From a user perspective, the deepest layer is the backbone layer. It handles the “untrusted” communication with the Backbone and the processing of data within the Backbone. Payload sent to and received from the Backbone is encrypted.

The Backbone itself requires metadata to work, thus there is also unencrypted data sent and received between the transport layer and the Backbone. However, this data is non-personal and cannot be linked back to any real-world persons by the Backbone operator.

Components

  • App
  • Backbone
  • Connector

Tasks

Identity to Backbone Communication

One of the backbone layer’s tasks is the communication between the App or Connector and the Backbone. This includes the authentication with the Backbone, the request and response behaviors and data serialization and deserialization.

Syntactical validation of encrypted data/metadata

The backbone layer is responsible for validating the data sent to or received from the Backbone.

External Events

The backbone layer keeps track of the current synchronization state of Identities and devices and is able to manually synchronize with the Backbone.

Entities

Challenges

Abbreviated: CHL

Stored data on Backbone:

  • id
  • createdBy
  • createdByDevice
  • expiresAt

Submitted data to Backbone:

  • id

Datawallet Modifications

Stored data on Backbone:

  • Datawallet Modifications
    • id: string
    • index: number
    • objectIdentifier: string
    • payloadCategory?: string
    • createdAt: string
    • createdByDevice: string
    • collection: string
    • type: string
    • encryptedPayload?: string
  • External Events
    • id: string
    • type: string
    • index: number
    • createdAt: string
    • syncErrorCount: number
    • payload: object
  • Backbone sync run
    • id: string
    • expiresAt: string
    • index: number
    • createdAt: string
    • createdBy: string
    • createdByDevice: string
    • eventCount: number

Data submitted to Backbone:

  • Datawallet Modifications
    • localIndex
    • modifications[]
      • objectIdentifier: string
      • payloadCategory?: string
      • collection: string
      • type: string
      • encryptedPayload?: string
  • FinalizeSyncRun
    • externalEventResults[]
      • externalEventId: string
      • errorCode?: string
    • datawalletModifications[]
      • objectIdentifier?: string
      • payloadCategory?: string
      • collection: string
      • type: string
      • encryptedPayload?: string

Devices

Abbreviated: DEV

Stored data on Backbone:

  • id
  • createdAt
  • createdByDevice
  • devicePassword
  • username
  • platform
  • handle
  • installationId

Submitted data to Backbone:

  • devicePassword
  • signedChallenge
  • platform
  • handle
  • installationId

Identities

Stored data on Backbone:

  • address
  • createdAt
  • identityPublicKey

Submitted data to Backbone:

  • devicePassword
  • signedChallenge
  • clientId
  • clientSecret

Tokens

Abbreviated: TOK

Stored data on Backbone:

  • id: string
  • content: string
  • createdAt: string
  • createdBy: string
  • createdByDevice: string
  • expiresAt: string

Submitted data to Backbone:

  • content
  • expiresAt

Files

Abbreviated: FIL

Stored data on Backbone:

  • id
  • createdAt
  • createdBy
  • createdByDevice
  • modifiedAt
  • modifiedBy
  • modifiedByDevice
  • deletedAt
  • deletedBy
  • deletedByDevice
  • owner
  • ownerSignature
  • cipherSize: number
  • cipherHash
  • expiresAt
  • encryptedProperties
  • file cipher

Submitted data to Backbone:

  • file cipher
  • cipherHash
  • owner
  • ownerSignature
  • expiresAt
  • encryptedProperties

Messages

Abbreviated: MSG

Data stored on Backbone:

  • id
  • createdAt
  • createdBy
  • createdByDevice
  • body
  • attachments[]
    • file id
  • recipients[]
    • address
    • encryptedKey
    • receivedAt
    • receivedByDevice

Data submitted to Backbone:

  • body
  • recipients[]
    • address
    • encryptedKey
  • attachments[]
    • file id

Relationships

Abbreviated: REL

Data stored on Backbone:

  • id
  • relationshipTemplateId
  • from
  • to
  • creationContent?
  • creationResponseContent?
  • createdAt
  • status
  • auditLog[]
    • createdAt
    • createdBy
    • createdByDevice
    • reason
    • oldStatus?
    • newStatus

Data submitted to Backbone:

  • relationshipTemplateId
  • creationContent
  • creationResponseContent

RelationshipTemplates

Abbreviated: RLT

Data stored on Backbone:

  • id: string
  • createdBy: string
  • createdByDevice: string
  • maxNumberOfAllocations?: number
  • expiresAt?: string
  • content: string
  • createdAt: string
  • deletedAt?: string

Data submitted to Backbone:

  • expiresAt?: string
  • maxNumberOfAllocations?: number
  • content: string