As the European Digital Identity Wallet (EUDI Wallet) moves closer to everyday use, banks, fintechs and other relying parties face a practical question: how should they verify information presented through a wallet?
Building that verification layer in-house can be demanding. Technical specifications continue to evolve, implementation details can be complex, and every team has limited time. Most organisations would rather focus on serving customers than parsing wallet responses.
A verification gateway can take on much of that technical work. It connects your systems with the wallet, processes verification requests and returns a clear result. But its value depends on keeping its role well defined.
A small layer with an important job
A good gateway acts as a controlled bridge between the wallet and the relying party. It helps request and verify the information needed for a specific interaction, while keeping the process predictable for both the organisation and the user.
That starts with limiting what can be requested. The gateway should allow only the attributes the relying party has explicitly approved for a given use case. If a request goes beyond that scope, it should be stopped before the wallet session begins.
It should also support relevant verification flows, such as age checks, strong customer authentication and mobile driving licence verification. Rather than building every flow from scratch, relying parties can use a consistent integration and receive a straightforward outcome: whether verification succeeded, along with only the data they are permitted to access.
Data handling matters just as much as verification. Credential claims should be deleted promptly when they are no longer needed. The gateway should also absorb much of the technical change as specifications evolve, helping organisations maintain their integration over time.
The gateway is not the decision-maker
A gateway verifies information; it does not make business decisions. Whether a customer is approved, given access or offered a service remains the relying party’s responsibility.
The gateway should not retain credential data after the check is complete. It should not weaken or bypass the consent a user gives in their wallet, act as an identity provider, or issue credentials. And it should never collect extra attributes simply because they might be useful later.
These boundaries help protect users, reduce unnecessary data handling and make clear which organisation is responsible for each part of the process.
Preparing for the 2027 deadline
The timeline is approaching. Under the revised eIDAS framework, certain private relying parties that are required by law or contract to use strong user authentication for online identification must accept EUDI Wallets when users choose to use them. For many affected organisations, the deadline is 24 December 2027. Regulation (EU) 2024/1183
Few organisations will want to build and maintain the entire verification stack themselves. A focused gateway can help them prepare while keeping the integration manageable and limiting the data involved.
Making verification easier to live with
A verification gateway should make one part of the EUDI Wallet experience simpler. It should handle the technical verification step, respect the user’s choices and return only the information the relying party is allowed to receive.
It should not try to become the wallet, issue credentials or take over decisions that belong to the relying party. Organisations that define these boundaries early will be better prepared for the 2027 deadline - and for the next stages of digital identity.