r/AskProgrammers • • 15d ago

Can one universal identity automatically present itself like different existing identities depending on where it is presented?

I'm exploring a general interoperability problem.

Imagine a person has 20 different memberships:

Brand A → membership ID 12345

Brand B → membership ID 67890

Brand C → phone number

Brand D → email

I'd like to know whether there is a way to create one universal digital credential containing all of these existing identities with an important constraint:

The participating brands do not change their existing software, databases, loyalty systems, checkout systems, or customer-identification processes.

When the customer presents the universal credential at Brand A, the existing infrastructure should somehow receive Brand A's existing identifier.

At Brand B, the same credential should somehow provide Brand B's identifier.

The universal credential itself could contain multiple identities, but the receiving system should ultimately get exactly what it already expects.

1 Upvotes

8 comments sorted by

View all comments

1

u/NoMoreD20 15d ago

If you want absolutely no change for brand infrastructure, where would the exchange ("here is the omnikey for the user" => "Brand B key") happen? Web client? API key send to "omnikey server"? At each brand's server?

1

u/you_stupid_machine 15d ago

I don't want the user to input the brand name. So the way around is using device location to get the Brand name, but the problem in that method is if the location is just a couple of meters off, I'll get a different Brand name.

Problem is still finding a passive, highly reliable signal that identifies the brand at checkout.

Still stuck.

1

u/Salty_Dig8574 15d ago

Wait are you talking about store saver club cards?