Things that make us go hmmm…
What’s in your wallet? Credentials that travel.
Nu U Staff | November 2025
Digital “skills wallets” that store verifiable credentials are moving from idea to real pilots. The big boost: The core plumbing (W3C Verifiable Credentials 2.0) is now a formal web standard and the EU is on a path to roll out government-backed digital ID wallets —pressure that tends to pull platforms and cross-border employers along. Meanwhile, concerns about job-scam and résumé fraud keep rising, strengthening the appeal and ROI for cryptographic verification at the source. If proof of skills becomes easy to share and trust across borders, hiring, promotion, and compliance could feel very different—lighter for candidates, more reliable for employers. But it could all fizzle out as a fad if employers never plug wallets into real hiring flows—integrations stay thin, the wallets are clunky to use or recover, and one privacy face-plant scares everyone off—and/or if proving a skill isn’t quick, private, and simple for users. Will this become the norm…or get stuck in the standards weeds? For people and L&D leaders, this is one worth tracking closely.