The capital of Argentina, Buenos Aires, has announced the adoption of blockchain technology and cryptology without knowledge for the issuance of digital identities.
According to reports from local media, the government revealed on October 21 that it has integrated the decentralized identification solution QuarkID into the digital platform miBA — the city's platform for accessing government services and documents.
Since October 1, more than 3.6 million active miBA users have received decentralized digital identities (DIDs) protected by QuarkID — a digital identification protocol developed by the Web3 company Extrimian. The QuarkID wallet is operated by ZKsync Era, an Ethereum scaling protocol using zero-knowledge proofs.
"By empowering 3.6 million residents with greater control over their personal data, the city is setting a new standard for privacy and security in digital identity management," according to a translated statement from the Buenos Aires government.
Buenos Aires has been implementing blockchain-based initiatives over the past few years. In September 2023, the city announced that birth certificates and marriage certificates will be the first documents available on-chain, followed by income certificates and academic records.
"We have seen a lot of innovation in blockchain-based financial services, but this initiative demonstrates the potential of blockchain to revolutionize other use cases, such as government services, by empowering citizens to securely own their data," said Diego Fernández, Secretary of Innovation and Digital Transformation of Buenos Aires.
"By empowering residents to control their identities, we not only improve privacy and security, but also lay the foundation for a future where personal data ownership becomes a fundamental right, protected by advanced cryptographic proof," Fernández continued.
Another notable recent initiative has targeted the city's education system. In August, Buenos Aires integrated Ethereum training into the high school curriculum, providing some students with classes on Solidity — a programming language used to build DApps on Ethereum.
