Roadmap

Future work with Roam will focus on three aspects: continuous improvement of the DID/VC based WiFi OpenRoaming network, the addition of secondary decentralized infrastructure built on top of the decentralized wireless access network, and the further development of Roam protocol.

5.1 Decentralized OpenRoaming

The industry still has a long way to go before fully adopting OpenRoaming. To accelerate this process, Roam will work with the WBA, WiFi Alliance, and industrial partners on the following action items:

• i) Greater EAP-TEAP adoption by WiFi devices, access points, and access controllers. This will help Roam provide better user experiences to its customers;

• ii) A standardized SDK for ID providers to incorporate in their backend. The SDK shall follow the W3C’s DID and Verifiable Credential guidances, and, for industrial adoption, it will be developed under the WBA’s Decentralized OpenRoaming Group;

• iii) Research work with the IEEE 802.11 working group on IEEE802.11bi activities for privacy protection and regulatory compliance with blockchain technologies;

• iv) A proposal for EAP-DID created alongside the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). This will open the door for the large-scale adoption of DID/VC based authentication in multiple industries.

5.2 Decentralized Edge Computing Networks

Riding the wave of WiFi 6 and WiFi 6E upgrades, Roam provides a global-scale decentralized wireless access network. The ultimate goal of the DePIN model is to provide a complete set of computing, storage, network, energy, and sensing infrastructure in a decentralized way. On top of the network services, Roam has the potential to provide a decentralized edge computing network.

Moreover, the WiFi Gateway always constitutes the core IT equipment of any local network. It can be attached to storage devices, computing units, and IoT gateways to facilitate the built out of edge computing units as shown in Figure. Such units are consistent with the 5G deployment scheme and can support AI applications running within the decentralized infrastructure. The core technologies needed to achieve this include DID implementation, blockchain integration with communication models, confidential computing, and data encryption. Roam intends to incubate other DePIN projects which can be built upon its global OpenRoaming networks.

5.3 Future Development of Roam Protocol

Roam protocol is essentially a verifiable credential-based data exchange protocol as defined by the Trust-Over-IP stack. It can support other applications in addition to global WiFi OpenRoaming. For example, it can support an on-chain KYC system to allow the users of regular ID providers to participate in DeFi activities, as they can use the VP generated from their VC (provided by the ID providers) to prove who they are.

Roam protocol could also be used in crypto payment gateways to allow for a liquidity pool based decentralized payment protocol to replace the traditional enterprise crypto wallet used by existing centralized crypto payment gateways. The other application of Roam protocol is to support the DID-based credit rating system, as the Roam network provides a large amount of user activity information.

A series of tools and gadgets are required to facilitate new applications beyond global WiFi roaming as explained above. Roam plans to build these alongside its community members as well as with fellow projects in this domain.