On Tuesday, IDKEEP, a startup blockchain aiming to help financial institutions quickly verify digital identities, went live in Luxembourg. IDKEEP was designed by Cambridge Blockchain, a Flourish portfolio company, and LuxTrust, a startup backed by the Luxembourg government and several banks. It launches with the 700,000 customers of the six main retail banks of the small European nation.

American Banker’s Penny Crosman discussed the launch and spoke with Flourish’s Kabir Kumar on what this step means for data privacy advancement.

“This is truly a first-in-the-world implementation of a data-sharing architecture, where consumers have control over how their data is shared between institutions for know-your- customer purposes,” said Kabir Kumar, director of Flourish, a venture capital firm that was spun off by the Omidyar Network. “Multiple markets have attempted to create such systems but have struggled with different approaches. Luxembourg’s model, which heavily leverages the collaboration between the commercial players and the government through the LuxTrust consortium, provides a unique road map that can be replicated by other countries.”

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