Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technologies

EU Digital Single Market Copyright Directive aims to facilitate a fairer marketplace for rights holders. Effective IP rights management in the digital environment is key to support the competitiveness of creative SMEs. ISO/IEC 21000-23 Smart Contracts for Media supported by rich semantic copyright models can be handy when data-based decisions need to be derived by evidence and logic, leading to new business models that can be efficiently deployed on decentralised digital media platforms. Moreover, the interoperability of such platforms is addressed by ISO/IEC 23000-23 Decentralised Media Rights Application Format which building around DLT-agnostic ISO/IEC 21000-23 Smart Contracts for Media has the potential to unlock the Semantic Web and in turn the creative economy. The latter is not only one of the most rapidly growing sectors of the world economy, but also a highly transformative one in terms of income-generation, job creation, export earnings, quality of life and social cohesion.

Distributed ledger technology offers an opportunity to promote better management of data within public services, including for accounting and records management, as well as for electronic payments, particularly in the context of digital currencies, which represent an opportunity for central banks and financial regulators to provide a public payment mechanism that citizen-consumers can use independently of potentially exclusive custodial relationships.

These standardisation efforts support the achievement of the objectives of the Green Deal and the SDGs, as well as the political objectives of the European Commission and support for the New European Standardization Strategy. As a convenor position of a key working group at the ISO level, I am able to promote the European values in standards development. In addition, this action promotes the improvement in the efficiency of public services with the use of reliable applications and technologies that contribute to sustainable development.

Toward the development of EU-friendly solutions for biometrics-based services, employing strong privacy enhancing technologies, thus going further contractual/organisational requirements, to ensure privacy and security by design. Promoting the use of the newest privacy enhancing technologies is in particular very important (biometric technologies are more and more seen as a way to fight against authentication/identification threats in our digital lives) as sharing or leaking biometric information without appropriate protection can be very critical.

In terms of broader European interests, my fellowship contributes to EU goals of digital sovereignty, user empowerment, and privacy leadership on the global stage. As the EUDI wallet is adopted across Europe, this framework will provide a scalable model for data protection and user-centric identity management that can be extended beyond digital wallets to other data-sharing contexts, enhancing Europe’s role as a privacy leader. With data privacy becoming a key competitive factor, this initiative not only strengthens the protection of EU citizens’ rights but also sets a high standard for digital identity solutions globally.

My work supports fundamental societal values by helping define how citizens can safely and transparently share their personal data through the European Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallet. At the heart of this is the development of access control standards that ensure individuals are not just passive data subjects, but active participants who can decide what data is shared, with whom, under what conditions, and for what declared purpose.
By enabling these controls through enforceable, machine-readable policies, the standard empowers users to exercise real agency over their digital identity—moving beyond consent screens toward meaningful privacy protections embedded in the architecture of the wallet itself. This aligns with the EU’s commitment to privacy, data minimisation, and purpose limitation under the GDPR.
The work also supports societal inclusion by ensuring that access control mechanisms are transparent and usable, helping citizens understand their rights and obligations, while also simplifying compliance for service providers. The inclusion of ISO/IEC 27560 in this framework ensures that all lawful bases for processing—not just consent—are clearly documented and traceable, which is especially important for use cases like healthcare, education, or public services.
Importantly, the open availability of ISO/IEC 27560 as a free standard lowers the barrier for adoption, supporting uptake by public administrations, SMEs, and civil society. This ensures that privacy-enhancing technologies are not limited to large commercial actors, but can benefit all layers of European society.
Overall, this work contributes to a more trustworthy, transparent, and citizen-centric digital identity ecosystem—one that upholds European values while supporting innovation, cross-border interoperability, and regulatory alignment.