VivaTech Special Feature – Jeff Hu, CEO, Turing Space

Jeff Hu

Jeff Hu is the Founder and CEO of Turing Space and a serial entrepreneur. He was selected for the Forbes 30 Under 30 list (2025) for his contributions to digital identity and blockchain innovation.
He holds a Master of Engineering in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research (FinTech) from UC Berkeley (2020). At UC Berkeley, he was a Scholar at the Blockchain X-Lab, focusing on decentralized systems and applied cryptography. He served as a Dialogue Speaker at the United Nations Social Forum in Geneva in 2023. He is currently a GGLI Fellow and Lecturer at Hosei University in Japan. He is also a Global Fellow at the Clinton Foundation, contributing to international policy and innovation dialogue.
His research in blockchain has been published in ACM MobiSys (Best Paper Award), IEEE DAPP, and the CPE Journal, where he is first author.

JH: I am Jeff Hu, CEO and founder of Turing Space.

Turing Space operates in the domain of digital trust infrastructure. In today’s environment, where AI-generated content, synthetic identities, and automated transactions are rapidly increasing, the fundamental issue is no longer simply connectivity, but trust. The question we address is how to reliably determine whether an entity is a human, an AI agent, or a robot, and how to verify what they claim to be.

Our infrastructure enables what we describe as a self-verifiable digital identity layer. This allows counterparties to verify identity, transaction integrity, and, in certain contexts, attributes such as credentials or eligibility.

We work with regulated sectors where trust is critical, including hospitals, banks, and educational institutions. One of our core applications is credential verification. For example, when institutions receive foreign academic or professional documents, such as diplomas from Japan or France, they often face manual and time-consuming verification processes. Our system enables automated authenticity verification through cryptographic mechanisms, removing the need for manual checks while maintaining reliability.

JH: In the past, fraud and impersonation were relatively limited because interactions were predominantly offline and trust was established through physical presence or institutional gatekeeping. That model no longer holds.

With the expansion of digital systems, we now see widespread impersonation, data breaches, and increasingly sophisticated fraud schemes targeting both individuals and institutions. Even high-value academic credentials are affected. In some cases, it is estimated that a significant portion of claimed doctoral degrees may be falsified or misrepresented, and diploma fraud has evolved into a large-scale illicit economy.

The core issue is that verification mechanisms have not scaled alongside digital interaction. Identity assertions can now be created instantly, but verification still relies heavily on manual or fragmented processes.

Our approach is to embed verification directly into the moment of interaction. Individuals and institutions can present digitally signed credentials that are verifiable in real time. Importantly, this is designed not only for security but also for usability. The goal is to preserve convenience while increasing trust.

A practical example is in mobility services. A driver’s license translation used in a foreign car rental context, for instance in Japan, can be verified instantly through a QR-based system rather than requiring physical document inspection. This reduces friction while maintaining assurance of authenticity.

JH: Current cross-border identity systems are typically built through bilateral or multilateral agreements. These require alignment on legal frameworks, data exchange protocols, encryption standards, and governance mechanisms. As a result, integration between two countries can take significant time, and scaling this globally becomes increasingly complex.

Decentralized Identifiers introduce a globally unique identifier system that is not dependent on a centralized registry. This allows entities; whether individuals, organizations, or devices to maintain a consistent identity anchor across systems.

Verifiable Credentials build on this by enabling structured, cryptographically verifiable claims to be attached to that identity. These claims can include information such as employment history, educational background, or authorization status.

Together, DIDs and VCs create a layered architecture in which identity is separated from attributes. The DID represents the entity, while VCs represent verified statements about that entity. This combination allows eligibility, access rights, and credentials to be verified across systems without requiring repeated manual validation or centralized data replication.

JH: Our approach is defined by three main characteristics.

First, we prioritize interoperability across ecosystems, including collaboration with entities that might otherwise be considered competitors. The objective is not to dominate a closed system, but to ensure that trust infrastructure can operate across fragmented environments.

Second, our architecture is designed for regulatory adaptability. We support compliance requirements across multiple jurisdictions, including the European Union, the United Kingdom, Taiwan, and Japan. Very few identity infrastructure providers are able to operate across such a broad regulatory landscape.

Third, we focus on real-world cross-border use cases rather than purely digital authentication flows. Many identity solutions are optimized for online login or platform-specific verification. In contrast, we focus on scenarios where identity must function across physical and institutional boundaries. Examples include hotel check-ins without presenting physical passports, car rentals without repeated document verification, or expedited customs processes based on pre-verified identity. The underlying principle is that once identity has been verified, it should not need to be revalidated repeatedly across different service providers.

Our primary focus is therefore cross-border mobility, where fragmentation of identity systems is most pronounced.

JH: VivaTech represents one of the most significant global platforms for technology companies engaging with European markets. It brings together enterprises, governments, and potential partners in a concentrated environment.

For Turing Space, Europe is a strategic region, and France plays a particularly important role due to its proximity to our European base in the Netherlands and its active leadership in cybersecurity and artificial intelligence policy development. It is also one of the largest institutional markets in the region.

JH: Our main objective at VivaTech is to establish partnerships and initiate real-world deployments.

We are particularly focused on institutions such as banks and hospitals in France, where identity verification is both high-volume and high-risk. These environments face significant operational costs related to fraud prevention and manual verification processes.

We aim to demonstrate how our infrastructure can integrate into existing systems to enable faster, more reliable identity verification. The emphasis is on pilot projects that allow institutions to test our technology in real operational environments.

JH: Each major technological era has reduced a specific type of friction. Transportation reduced physical distance, the internet reduced information friction, and digital finance reduced the friction of capital movement.

However, trust has remained largely unstructured and non-portable. Our objective is to address this missing layer by making trust itself transferable across systems and borders.

As AI systems and autonomous agents become more integrated into daily life, identity becomes more complex. We are entering a context where machines, not only humans, participate in economic and social interactions. This raises new questions about accountability, especially in cases involving autonomous systems such as self-driving vehicles or AI-driven decision-making.

In this context, we see the need for a trust layer that extends beyond human identity to include AI systems and machines. The long-term objective is to establish frameworks where both humans and non-human agents can be identified, verified, and held accountable within a shared trust infrastructure.

JH: We view regulatory and technological development as interdependent processes that must evolve in parallel. Technology alone is insufficient without institutional adoption, and regulation alone cannot function without technical implementation.

The European Digital Identity Wallet initiative is particularly significant because it aims to create a standardized system for storing and using verified identity credentials across all EU member states. This includes documents such as diplomas, identity cards, and professional certifications.

From a practical standpoint, this enables individuals to carry verifiable credentials digitally across borders without requiring repeated validation processes.

We are already exploring applications in the education sector. For example, in collaboration with École 18.06, the objective is to enable students to store verified certificates digitally, making them portable across countries and simplifying access to employment or further education abroad.