# 2 Description The purpose of this document is to be the reference specification of the Identity Building Block, describing its internal architecture, its external interfaces, and how it is expected to interact with other Building Blocks. The Identity Block creates, manages, and uses a digital foundational identity (functional identity is not in the scope of this document). As a part of the overall identity system, it can be interfaced with other Building Blocks in order to realize the complete set of requirements necessary for the delivering identification services and managing lifecycle of Foundational Identities. The Identity Building Block is composed of a set of interoperable sub-components/modules dedicated to the management of the foundational identity offering different services for ensuring a trusted foundational identity for enabling related use cases. The guidance from this Building Block takes note of recognized approaches across the globe which in detail and deployment can vary greatly. These approaches will consider central, federated, and distributed (decentralized) models, the Identity Building block will remain approach agnostic and flexible for being capable to adapt to the different policies and existing countries that can exists in adopting countries. This version of the document is focused on centralized approach already taking into account integration with Functional Identity, therefoce covering the federated approach. Fully distributed approach (decentralized identity issuance or self-issuance) is not yet covered yet . This Building Block may have its own internal workflows and user interface together with its own repositories for delivering its functions. --- # Agent Instructions: Querying This Documentation If you need additional information that is not directly available in this page, you can query the documentation dynamically by asking a question. Perform an HTTP GET request on the current page URL with the `ask` query parameter: ``` GET https://identity.govstack.global/identity-1.0/2-description.md?ask= ``` The question should be specific, self-contained, and written in natural language. The response will contain a direct answer to the question and relevant excerpts and sources from the documentation. Use this mechanism when the answer is not explicitly present in the current page, you need clarification or additional context, or you want to retrieve related documentation sections.