How Users Can Now Secure Their Online Identities with Civic

CIVIC

Blockchain-driven digital identity fraud firm Civic has partnered up with wikiHow to provide its user base with login security.

The partnership will mean that around 150 million monthly wikiHow users will now able to use Civic’s identity platform to log in securely with a verified identity, without needing a username and password.

Vinny Lingham, CEO of Civic, said in a statement: “We are pleased to officially welcome wikiHow to Civic’s Partner Network. This collaboration illustrates our continuing, strong momentum in building our ecosystem for on-demand, secure and low-cost access to identity verification services.”

Civic says it will help improve wikiHow’s user experience, providing users with a more secure account creation and login process.

WikiHow is an open source online “how-to” platform that operates in 87 different languages. Its focus is on “teaching anyone in the world how to do anything” in a collaborative, shared-learning environment.

The advantage for wikiHow in this collaboration with Civic is that it can now verify that user accounts are created using true identities and it won’t have to deal with security hassles associated with weak passwords and password resets. All user data is encrypted in the Civic app on the user’s device and never stored by Civic or wikiHow.

"Working with Civic, wikiHow provides greater trust and security to its users," Lingham told Bitcoin Magazine. "With the Secure Identity Platform, Civic helps ensure all wikiHow accounts are created by the true owner of the identity data — which ultimately ensures that wikiHow's how-tos are created and edited by verified users."

"wikiHow is partnering with Civic because we believe in their long-term goal of decentralized identity," said Jack Herrick, CEO of wikiHow in a statement. "We hope to live in a future where people, not corporations, control their own personal information."

In an earlier interview with Bitcoin Magazine, Lingham talked about the problem of distributed mobile identity. “This is what we are focusing on now,” he said, “to build the world’s largest identity platform, powered by technology that decentralizes and secures consumer identity information.”

In June Civic sold $33 million in ICO tokens. Civic tokens provided access to the product while allowing token holders to benefit from its network effect.

The company also received $2.75 million in funding via Social Leverage, an early-stage seed investment fund, as well as through various VC firms that are engaged in Bitcoin and blockchain technology, including Pantera Capital, Blockchain Capital and Digital Currency Group.

Lingham is a vocal advocate for Bitcoin and the blockchain movement both in the media and at industry events. He was a leading pioneer in the effort to integrate bitcoin payments at Gyft during his tenure there.

He believes that blockchains are likely the most secure place to store information right now, which is why Civic is constantly assessing opportunities to leverage and capitalize on the emerging technology.

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