1. The "Stated" Well-Known Resource Identifier

This document describes the use of URIs whose path component is "/.well-known/statements.txt" and "/.well-known/statements/", and includes a template for their registration as required by RFC5785.

2. Purpose

The Stated Protocol provides a standardized format for organizational communications and collective action. Organizations publish statements on their own websites using this format, enabling decentralized coordination for joint statements, collective contract signatures, and collaborative decision-making.

The "/.well-known/statements.txt" file and "/.well-known/statements/" directory enable:

Use Cases Include: International government diplomacy, corporate joint ventures, NGO coalition building, academic collaborations, industry standards adoption, and community organizing.

The statements.txt file is served with a media type of "text/plain" and contains all statements concatenated with two newline characters as separators. Individual statements are also published in the statements/ directory as separate files named using the URL-safe base64 encoded SHA-256 hash of the statement content. Third-party platforms can automatically discover and aggregate these statements by polling known organizational domains.

3. Core Statement Types

All statements in the Stated network follow a standardized format with the following required fields:

3.1. Plain Content Statements

The simplest form of statement contains unstructured text content. These statements can contain any textual information and do not require a specific type designation.

3.1.1. Examples:

3.2. Sign PDF Statements

PDF signing statements allow organizations to digitally sign documents, agreements, contracts, and policy papers by referencing their cryptographic hash. This creates an immutable record of document endorsement and enables instant coalition formation around shared documents.

3.2.1. Example:

3.2.2. Use Cases:

3.2.3. Fields:

3.3. Poll Statements

Poll statements allow organizations to create structured voting opportunities with defined options, deadlines, and voter eligibility criteria. These enable democratic decision-making and consensus building across distributed organizations.

3.3.1. Example:

3.3.2. Use Cases:

3.3.3. Key Fields:

3.4. Vote Statements

Vote statements allow eligible participants to cast their votes on existing polls. Each vote references the specific poll and records the chosen option, creating a transparent voting record.

3.4.1. Example:

3.4.2. Use Cases:

3.4.3. Key Fields:

3.5. Organisation Verification Statements

Organisation verification statements allow trusted entities to verify and authenticate information about other organizations. This creates a web of trust for organizational identity and credentials within the Stated network.

3.5.1. Example:

3.5.2. Use Cases:

3.5.3. Key Fields:

3.6. Response Statements

Response statements allow organizations to reply to or comment on existing statements. This creates threaded conversations and enables structured dialogue between organizations within the Stated network.

3.6.1. Example:

3.6.2. Use Cases:

3.6.3. Key Fields:

3.7. Additional Statement Types

The Stated Protocol also supports the following statement types:

4. Cryptographic Signatures

Version 5 supports cryptographic signatures using Ed25519 for non-repudiation and tamper detection.

4.1. Signed Statement Format

A signed statement consists of the original statement followed by a signature block separated by "---":

4.2. Signature Components

4.3. Verification Process

  1. Extract the statement text (everything before "---")
  2. Calculate SHA-256 hash of the statement and verify it matches the Statement hash field
  3. Verify the Ed25519 signature using the public key and statement text
  4. If both checks pass, the signature is valid

5. File Structure

Statements can be published using the following standardized directory structure:

5.1. Peer Replication Structure

Organizations can periodically replicate statements from other domains to realise a decentralised platform via the following path structure:

6. Statement Validation

All statements must:

7. Implementation Examples

Organizations can implement the Stated Protocol by publishing statements at their well-known URL:

7.1. Government Agencies:

7.2. Other Organizations:

Live Example: www.rixdata.net/.well-known/statements.txt

8. Additional information

(Per RFC5785 requirements).

URI suffixes: "statements.txt" and "statements/"

Change controller: The Stated project. Contact information available at stated.network.

Specification document: This document.