What is Certified?

Certified is the identity provider for the Hypercerts ecosystem. Create one account and you can sign in to every application built on the Hypercerts Protocol — and your hypercerts, evaluations, and other records travel with you across all of them. Think of it as your passport to the world of impact certificates.

Why Certified exists

The Hypercerts Protocol is built on AT Protocol — the same decentralized data layer that powers Bluesky. But most Hypercerts users are not Bluesky users. They are researchers, land stewards, open-source maintainers, funders, and evaluators. Asking them to "sign in with Bluesky" to use a funding platform would be confusing — it ties a funding tool to a social media brand. This is no knock on Bluesky — it's a great platform, just not the right entry point for a funding tool.

Certified solves this. It is a neutral identity provider that isn't tied to any single application. Users create an account at certified.app and immediately have an identity that works across the entire ecosystem — no knowledge of Bluesky, ATProto, or decentralized protocols required.

What you get

• Low-friction sign-in — No usernames, handles, or passwords to remember. Sign in with just your email and a code.
• Ecosystem access — Your Certified identity is recognized by every application built on the Hypercerts Protocol.
• Web3 wallet — Add your existing wallet to your Certified identity, or get a new embedded wallet.
• A DID (Decentralized Identifier) — Your permanent, portable identity. It stays the same even if you change servers or handles.
• A Personal Data Server (PDS) — Your hypercerts, evaluations, and other records are stored here. You own this data.
• Data portability — You can migrate your data to another PDS at any time. No lock-in.

Already have a Bluesky account or another AT Protocol account?

If you already have a Bluesky account or another AT Protocol account, you don't need a Certified account. Any AT Protocol identity works with all Hypercerts applications. Log in with your existing handle (e.g., alice.bsky.social) — everything just works.

The app.certified namespace

Beyond identity, Certified contributes shared data schemas to the AT Protocol ecosystem. You'll see app.certified.* in some lexicon names — for example, app.certified.location defines how geographic locations are represented. These are general-purpose schemas available to any application on AT Protocol, not just Hypercerts.