Sentient Identity

OctoMY's Sentient Identity (SID) system provides cryptographic identity for human operators — and any conscious entity in the future.

What is a Sentient Identity?

A Sentient Identity (SID) is a cryptographic identity representing a human operator. It owns one or more Node Identities (NIDs) — the personalities a robot assumes.

Key properties:

• Auto-created — a shadow SID appears on first boot, no setup needed
• Cryptographic — Ed25519 keypair derived from a BIP39 recovery phrase
• Encrypted — all data stored in an encrypted hive (Shufflecake volume)
• Progressive — starts passwordless, upgradeable to password-protected

Why "Sentient"? We chose this over "Person" or "User" because it encompasses any conscious entity — humans today, and any being capable of subjective experience in the future.

Shadow vs Full Sentient

The ghost identicon (faded, wavy-bottomed face) is the visual indicator that you're using a shadow identity. Tap it to upgrade.

SID vs NID

One SID can own multiple NIDs. NIDs are mutually invisible — "Gustav" and "Johnny" on the same device never see each other's config or peers.

Components

SentientVault

Secure storage inside the encrypted hive containing:

• Ed25519 signing keypair (derived from BIP39 recovery phrase)
• Display name and identicon parameters
• BIP39 recovery phrase (12 words, stored encrypted)
• Known sentient contacts

SentientCard

A shareable identity bundle with disclosure levels:

Cards are signed for authenticity and can expire.

Face Identicon

A unique 16x16 pixel-art face generated deterministically from the SID's public key. Each face has unique hair, skin, eyes, mouth, freckles, and blush. The identicon appears in the Lanyard, contact lists, pairing UI, and profile badges.

Shadow sentients show a ghost identicon (wavy bottom edge, cut corners) with the tooltip "Shadow identity — not password-protected."

How It Works

First Boot (Automatic)

1. App launches → StartupStateMachine finds no identity, runs the §SP-1 silent auto-create
2. BIP39 recovery phrase generated (12 words)
3. Ed25519 keypair derived from phrase; SID = sha256(publicKey)
4. Sentient hive created with the typed on-disk id SID-<sid-hex> and mounted with an internal shadow passphrase
5. Shadow sentient created with a SentientNameGenerator random name (e.g. curious_otter) + ghost identicon
6. Optional upgrade prompt fires once via SecurityUnboxingActivity (Set a passphrase or Skip)
7. Ready to use — first-boot is interruption-free past that single optional prompt

See the First Boot how-to for the full walkthrough.

Typed-Hive Taxonomy

Hives on disk carry their type and owner in their identifier (§HT-1):

The user never sees the raw SID-<hex> / NID-<hex> strings — every UI surface (Lanyard, lobby activities, status widgets) looks up the owning entity and renders its display name. Renaming a sentient updates the display everywhere without changing the on-disk id; nothing has to be re-mounted.

This taxonomy replaces the pre-spec "System" hive name. Pre-makeover installations carried a literal "System" hive owned by the device's primary sentient; post-spec each sentient's hive carries the SID-derived id and there is no privileged System slot. The auto-create path in §SP-1 produces the first SID-<hex> hive without ceremony — the user sees their friendly name, never the system internals.

Upgrading to Full Sentient

1. Tap the ghost identicon in the navigation bar
2. Optionally change your display name
3. Set a password (20+ characters)
4. Hive header re-encrypted with your password (O(1) operation)
5. You become the device owner (Capture the Flag)
6. Ghost identicon transitions to normal face

Sharing Your Identity

1. Open Sentient from the navigation bar
2. Tap Share Identity
3. Choose disclosure level
4. Share via QR code or clipboard

Privacy by Design

• No real name required — SID is an opaque hash
• No central authority — no server, no email, no phone number
• Recovery phrase is the backup — 12 words written down, kept safe
• Device-independent — enter recovery phrase on any device to restore
• Multiple identities — future support for separate work/personal SIDs

5. Preview the card that will be shared
6. Click Create Card to generate a QR code
7. Share the QR code with your contact (in person or via screenshot)
8. Optionally click Copy to Clipboard for the card data

Pro Tip

For maximum privacy, start with Minimal disclosure. The recipient can verify you're a consistent identity without knowing your name. You can always share a more detailed card later.

Managing Contacts

To view and manage your contacts:

1. Navigate to Sentient in Hub's main menu
2. Click Contacts
3. Browse your contact list

Each contact shows:

• Their identicon
• Their display name (or "Anonymous")
• Trust status (Pending, Accepted, Trusted, Blocked)
• Last seen time

Click a contact to view details and manage the relationship.

Trust Levels

You can set trust levels for each contact:

Pending Requests

When network sharing is enabled, the Pending badge shows how many contacts are awaiting your decision. Click it to review and accept or reject each request

Security Considerations

Key Storage

Your private key is:

• Encrypted at rest with your account key
• Decrypted only in memory when needed
• Never transmitted over the network

Key Loss

Important: If you lose your private key, you lose your Sentient identity. There is no recovery mechanism (by design - this prevents identity theft).

Consider:

• Backing up your account securely
• Future: mnemonic phrase backup

Verification

Others can verify you are who you claim by:

• Challenge-response cryptographic proof
• You sign a random challenge with your private key
• They verify against your public key

Hive Integration

Your Sentient identity is stored inside the encrypted Hive filesystem:

• Encrypted storage: Your vault and contacts are stored at /.octomy/sentient/ inside the mounted hive volume, protected by the hive's ShufflecakeVolume encryption
• Authentication: You must unlock a Hive before accessing Sentient features
• Lanyard: The top-right corner of the Hub carries three controls — a bare-glyph hive button (visible only when a hive is mounted), the sentient chip (green, with your face identicon), and the node chip (blue, with the node identicon). Clicking the sentient chip opens SentientLobbyActivity for switching, renaming, or upgrading; clicking the hive button opens HiveLobbyActivity
• Session: Only one Hive and one Sentient can be active at a time
• Auto-focus: When mounting a hive, the passphrase input receives focus automatically

When switching Sentients, the current session closes first with a confirmation prompt.

Current Status

The Sentient Identity system is functional with the following features:

• Identity creation and profile management
• Card-style profile badge with inline editing
• Unique 16x16 pixel-art face identicon for each sentient, displayed throughout the UI
• Identity sharing via QR codes with disclosure levels
• Contacts database with trust management
• Hive-integrated session and authentication
• Sentient data stored inside encrypted hive volume
• Identity lab — parameter explorer for the face / iris / node identicon generators (reached from IdentityAssetsActivity toolbar)

Coming in future updates:

• Ed25519 keys are now available (EdKey class, Phase 3 of encryption spec). Default algorithm switch deferred to Phase 4 of algorithm-agnostic-keys spec
• Network sharing via paired nodes
• Challenge-response identity verification
• End-to-end encrypted messaging between sentients
• Multiple sentients per account

Component Reference