BRUSSELS, April 1, 2026. In an announcement today, the Continental Wallet Identity Interoperability Retinue (CWIIR) released initial specifications requirements for the wallet interoperability wallet to address the confusion that has arisen regarding EUDI wallet implementation. Since the release of the second-generation eIDAS specifications, Architecture Reference Frameworks, and the more recent EU Business Wallet specification, it has become increasingly unclear.
“More than one Member-State has publicly declared that they won’t make the December 2026 deadline,” says CWIIR Director Mandaloo Captcha. “Plus we probably have at least two years until the Business Wallet Architectural Reference Framework is written up. This means we’ve got plenty of time to employ even more bureaucrats in developing the EU Wallet Interoperability Wallet (EWIW). The EWIW will have the sole purpose of allowing other wallets to talk to one another.”
The inspiration for the EWIW comes from the Paris public transportation apps. The suite of apps, which includes Bonjour RAPT and IDF Mobilités, forces users to download one app to hold the tickets, another app for maps, and a third app for processing payments. Most tourists fail to get the system to work, leading to long queues at the Gare du Nord metro station. There non-French people can purchase top-up cards which, instead of holding a lump sum, hold separate bus tickets and metro tickets which cannot be interchanged with one another. In addition to allowing the collection of data without distribution of a functional app, the Paris transportation system also provides employment to European workers who are available 24/7 to assist hapless passengers in purchasing their tickets.
The most recent eIDAS Architecture Reference Framework indicated a breakthrough innovative direction for EUDI architecture, leaving many self-sovereign identity wallet providers with technology that would have fit with the original EUDI specification but no longer conform to the architecture document that followed it. Similarly, the successful large-scale trials with universities using W3C-VCs were disregarded in the specification, leaving 1.3 million students with digital credentials that aren’t accepted by any of the prototype implementations of the ARF 2.8. CWIIR has been established to handle this problem, providing interoperability for DIDs and VCs that are technically adherent to eIDAS but not properly specified within the Architecture Reference Framework.
Commentators and critics have noted that it is implausible that the different member state wallets will be interoperable with one another, the Swiss or UK wallets, or any other national wallets outside of the EU. For that reason the EWIW has its work cut out as a protocol interoperability wallet that bridges among the different member state individual and business wallets.
“The best thing about this regulation is that we expect another €80 million of EU public funding to funnel into the more than 260 organisations who developed successful pilots but were not considered in the ARF,” said Captcha. “This meaningless injection of supplemental funding ensures that Europeans will continue to develop identity technology that protects human rights, creating another three years of false hopes that Brussels and member states can meaningfully coordinate private-sector stakeholders.”
