Digital Identity Wallet
A secure app or device that stores government-issued digital credentials — such as a mobile driving licence or digital ID — and presents them selectively without revealing more data than necessary.
Also known as: mobile ID wallet, verifiable credential wallet, digital ID app
Last reviewed: 10 June 2026
Digital identity wallets store verifiable credentials issued by governments, educational institutions, or other authoritative bodies in a tamper-evident cryptographic format. The user can present a credential to a verifier — a shop, a website, a border control officer — who can confirm its authenticity by checking the issuer's digital signature without contacting the issuer in real time. Selective disclosure allows presenting only necessary attributes: proving you are over 18 without revealing your exact birth date or full address.
Wallets implementing the W3C Verifiable Credentials standard and eIDAS 2.0 (in the EU) are designed to give individuals control over their identity data, reducing the need to photocopy passports or hand over more information than needed. From a fraud-prevention angle, cryptographically signed credentials are far harder to forge than paper documents, reducing the effectiveness of document-fraud attacks on KYC processes.
The consumer-protection risks to watch in digital identity adoption include wallet apps of dubious provenance (malicious apps impersonating official wallet apps), over-collection by relying parties beyond what is needed, and the concentration of identity data in a single app that becomes a high-value target if its device is compromised.