What Is Selective Disclosure?

Selective disclosure lets the holder of a credential reveal only the fields a situation requires, while keeping the rest hidden and the whole still verifiable. A credential signed as a bundle can be shown field by field — proving you are over eighteen without exposing a birth date — using techniques like SD-JWT or BBS+ signatures. It is how a verifiable credential satisfies a check without over-sharing, the data-minimisation an agent-to-agent exchange needs.

Reveals

Only the fields a check requires

Keeps

The rest hidden, the whole verifiable

Techniques

SD-JWT, BBS+ signatures

Prove the claim, not the document

A credential normally forces a choice: show the whole thing or show nothing. Selective disclosure breaks that by letting the issuer sign in a way that each field can be revealed or withheld independently, with the verifier still able to confirm the issuer signed it. The holder decides what the verifier learns.

For agents this is the difference between a safe exchange and a leaky one: an agent can prove exactly the fact a counterparty needs and nothing else, which is both a privacy property and a smaller attack surface.