did:self A registry-less DID method

Abstract

We introduce did:self, a Decentralized Identifier (DID) method that does not depend on any trusted registry for storing the corresponding DID documents. Information for authenticating a did:self subject can be disseminated using any means and without making any security assumption about the delivery method. did:self is lightweight, it allows controlled delegation, it offers increased security and privacy, and it can be used for identifying people, content, as well as IoT devices. Furthermore, DID documents in did:self can be implicit, allowing re-construction of DID documents based on other authentication material, such as JSON Web Tokens and X.509 certificates.