Call for Participation in RecordWeb Community Group
The RecordWeb Community Group has been launched:
In some contexts —building permits, medical records, parliamentary decisions, etc.— it is important to be able to prove information is attributable to a specific responsible party, frozen at a specific point in time, and verifiable regardless of the system in which it is stored. Today, this is structurally impossible on the Web. Legal proceedings may fail because document versions cannot be reconstructed. Public trust erodes because accountability is claimed, not demonstrated.
Today’s Web does not support institutional provability. Although W3C has addressed parts of this gap in isolation –DIDs solve persistent identity, Verifiable Credentials solve tamper-evidence, PROV-O solves provenance description– no architecture composes these three into a coherent, deployable protocol for institutional records governance.
The mission of this group is to enhance the Web to support institutional records management across public authorities, regulated organizations and other institutional contexts.
The Community Group expects to produce two main kinds of deliverables:
1. an explainer (RecordWeb Concept, RWC) that describes the problem, the model and its relationship to archival science and records management practice;
2. one or more normative Specifications (RecordWeb Protocol, RWP, and the did:rwp DID Method) that define a royalty-free implementation profile suitable to be referenced in procurement, implementation and interoperability requirements.
The group will also document practical use cases and pilot experiences, particularly in public administration contexts, to ensure that the specifications remain grounded in real institutional records management practice.
The group will explore solutions that build on existing Web standards, in particular DID Core, PROV-O, Verifiable Credentials and related technologies.
The group is open to all, and in particular public authorities, institutions and industry, with a focus on real-world interoperable implementations rather than purely theoretical models. Note: The group will take inspiration from previous work by Nik Jenzer, and that work may inform the group’s discussions. That work does not constrain the group’s discussions, and all decisions about the group’s deliverables will be made by the Community Group participants.
In order to join the group, you will need a W3C account. Please note, however, that W3C Membership is not required to join a Community Group.
This is a community initiative. This group was originally proposed on 2026-06-29 by Nik Jenzer. The following people supported its creation: Melvin Carvalho, kenneth lord, Nik Jenzer, Nicolas Buerkler and Erich Gollino. W3C’s hosting of this group does not imply endorsement of the activities.
The group must now choose a chair. Read more about how to get started in a new group and good practice for running a group.
We invite you to share news of this new group on social media and other channels.
If you believe that there is an issue with this group that requires the attention of the W3C staff, please email us at site-comments@w3.org
Thank you,
W3C Community Development Team
