’re partnering with Rivetz and ElevenPaths to incorporate our identity verification with their hardware-protected mobile solutions. Civic stores all user information locally on the mobile device, which is protected by biometrics and high-level encryption. This means the user’s personal information and the user’s private key used to sign transactions on the blockchain are stored in the Civic App (software).

Rivetz’s security solution leverage the Trusted (TEE), which is basically a hardware-based vault that is built into mobile phones, to provide enhanced security. By integrating the Civic App with Rivetz hardware solutions, Civic user’s private keys will be stored in the TEE while personal information will remain in the Civic App. This separation provides an extra level of protection, as the private key will be stored within user’s device hardware.

Rivetz’ mobile hardware security, based on a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE), will be built into smartphones and supplemented with enhanced encryption SIMs deployed by Telefónica.

CVCs tokens govern the Identity.com ecosystem, and this is how ecosystem participants, including Rivetz and ElevenPaths through Civic, organizations that need to verify identity and organizations that can validate identity, transact for identity verification services.

12. Victor Anox asks: CVC (currently on the ERC20 platform) is expected to move to RSK. Is this correct? If yes, how would this affect CVC tokens already on ERC20 wallets?

We’re building Civic solutions to be interoperable and be mobile between chains. RSK is an option that we’re considering, as it matures and becomes operational.

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