Solution: NFT Authentication Process

As described in the previous section, the solution for the professional looking to verify documents through NFTs and distribute them to a web2 audience is in the following documentation.

NFTs are essentially digital stamps on files which are in the form of a token. This token (a files "stamp") can be passed around between users and acts as a form of ownership. But, how do you know if a document, certificate, patent, etc. is legitimate.

For example, how does a Harvard graduate know their diploma is legitimate and theirs? How does an inventor know that they own the patent? Well, it's legitimate when the countries patent office verifies the patent and gives confirmation to the inventor. The diploma is legitimate when Harvard creates it and gives it to the graduate. The following steps can be used for these use-cases and a range of others.

The NFT Authentication Process is 3 steps:

1. Establishing Legitimacy: Allows the minter to be the main and only source of creation. This is the wallet that will mint the NFTs.

More on Establishing Legitimacy

In order to start an NFT project, regardless of the use-case, you need to establish legitimacy. The legitimacy of the minting wallet is what gives the future NFTs there verification.

For example, if NFTs are being minted as the certificate of an educational program, how do I know this certificate is legit? Well, we know the certificate is legit because it is minted from a specific, verified address. In the future, digital signatures and other forms of "digital footprints" can act as verification. For now, this system requires legitimacy which comes from the address it is minted from.

Since you are the one minting and "verifying" the legitimacy of these NFT certificates, you need to establish a new wallet that will act as the main source of minting for this project / institution. For example, if Harvard University wants to confirm through NFTs the graduate of their school, they will administer these NFTs from the official Harvard University wallet address. The Tezos Israel team always gives this wallet a name. In this example, we would give the wallet a title like harvardverified.tez/.eth/.sol. Then, the official Harvard website would publicize that all real Harvard graduates will receive an NFT from this wallet, harvardverified.tez/.eth/.sol.

2. Minting: Step-by-step on how to verify the documents through NFT minting. Once this process is complete, each NFT will have a digital stamp that can be passed between users in the form of a token.

3. Distribution: Step-by-step on how to send these NFTs to users through a wallet or social log-in like Kukai or Web3Auth.