How your Civic Trust Score works.
Every number on this page comes directly from the scoring engine. No estimates, no aspirational figures — what you read here is exactly what the system calculates.
Step zero
How to enroll
Enrollment takes approximately 8 minutes at any participating Telco or retail node (MTN, Vodacom, or Telkom stores in South Africa). No documents need to leave your hands.
Visit an enrollment node
Walk into any participating MTN, Vodacom, or Telkom store. Ask to enroll a Civic Anchor identity. No appointment needed.
Active liveness capture
You perform a short liveness sequence (blink, head-turn, smile). The store's device hashes your biometric template on-device — the raw data never leaves the capture hardware and is never stored on our servers. Only the HMAC-SHA256 hash is recorded.
Passkey binding
Your phone generates a WebAuthn passkey and binds it to your biometric anchor. From this moment on, only you can present your identity — Civic Anchor cannot impersonate you even if our database is compromised.
You receive your DID
A did:civicanchor:UUIDv7 identifier is minted and signed by the enrollment node. This DID is immutable for life. You also receive a QR code and can link it to your WhatsApp or open your wallet at civicanchor.me.
Scoring engine
Five pillars, one score
The Civic Trust Score is an integer in [0, 1 000]. It is the sum of five independent pillar scores, each with its own ceiling, minus any active penalties. Pillars never borrow from each other — a weak biometric cannot be hidden by a strong P2P record.
| Pillar | Max pts | How it fills |
|---|---|---|
Biometric | 300 | First passkey: 120 base points. Each additional passkey (up to 3): +30 pts. Liveness bonus: up to +120 pts, decaying with time since your last biometric ping. |
P2P attestations | 300 | Points accumulated from completed peer handshakes. Each handshake awards BASE × multiplier to both parties. Multiplier is set by the verifiee's best institutional anchor class (×8 bank, ×6 telco, ×4 employer, ×1 other). Halved if liveness is stale. |
Institutional | 250 | Sum of your enrolled institutions' trust weights, multiplied by a diversity multiplier (×0.50 for 1 class, ×0.75 for 2, ×0.90 for 3, ×1.00 for 4+), then scaled to fit the 250-point ceiling. |
Credentials | 100 | Sum of point values for all active Verifiable Credentials you hold. Multiple VC types stack; unrecognised types contribute 0. Capped at 100. |
Temporal | 50 | One point per week since your first enrollment. Fills completely after ~12 months. Purely time-based — no gaming vector. The system calculates this automatically. |
| Total | 1 000 | Maximum achievable score before penalties. |
Biometric tip
Refresh liveness within 7 days of a biometric verification to keep the full +120 bonus.
P2P attestations tip
Getting verified by someone with a bank anchor earns 8× more than an unanchored peer.
Institutional tip
Diversify your institutional anchors. Four different institution classes (e.g. telco + bank + employer + NGO) score higher than four of the same class.
Credentials tip
FICA KYC, AFISwitch clearance, and professional council membership each add 25 pts — the highest single-action credential gains.
Temporal tip
No action needed. Stay active week-to-week and this pillar fills by itself.
What the number means
Score interpretation
These bands are informational guidance — the platform presents the raw score to verifiers, not a band label. Verifiers may apply their own thresholds for their use case.
0–199
Unanchored
No biometric passkey enrolled. The score cannot be meaningfully interpreted without a biometric anchor.
200–399
Establishing
Biometric passkey enrolled. Limited institutional anchors; little or no P2P history. Identity is anchored but breadth is thin.
400–599
Established
Active biometric anchor, at least one institutional verification, growing P2P history. Suitable for most standard verification use cases.
600–799
Trusted
Multi-source institutional diversity, active peer attestation network, credential depth. Passes employment, housing, and credit checks in most contexts.
800–1 000
Highly Trusted
Full institutional breadth, active liveness, multiple credential types, established P2P network. Suitable for government clearance, diplomatic, and high-value financial contexts.
Contextual scores re-weight the five pillars for specific use cases (credit, employment, border crossing, etc.). See the institution guide for the weight tables.
Biometric recency
Liveness decay schedule
The biometric pillar includes a liveness bonus of up to 120 pts that decays with time since your last biometric verification ping. Once liveness is expired (>180 days), the P2P pillar is also halved until you refresh.
| Time since last liveness ping | Decay factor | Liveness bonus | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| ≤ 7 days | 1.00 | +120 pts | Fresh |
| ≤ 30 days | 0.80 | +96 pts | Good |
| ≤ 90 days | 0.60 | +72 pts | Ageing |
| ≤ 180 days | 0.30 | +36 pts | Stale |
| > 180 days | 0.00 | 0 pts | Expired — P2P also halved |
How to refresh: visit any enrollment node and complete a liveness capture. The recency clock resets immediately. The full +120 bonus is restored within minutes.
Ranked by impact
How to improve your score
These actions are sorted by estimated point gain — the same ranking the in-app hint engine uses. At most one hint fires per pillar in any given evaluation; the highest-leverage action is always shown first.
Estimated gains are maximum possible gains for that action in isolation. Actual gain depends on your current pillar state and any active penalties.
Verifiable credentials
Credential catalogue
Each Verifiable Credential type contributes a fixed number of points to your credential pillar (max 100). Multiple types stack. Credentials must be active — expired or revoked VCs contribute 0.
Identity anchors
| Credential type | Points | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| FICA KYC | 25 | Financial Intelligence Centre Act, 38 of 2001 |
| AFISwitch clearance | 25 | AFISwitch criminal record clearance |
| Professional council membership | 25 | SAICA / HPCSA / ECSA / LSSA etc. — regulatory good standing |
| Security clearance | 25 | SAPS / SASI / SSA classified-employment clearance |
| Diplomatic accreditation | 25 | DIRCO / DHA accreditation for foreign officials |
| Authoritative anchor | 20 | Government-issued biometric ID cross-matched anchor |
| Military service record | 15 | SANDF service record via DPSA HR |
| Academic qualification | 15 | SAQA-confirmed degree or diploma |
| RICA verified | 15 | Regulation of Interception of Communications Act |
| Trade certificate | 15 | Formal trade or skills qualification |
| Employer attestation | 15 | Formal employment relationship — institutional employer |
Household relationships
| Credential type | Points | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Employment tenure (household) | 10 | Domestic worker / gardener / driver — role, hours, pay cadence |
| Tenancy | 10 | Landlord–tenant mutual attestation |
| Microbusiness operator | 10 | Repeat-buyer trading attestation |
| Pension fund membership | 10 | GEPF or private pension fund |
| Senior citizen identity | 10 | SASSA ≥60 confirmation |
| Stokvel membership | 8 | Chair ↔ member reciprocal attestation |
| Relationship formed | 5 | New household relationship anchor |
| Exit attestation | 5 | Clean-exit record on relationship end |
Credential ceiling: the credential pillar is capped at 100 pts regardless of how many VCs you hold. Stacking 4 credentials each worth 25 pts is optimal — beyond that, additional VCs provide no score benefit (though they still expand what verifiers can ask you to present).
Trust enforcement
Penalties and lifecycle states
The scoring engine deducts points for active disputes and unreviewed fraud alerts. Severe repeated violations trigger lifecycle state changes that cap or zero the score until review and remediation.
Score deductions
Active severe dispute
−25 pts per disputeLifts when the dispute is resolved or closed.
Upheld severe dispute (12 months)
−50 pts per instancePersists for 12 months from the dispute ruling date.
Unreviewed severe velocity alert
−15 pts per alertAlert severity ≥ 8. Lifts when a platform administrator marks the alert as reviewed.
Account lifecycle states
| Status | Effect on score |
|---|---|
| active | Normal — score computed and presented in full. |
| probationary | Score ceiling capped at 400. Applied after NGO redemption programme. Allows gradual rebuilding without unrestricted score access. |
| slashed | Score forced to 0. Triggered by two upheld severe disputes within a 30-day window (consensus slash). Reviewed by platform trust team. |
Dispute process: any user can raise a dispute through the in-app dispute flow. Disputes are reviewed by the platform trust team within the published SLA window. Groundless disputes do not penalise the party who raised them; vexatious repeated disputes may result in a probationary status for the disputing party.
Ready to build your trust profile?
Enroll free at any MTN, Vodacom, or Telkom store. Takes 8 minutes.