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OR13 merged 53 commits into from
Nov 4, 2021
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New section on environmental impacts #27

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chore: new section on envrionmental impacts
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Expand Up @@ -1412,6 +1412,99 @@ <h3>Biometrics</h3>
</section>
</section>

<section class="informative">
<h2>Ethical Considerations</h2>

<p>
The following section details certain key areas of focus when implementing a
new DID method, or implementing a solution that incorporates DIDs.
</p>

<p>
The <a
href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/">W3C TAG
Ethical Web Principles</a> document is a helpful guide
when weighing ethical considerations of various technologies.
</p>

<section class="informative">
<h3>Broad Ethical Principles</h3>
<p>
Decentralized Identifiers may come to underpin much of our digital life. This
may include public social and career personas, as well as more private personas
shared among friends and family. Identifiers representing these personas and
relationships may be some of the most important in our lives, so great care
will be taken when choosing an identifier system to support these critical
activities. As with all things, the appropriate and ethical use of technology
will be strongly considered when implementing items related to DIDs.
</p>

<p>
As noted in the <a
href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/#principles">
Principles</a> section of the Ethical Web Principles, there are key goals that
apply to all Web standards and technologies. DIDs are explicitly intended to
help users get closer to several of these goals, especially the following:
<ul>
<li>
<a href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/#privacy">
Privacy
</a>
</li>
<li>
<a href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/#control">
Individual Control
</a>
</li>
<li>
<a href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/#multi">
Device Independence
</a>
</li>
</ul>
</p>
</section>

<section class="informative">
<h3>Other concerns as applied to DID method development</h3>
<p class="advisement">
The following section reflects the views of some members of the working group.
Additional PRs are welcome from the working group with additional points of view.
</p>
Comment on lines 1472 to 1473
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@csuwildcat csuwildcat Sep 9, 2021

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Suggested change
<p class="advisement">
Utilizing or authoring DID methods that require unsustainably-sourced
energy as part of their technical implementation or utilization should
be very carefully considered in balance against alternative approaches.
</p>
<p class="advisement">
Utilizing or authoring DID methods that degrade security and
protection against the full range of attack vectors, interdiction
points, and centralization forces in trade for perceived gains in
system-external subjective factors should be very carefully
considered in balance against alternative approaches that
provide the highest levels of security and protection.
</p>

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@mprorock mprorock Sep 9, 2021

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@csuwildcat how about something like this:

<p class="advisement">
  Utilizing or authoring DID methods that compromise on
  the principles of security and / or control for other principles
  of such as environmental concerns should be very carefully 
  considered in balance against alternative approaches that 
  provide the highest levels of security and protection
  depending on the use case involved.  For matters that concern
  human rights, selection of approaches that are weighted towards
  privacy and control should outweigh other considerations.
</p>

Thought being, that for areas where personal ID is involved I am highly skeptical of methods that do not opt for a proof of work approach at the current time, simply because of the privacy, security, and end user control compromises that are made with other approaches. However, there are a lot of use cases for DIDs that may have lesser requirements in those areas. A specific case I am thinking of is an area where our system issues a DID for discrete sources of data that have been identified. We often utilize did:key for this, which then gives us options depending on the scenario and environment as to how to approach anchoring, etc. if required, but also gives us the option to lighten compute and network load where appropriate, while still being able to benefit from a DID based approach.

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@TallTed TallTed Sep 9, 2021

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The above is written in very strong subjective language (degrade, perceived, subjective, highest) which appears to be intended to be read as an objective analysis. I wanted to suggest some language to help improve it, but it's as above -- switch from "try to conserve energy in your efforts to increase 'security'" to "consume all energy to increase 'security'!" -- to which I strongly object.

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@mprorock mprorock Sep 9, 2021

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@TallTed thoughts on the alternate language I offered? I think it could use some edits

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@csuwildcat csuwildcat Sep 9, 2021

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@TallTed this is actually shifting the conversation to the more empirical topic of security, specifically protecting against "the full range of attack vectors, interdiction points, and centralization forces". These are critical aspects of system design that can be addressed with specific technical mitigations within implementations, thus it's probably a better basis for framing the considerations at bar.

I must push back strongly against the hyperbolic framing that this is switching to a premise that implementers should "consume all energy to increase 'security'!". There are many things wrong here, not least of which is that electricity != emissions (all electricity generation worldwide = just 25% of emissions), but the whole point of these changes is to avoid opening this up to inherently subjective value perceptions that the other premise will draw into the discussion.

If we assume a basis for articulation that invites subjective value perceptions, you may see PRs adding text that challenge people to justify why what may become some of the most important infra in human life is not valuable enough to protect with implementations that provide the highest levels of security. The most notable exemplar of a highly secure substrate commonly used today is equivalent to ~1/100th of the emissions impact from cow farts or 1/24th the emissions impact of clothes dryers. I personally believe what may become some of the most important infra for humans is worth ~1/100th of the emissions impact from cow farts or 1/24th the emissions impact of clothes dryers, but I don't want to have to ask others why they don't, which is why we should avoid that previous premise for articulating the considerations.

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@TallTed TallTed Sep 9, 2021

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[@csuwildcat] the more empirical topic of security, specifically protecting against "the full range of attack vectors, interdiction points, and centralization forces".

At minimum, for this phrasing to do what you apparently meant, "full range" should be "full known range", as new vulnerability specimens surface regularly.

Next, please note that I referred nowhere to (presumably CO2 and other greenhouse gas) emissions in my words. I was reacting to what you said earlier --

ultimately security and protection of critical systems, like identifier networks that may become the foundation for critical activities in human life, are the most important factors to account for.

-- which I read as it was written -- i.e., security over all other considerations, amongst which I'm pretty sure you'll agree we find energy consumption.

Now, as to cow emissions... "Over 95 percent, actually, is from the mouth, from the front end of the cow." and In a year, a single cow can belch around 220 pounds of methane. Those articles show a cute new mask for the cows that can reduce their belch emissions by ~98%, and they've also separately found that adding a bit of seaweed (~1% or less, because of flavor issues -- not in the milk or beef, but the cows don't like >1%) to the cows' diet reduces overall emissions by ~80%, so your examples and/or figures will need some reworking.

Regarding clothes dryers, are you talking about gas or electric? Or is this some magic aggregate? Not that this is actually relevant to the discussion at hand, which, to my mind boils down to --

Balance the concerns associated with the DID methods you're considering using or implementing, including their relative energy consumption at scale, their relative security, etc. Sometimes higher security [note: there is no "highest" nor unbreakable security] is worth more energy consumption. Sometimes lowering energy consumption is worth lower security. It's horses for courses. The right tool for the right job. Don't use a hammer to drive a screw. Don't use a saw to drive a nail.


<section class="informative">
<h3>Environmental Considerations</h3>

<p>
The guiding principle that
<a href="https://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/ethical-web-principles/#sustainable">the
web must be an environmentally sustainable platform</a> should be followed.
<br />
When implementing or utilizing a DID method, consideration should be given
to the environmental impacts caused by the method.
</p>

<p class="issue">
Some members of the working group feel it important that the [[DID-RUBRIC]]
include environmental considerations as discussed in <a
href="https://github.com/w3c/did-rubric/pull/51">this pull request</a> in
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@jandrieu jandrieu Sep 28, 2021

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I doubt it is appropriate to cite a PR to another document within the implementation guide.

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@OR13 OR13 Sep 28, 2021

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it's pretty common to cite issues or PRs when work is in progress, as a way on unblocking work. We've done this a few times in did core if you prefer to cite an issue instead of the PR, we can make that change.... for example:

https://github.com/w3c/did-spec-registries/blob/main/index.html#L1061

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@jandrieu jandrieu Sep 28, 2021

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I'd agree if we were earlier in the publication process, but this is now a published note, so its not really a "work in progress" as much as, say, the current VC-API spec.

Seems to me, if we want to point to specifics in the Rubric, we should point to published criteria, and if necessary, keep issues open in the implementation guide repo until we get good criteria added to the Rubric.

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@OR13 OR13 Sep 28, 2021 •
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my point is that its bad form to object to adding a link to an open issue / PR, as a mechanism for making progress on a contentious issue... we make progress incrementally, sometimes that acknowledges that issues remain open... For example:

w3ctag/design-principles#338
https://github.com/w3ctag/design-principles/issues/339
w3ctag/design-principles#239

Could all be cited since they are all relevant to the imp guide, and all remain unresolved.

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@mprorock mprorock Sep 28, 2021

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@OR13 any issue in pulling the PR reference as this issue paragraph will go away soon enough with just a pointer to the rubric?

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@OR13 OR13 Sep 28, 2021

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I don't have any issues merging PRs... git tracks the history of all changes and all comments.

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@TallTed TallTed Sep 28, 2021

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@jandrieu -- The published NOTE is a static document, which does not and will not include the reference to the PR on another document. There's nothing wrong with such a reference in an Editor's Draft, on one of which all these current PRs are focused, and from which all such references would be removed before it were published as an updated NOTE.

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@jandrieu jandrieu Sep 29, 2021

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@TallTed As I understand it, echidna now automatically publishes updates to the document. So, all PRs merged get published.

In short, I don't believe this is an editor's draft any longer.

Maybe @iherman can correct me if I'm wrong.

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@jandrieu jandrieu Oct 19, 2021

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This remains unresolved. IMO, a published W3C doc should not point a pull request.

order that users might appropriately evaluate and compare relevant aspects
of DID methods that might be applicable to their use cases.
</p>
<p>Many methods minimize environmental impact by leveraging existing infrastructure, such as
the World Wide Web (with did:web) and Bitcoin (with did:btcr and did:ion). When considering any
particular approach, whether creating a new method or selecting among current methods, care
should be taken to distinguish between the marginal impact of the additional use of such
infrastructure as a result of the DID method and the existing impact from current use. For example,
the did:web implementation is unlikely to have a significant additive environmental impact above
and beyond the existing World Wide Web.
</p>
</section>

</section>

</section>

<section>
<h2>Future Work</h2>
<p class="note">
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