Identity tells you who someone claims to be. Continuity asks whether the same entity is still here. The internet has protocols for identity, for encryption, for data — but no protocol for proving that a digital subject has been continuously present.
Twenty years ago, seeing a face on screen meant someone was probably there. Today, it doesn't.
AI can generate a face in seconds. Clone a voice in milliseconds. Produce video that looks indistinguishable from a real person sitting in front of a camera.
Every security system still asks: "Who are you?" Almost none asks: "Are you continuously there?"
Can continuity be made a verifiable property of digital existence — as measurable, provable, and exchangeable as a cryptographic signature?
Not identity. Not "who are you." Continuity: has the same entity been here the whole time?
We've run 576 experiments across four independent evidence engines.
We also published the experiments that failed — because negative results are results.
We asked: what if verification didn't return "yes" or "no" — but evidence? Signed, timestamped, hash-chained receipts that you can hold, verify, and link together into a proof of continuous presence.
This became CPS-0001 — an open protocol for continuity receipts. Engine-independent, self-verifying, and designed to be implementable by anyone.
MyShape does not rely on a single unforgeable signal. It combines multiple sources of evidence to measure continuity across time, modalities, and interactions — increasing the cost of maintaining a convincing forged presence over time.
What we still don't know:
These are not rhetorical questions. They define our research agenda. If any of them interests you, we'd welcome your contribution.