A unique digital identity in the Metaverse: state of the art and future challenges

‘On the Internet nobody knows you are a dog’. This was the slogan that characterized users’ use of the internet for years. As a result, each user was (and is) allowed to possess many different digital identities, often unrelated to each other, and bearing no resemblance to the person’s real identity. The start of the Web 4.0 era and the advent of the Metaverse, however, pose many challenges to the protection of individual rights. One of the most important challenges concerns digital identity. While it is important to ensure maximum freedom, users increas­ingly demand ‘authenticity’. Moreover, this fragmented nature does not allow for adequate identity protection and is an obstacle to interoperability, a much-desired feature of the Metaverse. This article aims to examine the state-of-the-art of the Metaverse, with a focus on issues related to digital identity. After introducing the concept of digital identity, the article analyses the effectiveness of the current European regulatory framework and ends by discussing the possible benefits of a single digital identity.