Introduction
Welcome to the second post about Web3 on the Astara Labs Blog. In the last Web3 blog, we discussed DID and how we manage our users' data, but today, we will discuss our vision for vehicles' digital passports, also known as VDID (Vehicle Decentralized Identifier). In addition, we will introduce the concept of attestations and how we use them to make some certifications about the vehicles.
Our vision
The VDID is our vision for digital vehicles, but what do we mean when referring to digital vehicles?
While digital twins serve as virtual models reflecting physical objects—like a vehicle's digital twin used for aerodynamic testing—VDID revolutionizes how we identify vehicles on the blockchain.
We do this by creating a sort of wallet for each registered vehicle. We say "sort of wallet" because it is not a traditional blockchain wallet. Instead, each vehicle is a unique NFT, and we create an account that allows it to hold various assets like cryptocurrencies, other NFTs, access rights, and more.
You may be wondering how we accomplish this. The explanation is simple: we utilize the ERC-6551 standard. This standard was created in February 2023 and enables us to extend the capabilities of ERC-721 (traditional NFTs). The creation of the ERC-6551 standard was motivated by the necessity to represent real-world assets that cannot be represented with traditional NFTs, and this is exactly what we do. However, we will delve deeper into this later in this post. Now, let's provide a broad overview of how ERC-6551 operates.
The ERC-6551 standard is very simple: It is an attached account for an NFT. When we create a traditional NFT, we can link one of these accounts to it. This account is a smart contract we can customize to fit our requirements. Once we have this account, we can send assets to it, and the owner of the main NFT gains rights over these assets in the linked account. This is why, in some sites, the ERC-6551 is referred to as a wallet.
Let's explain this standard with a real-world analogy: Imagine a traditional video game account with some skins and weapons. The video game account represents the main NFT, while the skins and weapons are the secondary NFTs. When you transfer your game account to someone else, the new owner inherits the skins and weapons, gaining the ability to use or sell these in-game items.
So, as a resume, we have an NFT that can hold other assets. This means that when this main NFT is transferred, the owner of the ERC-6551 account will also change. This is possible thanks to the logic that follows this standard, where the main NFT account owns the secondary NFTs. So, the owner of these secondary NFTs doesn't change when the main NFT is transferred because it is still the ERC-6551 account. But now, the main NFT owner has the right to use secondary NFTs.
Vehicle passport
As we said in this post, the ERC-6551 was motivated to represent real-world assets, so we have decided to represent vehicles. In our approach, we have a main NFT, which represents the vehicle minted by the owner (this is agnostic to the user; we do that on their behalf). Each minted vehicle has its own ERC-6551 account, which allows us to attach other assets to this NFT. But what kind of assets can we link to our vehicle?
With this scenario, we have many possibilities. Imagine having all your trusted and verified vehicle information in your pocket. We are not talking about just having the keys to your vehicle in an NFT. We refer to documents, certifications, vehicle state health summaries, etc. All those papers cluttering your glove compartment are now digitized, uploaded to the blockchain, and stored in your vehicle NFT wallet.
This collection of digital assets forms what we call the vehicle passport or VDID. The main NFT represents the vehicle, while the documents and information are secondary assets linked to it. This way, when someone acquires a vehicle, they also obtain all its associated documentation and certifications. The most important part is that owners can share these documents with potential buyers or interested parties.
But this is not all. Thanks to the public nature of the blockchain, you can access information about other vehicles you're interested in. Imagine renting a vehicle for a weekend and ensuring it has successfully passed all its recent revisions. Or searching for an EV from a third-party vendor and checking the battery health status before deciding.
At Astara, we believe our vehicle passport adds significant value and transforms mobility as we know it. By creating a community of users and partners where all vehicle information is trusted and verifiable, we foster a new level of transparency and trust in the vehicle market.
Attestations
Finally, let's dive into attestations and how we digitalize your vehicle's documentation and certifications.
To do so, we use the Ethereum Attestation Service (EAS), a Web3 platform that allows on-chain and off-chain attestations. In our case, we focus exclusively on on-chain attestations to ensure maximum reliability of the information.
This platform allows us to create our own schemas and upload relevant information to the blockchain. In addition, we can use the special private data schema (0x20351f973fdec1478924c89dfa533d8f872defa108d9c3c6512267d7e7e5dbc2) created by the EAS team. This schema enables us to hide and reveal sensitive information only to authorized parties.
Another interesting thing about this platform is that the schemas are public, so whoever can attest to our schemas. This doesn't mean that all the attestations made with our schemas are reliable, but it is possible to know who is making an attestation and check if that address is trustworthy. This way, we don't have to verify all the information or issue every piece of documentation ourselves. Instead, we can rely on our trusted partners to do so.
This is how we digitalize vehicle information and use blockchain technology to add value to our users. As in DID, we take all the difficult parts and make it agnostic for our users. All this magic happens in the background to achieve a smooth user experience.