Avalanche Powers UAE's National Digital Identity Platform

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is upgrading the document storage and verification feature of its national digital identity platform UAEPASS, known as Digital Vault, to be built on the Avalanche blockchain. The move involves replacing the existing blockchain layer supporting the Digital Vault with Avalanche's L1 blockchain, while the broader UAEPASS system remains unchanged.

UAEPASS, used by approximately 12.5 million registered users for accessing government and private services, has recorded over 600 million logins and 12 million digital signatures to date. According to Avalanche, more than 15,000 services and over 350 government and private institutions utilize UAEPASS.

The Digital Vault allows users to request, store, and share verified documents issued by government agencies. TDRA, the UAE's federal communications and digital government regulatory authority, stated that this feature has previously operated on a blockchain-based digital trust platform. The upgrade aims to enhance scalability and processing performance through Avalanche's L1.

Using a dedicated L1 blockchain eliminates competition for network traffic and processing capacity with other blockchain services, while allowing operators to directly control network participants, access permissions, and settings—key factors deemed suitable for government systems. Avalanche is already deployed in the U.S. public sector, including California's Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), which has digitized over 42 million vehicle ownership records on its own Avalanche L1.

Avalanche noted that certain vehicle ownership transfer procedures, previously taking about two weeks, have been reduced to minutes through this technology.