Meeting Date

• May 2, 2025 This meeting was set up in response to interest and activity on Trust Registries in the APAC region.

Zoom Meeting Link / Recording

Video Conferencing, Web Conferencing, Webinars, Screen Sharing

• APAC MEETING: 

  • @John Phillips

  • @Jo Spencer

  • @sankarshan

  • @Andres Olave

Agenda Items and Notes (including all relevant links)

Notes:

Minutes generated by notebookLM from the meeting transcript and chat:

Meeting Minutes Date: 2 May 2025 Time: Started around 00:02:07 (UTC) Location: Virtual Meeting

Attendees:

• Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited)

• John Phillips (Sezoo)

• Jo Spencer (Sezoo)

• Andres Olave (Velocity Career Labs Inc.)

Key Points Discussed:

1. Meeting Logistics and Ownership:

   • Discussion occurred regarding claiming the host key and pausing the recording. John Phillips noted they could not pause the recording, believing the meeting ownership was set up by Michelle from the Linux Foundation. Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay agreed on the setup process.

   • For this APAC meeting, it was suggested that a likely attendee would need the rights to control recording to avoid capturing informal discussions.

   • Initial attendance was small, and attendees agreed to wait a few minutes to see if others would join.

   • Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay noted it was 5 o'clock in the morning for him.

   • Jo Spencer and Andres Olave joined later. John Phillips remarked it felt more like a proper meeting with three people.

   • John Phillips formally declared the meeting open.

   • It was noted that ToIP meetings have an opening section about IP ownership. John Phillips stated that members of the Trust over IP fraternity agree anything created is effectively owned by Trust over IP.

   • Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay noted a meeting page had not been created for this session.

2. Meeting Structure and Place in Hierarchy:

   • Jo Spencer inquired about who the chair of the meeting was. John Phillips explained there wasn't a designated chair present; the meeting was set up with a host (likely in America) who wasn't on the call.

   • Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay suggested Andor might have the key details.

   • The meeting's origin was described: a proposal for an APAC meeting to discuss trust registries generally, stemming from the Trust Registry Query Protocol (TRQP) reaching public review maturity. Drummond Reid proposed the APAC call's value due to Joe, John, and others working on the UN CEFACT Global Trust Registry project.

   • Discussion arose about where this group fits within the Trust over IP hierarchy, possibly as a subgroup of the existing TRTF or a new Task Force. Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay suggested discussing this with the TRTF chairs.

3. UN Cefact Global Trust Registry (GTR) Project Update:

   • John Phillips provided an update on the UN CEFACT Global Trust Registry Project, which he had presented on during a recent UN CEFACT call for the United Nations Transparency Protocol (UNTP). Links to the UNTP spec and GTR project brief were shared.

   • The UNTP project originated from concerns about anti-greenwashing and false claims regarding Sustainable Development Goals. Recommendation 49 will propose a transparency protocol for supply chains (UNTP) to enable verifiable claims and certificates.

   • The Global Trust Registry project arose from the need for a "digital identity anchor" within the UNTP to verify entities in a supply chain (the "says who" problem). It aims to check if identifiers are issued by registrars on an "allowed list of trusted registers".

   • The GTR project was recently approved after being proposed in January. Initial country support came from Spain, Singapore, and Kyrgyzstan.

   • A project management concern was noted regarding ambitious deadlines despite the recent approval.

   • The project aims to be unprescriptive, recognizing the rights of nation states to decide what they register. It is primarily about recognizing existing registries, rather than issuing credentials itself.

   • The first step is a "directory of directories, or a registry of registrars," followed by publishing how to access their data. A third, longer-term step is providing recommendations for data accessibility.

   • Minimal requirements for a registrar to be recognized were discussed, such as being a sovereign nation state with sufficient rigor and legal framework.

   • The GTR project is independent of UNTP, despite its origin. Its scope is wider than just companies, potentially including land parcels, trademarks, ship registers, etc., differentiating it from initiatives like Glyph.

   • Deliverables include a UN-posted trust registry data model/governance framework and a pilot implementation acting as a reference framework for registrars.

   • Participation involves observing or registering as an expert through a country's head of delegation or the UN Cefact Secretariat. The expert registration form was reported as potentially non-functional.

4. Trust Registry Query Protocol (TRQP) Feedback:

   • Andres Olave provided feedback on his review of the TRQP specification.

   • A major point was the incongruence between the high-level TRQP specification and the specific Open API definition, which seem targeted at divergent audiences. The Open API is very specific about implementation details like HTTP binding, while the spec is abstract, suggesting bindings are done later.

   • Editorial inconsistencies were also noted.

   • Andres Olave suggested the concept of "profiles" needs much more elaboration in the spec. He felt the spec remains too abstract for too long, hindering interoperability.

   • Jo Spencer agreed on the need for implementation guidelines alongside the core spec and felt the current spec tries to put too much in for what should be a concept definition.

   • Andres Olave argued for details to be nailed down in a single specification for interoperability, rather than delegating parts to other groups. He provided examples of specific queries that need to be clearly defined.

   • API design suggestions were made, favouring a single, consistent way of expressing queries.

   • John Phillips inquired if TRQP handled accessibility controls; the consensus was it should be a context-free query protocol initially, with controls added as an extension.

   • Andres Olave suggested if Trust over IP aims for proper specification work, Diff could take over the role of making ideas developer-ready, including the Open API and profiles. John Phillips found this suggestion valuable in the context of Trust over IP's future role.

Agreed Actions:

• Sankarshan Mukhopadhyay will verify if the Expert Registration form for the UN Cefact Global Trust Registry project is non-functional by screen sharing with the person who reported the issue and inform John Phillips.

• If the registration form issue persists, John Phillips will contact the UNECE/CEFACT Secretariat.

• John Phillips will create a page for this APAC meeting on the Trust over IP Wiki, labelled appropriately, and use AI to generate draft minutes from the transcript for review by attendees. [DONE]

• The question of where this APAC group fits within the ToIP hierarchy will be noted as a takeaway to discuss with the main TRTF chairs.

Meeting Conclusion:

• Attendees expressed satisfaction that the discussion covered substantial ground despite initial uncertainties.

These minutes reflect the key points and actions discussed during the meeting based on the provided transcript and chat logs.

Meeting Chat

00:12:04 sankarshan mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited): This is all new Jo! All new for us!
00:17:39 Jo Spencer (Sezoo): So, will this be a sub group of the other TRTF under the Technology Stack Working Group? Or will it be a new TF under the Governance Stack WG?
00:18:19 John Phillips (Sezoo): UNTP • uncefact
00:19:53 sankarshan mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited): Replying to "So, will this be a s..."

I think we’ll make a note of this “where does the group fit” topic as part of our take aways today and work it out with TRTF chairs. We used to have a general purpose ToIP-APAC - but that is a “big tent” approach which might not generate the excitement among participants
00:23:06 Jo Spencer (Sezoo): Replying to "So, will this be a s..."

Great suggestion Sankarshan. When we decide what this is doing, we can decide where it should fit within the TOIP hierarchy...
00:36:53 sankarshan mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited): By the way, the Expert Registration form seems to be non functional (as someone I pointed it out to mentioned y’day)
00:37:10 sankarshan mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited): https://uncefact.unece.org/display/uncefactpublic/UNCEFACT+Expert+Registration
00:42:55 John Phillips (Sezoo): Replying to "https://uncefact.une..."

Happy to receive update on this if there is still a problem when you walk through later @sankarshan mukhopadhyay (Dhiway Networks Private Limited) - I can take it up with the UNECE/CEFACT Secretariat
00:46:02 John Phillips (Sezoo): For the meeting record:
UNTP Spec here: Specification | UN Transparency Protocol

UN GTR project brief here: https://uncefact.unece.org/display/uncefactpublic/Global+Trust+Registry