---
license: cc-by-4.0
language:
  - en
tags:
  - content-provenance
  - identity-verification
  - post-quantum-cryptography
  - federated
  - open-standard
  - eu-ai-act
  - tip-protocol
  - trust-identity-protocol
pretty_name: Trust Identity Protocol (TIP) Whitepaper v5.0
size_categories:
  - n<1K
---

# Trust Identity Protocol (TIP) Whitepaper v5.0

The canonical 140-page specification for the Trust Identity Protocol, the open, post-quantum, federated standard for verified human identity and content provenance on the internet.

## Citation

> Mendhe, Dinesh. *Trust Identity Protocol (TIP) v5.0: An Open Standard for Verified Human Identity and AI Content Provenance.* The AI Lab Intelligence Unobscured, Inc., 2026. Zenodo. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.20722378

## Canonical archive

The authoritative DOI-bearing copy is on Zenodo at CERN: [https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20722378](https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20722378)

This Hugging Face mirror is provided so the ML and AI research community can discover, download, and discuss the specification alongside other open AI infrastructure.

## What is TIP?

TIP is a three-layer protocol: TIP-ID (identity), TIP-CONTENT (provenance), and TIP-TRUST (reputation). The cryptography is built on NIST post-quantum standards (FIPS 203 ML-KEM-768, FIPS 204 ML-DSA-65, FIPS 205 SLH-DSA). The network is a federated DAG of cryptographically signed records operated by accredited Node Operators. The governance is an independent multi-stakeholder council.

## What is it not?

TIP is not a watermarking scheme, a content classifier, or a learned detection model. It is a cryptographic protocol that binds verified human identity to signed content and to a public registry record. The complementary technologies (C2PA for device-side capture, classifiers for AI-generated content detection) compose with TIP; they do not replace it.

## Implementer paths

- Whitepaper: this PDF, or the canonical [Zenodo DOI](https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20722378)
- Protocol overview and architecture: [theailab.org/trust-identity-protocol](https://theailab.org/trust-identity-protocol)
- Browser plugin reference implementation: [github.com/theailaborg/tip-browser-extension](https://github.com/theailaborg/tip-browser-extension)
- Verification portal source: [github.com/theailaborg/tip-vp-with-mobile-web-app](https://github.com/theailaborg/tip-vp-with-mobile-web-app)
- Verification flow and TIP-ID issuance: [vp.theailab.org](https://vp.theailab.org)

## Compliance

Designed to satisfy:
- EU AI Act Article 50 (AI content disclosure obligations)
- EU Digital Services Act (creator authentication and content moderation)
- GDPR (data minimisation and biometric data handling, Article 9)
- US state-level deepfake disclosure regimes

## Authorship

Invented and authored by Dinesh Mendhe, Founder and Chairman, The AI Lab Intelligence Unobscured, Inc. ORCID: [0000-0003-1158-3259](https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1158-3259).

## Licence

Whitepaper released under CC BY 4.0. The protocol licence (TIPCL-1.0) and the source-code repositories are licensed separately; see each repository for its specific terms.