Global COVID Certificate Network (GCCN) is an initiative to enable interoperable and trustworthy verification of COVID certificates between jurisdictions for safe border reopening.
Why GCCN now?
Since late 2020 and early 2021, many governments have begun designing and implementing COVID certificate systems. With the recently-launched EU Digital COVID Certificate, the lack of a global trust architecture and ready-to-deploy tools to build compatible systems in other countries could not be more clear. LFPH is launching GCCN to address this gap by adapting and operationalizing the Interoperability Blueprint of the Good Health Pass Collaborative, an industry coalition that has defined principles and standards for COVID certificates. LFPH has co-led the process drafting the Blueprint, which was released on June 7 for public review and officially published on August 12.
What does GCCN offer?
GCCN will support Global COVID Certificates (GCC) that apply to three use cases: vaccination, recovery from infection, and test results. We are working with a variety of partners and stakeholders to develop
- A trust registry network. GCCN Trust Registry Network will provide a way for the various COVID certificate systems in every jurisdiction to find each other and decide whether to accept each other’s certificates.
- A complete toolkit to build COVID certificate ecosystems. This includes a governance framework template, schema definitions and minimum datasets, technical specifications, implementation guides, and open source reference implementations.
- A vendor network for GCCN. We are building a directory of vendors who can competently work on these kinds of projects, so that governments and institutions can easily get running.
GCCN Trust Registry Network
Led by John Walker, the Community Architect of our COVID Credentials Initiative, and Savita Farooqui, a dedicated community volunteer, we have defined the starting definition for the Trust Registry Network and identified a technical infrastructure for the MVP. Savita and her team at Symsoft Solutions help us spun up a demo application to showcase how we envision the Trust Registry Network to work.
Currently, we are working on a Proof-of-Concept (PoC) with our community of implementers leveraging the EU ESSIF TRAIN (TRust mAnagement INfrastructure) project. We take a two-pronged approach with technical development and the development of business and governance models go in parallel. We understand the importance of strong governance for such a global network, so our staff has been actively speaking to key stakeholders interested in participating in the Trust Registry Network to evolve our thinking in this regard. In 2022, we plan to start a dedicated task force to continue these conversations as we work keep working on the technical infrastructure. Below is an estimated timeline for the next six months:
Join our meetings with the implementers and LFPH community to provide feedback and discuss progress and next steps. Take a look at the LFPH calendar to join our next meeting.
Participate in GCCN
To receive updates on GCCN activities, join our Slack (#gccn) or sign up for GCCN mailing list gccn+subscribe@lists.lfph.io (no subject or email content).
Government agencies and industry alliances
Government agencies or industry alliances that already running or are looking to launch a COVID certificate system for border reopening should reach out to us at info@lfph.io.
Implementers of existing COVID certificate systems
Implementers of existing COVID certificate systems focused on reopening borders can reach out to us at info@lfph.io and join our COVID Credentials Initiative to exchange experiences with other implementers.
Learn More
- SMART Health Cards – Understanding the Global COVID Certificate Landscape
- DIVOC – Understanding the Global COVID Certificate Landscape
- EU Digital COVID Certificate – Understanding the Global COVID Certificate Landscape
- Understanding the Global COVID Certificate Landscape
- Zoom in on the User Flow of the Global COVID Certificate Network
- Introducing the Global COVID Certificate Network (GCCN)
