Citation: Lo, O.; Buchanan, W.J.;
Sayeed, S.; Papadopoulos, P.;
Pitropakis, N.; Chrysoulas, C. GLASS:
A Citizen-Centric Distributed
Data-Sharing Model within an
e-Governance Architecture. Sensors
2022, 22, 2291. https://doi.org/
10.3390/s22062291
Academic Editor: Paolo Bellavista
Received: 21 January 2022
Accepted: 11 March 2022
Published: 16 March 2022
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Article
GLASS: A Citizen-Centric Distributed Data-Sharing Model
within an e-Governance Architecture
Owen Lo , William J. Buchanan , Sarwar Sayeed * , Pavlos Papadopoulos , Nikolaos Pitropakis *
and Christos Chrysoulas
Blockpass ID Lab, School of Computing, Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh EH10 5DT, UK;
o.lo@napier.ac.uk (O.L.); b.buchanan@napier.ac.uk (W.J.B.); p.papadopoulos@napier.ac.uk (P.P.);
c.chrysoulas@napier.ac.uk (C.C.)
* Correspondence: s.sayeed@napier.ac.uk (S.S.); n.pitropakis@napier.ac.uk (N.P.); Tel.: +44-131-455-2789 (N.P.)
Abstract:
E-governance is a process that aims to enhance a government’s ability to simplify all the
processes that may involve government, citizens, businesses, and so on. The rapid evolution of
digital technologies has often created the necessity for the establishment of an e-Governance model.
There is often a need for an inclusive e-governance model with integrated multiactor governance
services and where a single market approach can be adopted. e-Governance often aims to minimise
bureaucratic processes, while at the same time including a digital-by-default approach to public
services. This aims at administrative efficiency and the reduction of bureaucratic processes. It can
also improve government capabilities, and enhances trust and security, which brings confidence in
governmental transactions. However, solid implementations of a distributed data sharing model
within an e-governance architecture is far from a reality; hence, citizens of European countries
often go through the tedious process of having their confidential information verified. This paper
focuses on the sinGLe sign-on e-GovernAnce Paradigm based on a distributed file-exchange network
for security, transparency, cost-effectiveness and trust (GLASS) model, which aims to ensure that
a citizen can control their relationship with governmental agencies. The paper thus proposes an
approach that integrates a permissioned blockchain with the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS). This
method demonstrates how we may encrypt and store verifiable credentials of the GLASS ecosystem,
such as academic awards, ID documents and so on, within IPFS in a secure manner and thus only
allow trusted users to read a blockchain record, and obtain the encryption key. This allows for the
decryption of a given verifiable credential that stored on IPFS. This paper outlines the creation of a
demonstrator that proves the principles of the GLASS approach.
Keywords: distributed data sharing; distributed ledger; IPFS; blockchain; privacy
1. Introduction
Our current age is often known as the digital era, where data is a significant resource
that scales up constantly. Data contains sensitive information that could relate to the
confidential information of users, businesses, stakeholders, and so on. In a simple data-
sharing model, often one entity owns a document and gives access rights to other entities,
which could be achieved through role-based access control (RBAC) [
1
] or attribute-based
access control (ABAC) [
2
,
3
]. Data security is a method that aims to protect confidential
information from unauthorised access [
4
]. Data handled by public authorities must be
protected when it is associated with individuals’ sensitive details. However, a lack of cyber
situational awareness and abuse of sensitive data can cause great concern for citizen privacy.
Moreover, a third party, such as a public authority and/or agency, often governs the way
confidential data is maintained, and due to manual business flows and sluggish interaction
methods, a business often fails to build trust and confidence with its partners [
5
,
6
]. Hence,
existing data-sharing approaches often tend to be a serious threat to citizen privacy.
Sensors 2022, 22, 2291. https://doi.org/10.3390/s22062291 https://www.mdpi.com/journal/sensors
