Introduction · 2 min read
Alternatives compared
In short Today's options either fail against AI, reveal too much about people, or leave many of them out. Kin aims to be strong against bots, private, quick and open to anyone with a phone.
Many tools try to answer "is this a real person?". Each makes a trade off between how well it stops machines, how much it reveals, how much effort it asks of people, and who it leaves out.
At a glance
| Approach | Against modern AI | What it reveals | Effort for people | Who it leaves out |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Image puzzles | Weak: AI solves them | Sometimes behaviour and browsing | Repeated puzzles | People with low vision or slow connections |
| Phone number checks | Medium: numbers can be bought in bulk | Your phone number | A code by text message | People who share or can't afford a number |
| Social logins | Weak: one person can open many accounts | Name, email, often a photo | One tap | Few, but uniqueness isn't checked |
| ID document upload | Strong, though forged and AI made documents are rising | Your full legal identity, stored by a third party | Minutes, sometimes days | People without official ID, or who won't share it |
| Iris scanning hardware | Strong | A biometric scan taken at a special device | A visit to a device location | Anyone far from a device |
| Kin | Strong: real device, live person, one face per account | Only that you're human and unique | One selfie once, then one tap | Few: works on any phone, in 19 languages, free |
Why the trade offs matter
Puzzles were cheap and private enough when machines couldn't see. Now they mostly slow down people (see The problem).
Phone numbers and social logins are convenient, but they prove that someone has a number or an email, not that they are one person. Farms buy numbers and open accounts by the thousand.
ID documents prove who someone is, which is far more than most apps need. Every stored copy is something that can leak, and many people in the world have no ID they can, or want to, upload.
Special hardware can prove uniqueness strongly, but asks people to visit a device and hand a biometric scan to an operator, which limits reach and trust.
Where Kin fits
Kin combines the strength of a liveness and uniqueness check with the privacy of a yes or no answer. The selfie is deleted within seconds, only a one way template is kept to catch duplicates, and apps and blockchains receive proofs that reveal nothing else. It runs on the phone people already have.
No method is perfect. Kin is designed so that the cost of faking many humans is high, while the cost of being one is a single selfie.
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