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DirectTrust and GLEIF Partner to Advance Verifiable Organizational Identity to U.S. Healthcare
DirectTrust and GLEIF to develop new Qualification Agent model to support vLEI adoption in U.S. healthcare
DirectTrust and the Global Legal Entity Identifier Foundation (GLEIF) today announced that they are working together to develop a new Qualification Agent model within the verifiable Legal Entity Identifier (vLEI) Ecosystem Governance Framework. The model is intended to enable organizations with established certification or accreditation capabilities to qualify vLEI Issuers (QVIs), supporting broader adoption of verifiable organizational identity across sectors. The collaboration responds to strong market demand in the U.S. healthcare sector for trusted, scalable approaches to verifiable organizational identity.
Under this new partnership, DirectTrust plans to further extend GLEIF’s globally recognized approach to verifiable organizational identity into U.S. healthcare. Providers, payers, pharmacies, and technology vendors exchange sensitive patient information every day with other healthcare organizations and partners they need to trust. As exchanges expand across APIs, automated systems, and AI-enabled applications, organizations need a reliable way to verify the legal entity behind each interaction and the authority of those acting on its behalf.
“Healthcare has spent two decades building trusted exchange networks, but organizational identity remains fragmented across disparate directories and individual agreements,” said Scott Stuewe, President and CEO of DirectTrust. “Anchoring organizational identity to the Global LEI System gives us a path toward making that identity portable and verifiable, along with the authority of the people and systems acting on an organization’s behalf.”
The Legal Entity Identifier, an ISO 17442 standard, is a unique 20-character code that identifies a legal entity and links to reference data about its ownership and structure. The vLEI extends that identity into digital transactions through cryptographically verifiable credentials. Governed by GLEIF’s vLEI Ecosystem Governance Framework and issued by vLEI Issuers, vLEI credentials allow the identity, authority, and organizational roles of those acting on behalf of a legal entity to be verified digitally.
Under the new model being developed, GLEIF would qualify Qualification Agents, which would in turn qualify QVIs within their networks. GLEIF would oversee the operations of Qualification Agents, while each Qualification Agent would be responsible for monitoring the QVIs it qualifies. The model is intended to complement GLEIF’s existing approach to QVI qualification by enabling organizations with established certification or accreditation capabilities to support the expansion of the vLEI ecosystem.
GLEIF is developing the governance, qualification and oversight requirements needed to support the Qualification Agent model. The relevant vLEI Ecosystem Governance Framework documentation also would need to be updated.
“The Qualification Agent model is intended to help the vLEI ecosystem scale into sectors where established certification and accreditation networks already exist,” said Karla McKenna, Managing Director, GLEIF Americas. “DirectTrust’s deep experience in accreditation, certification and identity assurance in U.S. healthcare makes it a strong organization for GLEIF to work with as we develop the model and explore how it can support broader adoption of verifiable organizational identity.”
Once appointed as a Qualification Agent, DirectTrust would be able to qualify organizations within its network as QVIs under the governance requirements established by GLEIF. This would provide an additional pathway for organizations to become QVIs and support the adoption of vLEIs across the U.S. healthcare ecosystem. Working with healthcare stakeholders, DirectTrust will apply GLEIF’s governance and technical capabilities to:
- Establish verifiable organizational identity for healthcare organizations that can be reliably asserted in electronic transactions, giving exchange partners confidence in the organization behind an interaction.
- Link individuals to accountable organizations, associating transactions initiated by clinicians, staff, applications, and automated systems with a legitimate, verified organization.
- Support delegated authority through verifiable credentials that communicate defined roles, permissions, and healthcare purposes of use.
- Put those credentials to work across healthcare transactions, including secure messaging, APIs, and automated systems.
This announcement builds on previous digital identity work between DirectTrust and the CARIN Alliance, including efforts to advance interoperable digital identity credentials and address organizational identity in healthcare.
“Agentic AI makes this work even more important,” said Ryan Howells, Principal at Leavitt Partners and Program Manager of the CARIN Alliance. “As AI agents increasingly act on behalf of healthcare organizations, we need a reliable way to establish who delegated that authority and which organization stands behind the agent, that will be critical infrastructure for healthcare.”
DirectTrust will share additional details in the coming months on opportunities for U.S. healthcare organizations to participate in and support the initiative. Organizations interested in participating may contact Admin@DirectTrust.org.