🔑THEKEY(TKY): Digital identity better than Civic 🎫 The first ICO that I may participate in ever (NEO based ICO) 👍

There are a lot of really interesting ICO's and projects coming up on the NEO platform, and one of them is THEKEY (TKY). THEKEY is an Identity Verification Tool using a combination of big-data and blockchain technology. THEKEY will have an ICO on the NEO blockchain starting from february, and has already started pre-sales.

WHAT IS THEKEY:

THEKEY offers a way to verify users' identity through the blockchain, and can be likened to the well-known Ethereum based competitor Civic. The personal identity management (PIM) market was about $6.5 billion USDin 2015 and is expected to grow to reach $34 billion USD in the next seven years.

Identity Verification (IDV) plays an increasingly large role in our society, and you do it all the time on a daily basis. Whenever you do something that belongs to 'you' on the internet, you are in some way verifying your identity. This happens, for example, when you log onto something with a password. We all know the trouble of having several dozens of passwords, for different application. Each time when you log on, you 'solve' the login to prove that you are the owner of that account.

It happens a lot in real life too: When you make a payment for groceries, loyalty reward programs, signing up for subscriptions, and so on. Practically everything we do in life needs us to attach our identity to it, in some way, shape or form.

IDV solutions like Civic and THEKEY streamline this process into an all-in-one digital identity solution. By storing a single identity on the blockchain, and enabling other parties to connect to that, you create one digital identity that can be shared among all the others: One login and passphrase to rule them all?

Beyond ease of use, digital identities solve a lot of different problems as well. Through digital identities, you become the owner of your identity. Service providers that need to know certain information can receive that information, but only that information. The other personal data which they don't need, they won't get.

Additionally, when you've proved yourself to one participating service provider, there really is no need to prove yourself to all the service providers. For example, you may need to show your ID to open a bank account to prove you are a local citizen and over 18 years of age. The service provider will only receive 'Yes' or 'No' which is all they need, really. They will know you are above 18 years old, but they won't know exactly how old. They know you are a local, but don't know where you live locally. And so on.

Digital identities can also solve a lot of fraud and abuse issues. One could link a service such as Steemit to a form of digital identities, for example, to avoid account spamming: You'd need one digital identity per account, and that makes it a lot harder to set up a botnet of voting-bots unless you can find that many people to give you their identity for use, risking their own reputation of course.

Digital identities will be a big thing of the future, I believe: Governments and regulation do not like privacy and anonymity, but I do think they like digital identities to keep track of it all. I believe it is going to play a very large part in: passports, healthcare, insurance, taxes, voting, online identities, refugee tracking & care, and more.

It is, in some ways, what Leelo would call 'a multi-pass'

BUT WHY THEKEY AND NOT CIVIC?

Good question! Civic is great, right? Right. Except, THEKEY looks to be better, or perhaps more promising. They both essentially try to solve the same problem and offer the same solutions, that much is true. THEKEY gives these answers on their FAQ:

• More reliable results – The supporting data is gathered in real time, is comprehensive, accurate and reliable. The data is also validated in advance by government agencies or other public institutions.
• Lower cost - Full use of existing data sources. Avoidance of duplicate work for data collection, processing and authentication,
• Better user experience – It is not necessary for individual users to install any application or upload any information.

What it boils down to is that THEKEY is faster and offers real-time results, which is great, but the main point of interest in this comparison is the third one for me. Where Civic requires users to install an app to use it's services, THEKEY simply works with the existing internet framework: no apps required, and smooth adoption hurdle for new users. Only websites and service providers need to handle technical things in order for adoption to occur.

NEO & CHINA & IDENTITY

Firstly, I am bullish on NEO and one of the key core features of NEO is that of Digital Identities, to match their Digital Assets and Smart contracts. THEKEY essentially fulfills this promise of NEO, and as such is at the core of NEO's success or failure. Success of NEO almost means the same as success of THEKEY, and vice versa. So since I am so bullish on NEO, and I believe in their digital identity vision, I am also bullish on the implementation of that.

And then there's the China factor. If there is any country in the world where I believe the government has a high stake in keeping an eye on their citizens, and where they do not like anonymity, corruption and fraud... it's China. China is known to like to keep a solid grasp on it's citizens, and the issues with fraud in China are widespread and wellknown. Not only do digital identities offer the government a solid tool for control and regulation, but it also solves a lot of pragmatic issues with fraud, tax evasion and other illegal activities, all the while still offering better privacy-protection to the users.

If there is any country that I see being on the forefront of adopting digital identity solutions, I think it's going to be China. Because they need it, and because they want it.

TKY TOKEN

The TKY token will be necessary to transact and perform smart contracts on the THEKEY network: In order to settle a smart contract, one needs a little bit of TKY. And since every aspect of life is in need of identity verification, like security check, access permission, medical treatment and shopping etc. the utility of TKY token will be extremely high.

AND HERE IS THE KICKER: CHINA IS ALREADY ADOPTING IT

THEKEY has a lot more things going for it. They list their greatest achievements so far, and if you didn't pay proper attention it's almost easy to read over it but there is quite significant information here. I highlighted some of the important parts, but there's so much important parts that it kind of needs to all be highlighted.

• THEKEY’s first-generation IDV solution is currently in use for mobile social insurance pay in two pilot cities, which people can receive their payment for their pension, or healthcare insurance reimbursement. The IDV solution is currently being deployed in another 41 cities, covering more than 130 million people (!!!read this again!!!!!!).
• Personal identity data of 210 million people in 66 cities, authenticated by the relevant government authorities, are connected on a real-time basis. This constitutes a solid foundation of IDV.
• Commercial contracts signed with world-leading firms and the business model of our IDV products have already been partly proven.
• Six relevant national laboratories have been set up together with government agencies, banks, insurance companies and one university.
• 23 copyrights have been obtained, 15 patents have been accepted by SIPO (State Intellectual Property office of the P.R.C)
• The founder and CEO of THEKEY, Catherine (Xueli) Li has won "The Most Outstanding Women Entrepreneur in China of the Year (All-China Women’s Federation, 2017)"

Let me repeat that: THEKEY is currently IN USE in two pilot cities and being deployed in 41 cities, covering 130 MILLION PEOPLE. That is almost HALF the population of the USA that is ALREADY ADOPTING IT.

Furthermore, a total of 210 MILLION people in 66 cities are already connected in the database. Large corporations are already on board, universities and the governments are onboard. This project is a GO. And even though this all takes place in China (which is already huge), it doesn't stop there: the project aims to provide the same service globally and is already expanding to other countries.

Here is an interview with Catherine (Xueli) Li. It's quite long and the language barrier is a bit of a hurdle, but it's quite clear we are dealing with smart and professional people here. She also talks a lot about their plans for THEKEY:

In other words: THEKEY is a highly interesting project with a very large chance to see real-world usage and adoption. Whereas Civic offers solutions, but faces uncertainty in terms of adoption, THEKEY seems to be two steps ahead and well on their way with implementation.

NEO and OnChain are official partners of the THEKEY project as well. THEKEY will in my opinion be integral to the NEO blockchain space, or atleast play a very large role in the Asian hemisphere. Another very interesting partner is: ANT FINANCIAL. You may have heard of this one, it used to be called AliPay and is an affiliate of Alibaba and it is THE most valuable fintech company in the world. There are more huge partners too, for example Ping An Insurance which is the world's most valuable insurer worth $204 billion USD. And the list goes on.

I normally don't invest in ICO's and never have invested in one, but this is the first ICO that I am considering investing in. I already have a bunch of NEO, and I see a lot of potential in this coin. Digital identities certainly have a place in the future, and THEKEY seems very much set up for success in this field.

ICO DETAILS

• Ticker: TKY
• Pre ICO Start: November 01, 2017
• Pre ICO End: January 15, 2018
• ICO Start: February 1, 2017
• ICO End: February 28, 2018
• Min transaction: 0.0001 BTC during ICO stage
• Token price: 1 BTC = 1,000,000 TKY

(see the token distribution model here)

After the ICO stage it is likely that TKY will first appear on the relatively new exchange Kucoin, which has been the main exchange where NEO-based projects like Red Pulse, DeepBrainChain and others are available for trading.

I am curious to know what you all think about this ICO! Is anybody else feeling the attraction and FOMO in this one as well? I know there is a pretty big hype building up around this one: There is a pretty good chance that because of popularity a lot of people will miss out on the ICO unless you are very timely about it.

>> To visit THEKEY's website and learn more, click here! <<

(Art by Roy Lichtenstein)