Proof Infrastructure vs Existing Cryptographic Approaches
Proof Infrastructure is not a new cryptographic primitive. It is an infrastructure layer that uses established primitives — hashes, digital signatures, and commitments — to turn business and AI events into portable, independently verifiable proof. Here is how it relates to, and differs from, the concepts it is most often confused with.
Because Proof Infrastructure involves cryptography and privacy, it is easy to assume it is "just" digital signatures, verifiable credentials, or zero-knowledge proofs. It is not any one of these — it builds on them.
The distinction matters: digital signatures, verifiable credentials, zero-knowledge proofs, and transparency logs are primitives and standards. Proof Infrastructure is the layer that assembles the right primitives into a proof artifact — a portable, self-verifying record of a business or AI event, complete with issuer authority and timing — and makes it independently verifiable across organizations.
The key distinction
Proof Infrastructure is not a cryptographic primitive — it is the infrastructure layer that assembles primitives into independently verifiable proof of events.
How it relates to each approach
Digital signatures
What it is
A primitive that proves a message was produced by the holder of a private key and has not been altered.
Great at
Authenticity and integrity of a specific message or document.
How Proof Infrastructure differs
A signature alone is not a record of a business event. Proof Infrastructure wraps signatures with a data commitment, issuer authority, event semantics, and timing to produce a portable, independently verifiable proof of what happened.
Verifiable Credentials (VCs) & DIDs
What it is
A W3C standard for issuing and verifying cryptographically signed claims about a subject (e.g., identity or qualifications).
Great at
Portable, holder-presented claims about identity and attributes.
How Proof Infrastructure differs
VCs are optimized for identity and attribute claims. Proof Infrastructure focuses on events, decisions, approvals, and workflows — proving that something happened, with issuer authority and timing — and is complementary to, not a replacement for, VCs.
Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs)
What it is
A technique that proves a statement is true without revealing the information behind it.
Great at
Proving properties of secret data (e.g., "I am over 18") with strong privacy.
How Proof Infrastructure differs
ZKPs are a privacy technique that can be used within proof artifacts. Proof Infrastructure keeps data private primarily through commitments (hashes), and can incorporate ZKPs where richer privacy is required — but its purpose is verifiable proof of events, not a specific privacy proof.
Transparency & tamper-evident logs
What it is
Append-only logs (e.g., certificate transparency) that make it hard to alter history without detection.
Great at
Tamper-evidence and public auditability of a single system’s log.
How Proof Infrastructure differs
Transparency logs secure one operator’s log. Proof Infrastructure produces self-contained proof artifacts that are verifiable off the log, across organizations, without trusting any single operator’s infrastructure.
Where Proof Infrastructure sits
In short: these are the primitives and standards; Proof Infrastructure is the layer that turns them into independently verifiable proof of business and AI events. If you need to prove that an event, decision, approval, or workflow occurred — to a party that does not trust you, without exposing sensitive data — that is Proof Infrastructure, and it may use any of these primitives underneath.
Related concepts
See it in action
Inspect a proof artifact and run independent verification in the live demo.