A Study on Privacy-Preserving Scholarship Evaluation Based on Decentralized Identity and Zero-Knowledge Proofs

TL;DR

This paper introduces a privacy-preserving scholarship evaluation system utilizing Decentralized Identity and Zero-Knowledge Proofs, enabling secure, transparent, and efficient assessment without exposing sensitive student data.

Contribution

It presents a novel system combining DID and ZKP to protect student privacy while ensuring transparent scholarship evaluations, addressing limitations of centralized methods.

Findings

Automates evaluation efficiently

Maximizes student privacy and data integrity

Offers a practical, trustworthy paradigm for higher education

Abstract

Traditional centralized scholarship evaluation processes typically require students to submit detailed academic records and qualification information, which exposes them to risks of data leakage and misuse, making it difficult to simultaneously ensure privacy protection and transparent auditability. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a scholarship evaluation system based on Decentralized Identity (DID) and Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKP). The system aggregates multidimensional ZKPs off-chain, and smart contracts verify compliance with evaluation criteria without revealing raw scores or computational details. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed solution not only automates the evaluation efficiently but also maximally preserves student privacy and data integrity, offering a practical and trustworthy technical paradigm for higher education scholarship programs.