I.CNTRL is a platform for individuals to manage all of their digital data from one convenient location

According to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) that entered into force on May 25th, 2018, every person has the right to several activities relating to his/her data. Such activities include getting an overview of, transferring, changing or deleting the data collected on the individual, whether by a private or a public organisation. Furthermore, the regulation places greater responsibility and burden on each organisation, who processes the personal data of the European Union citizens. This is a step towards better control over the protection of the digital identity of a person.

Belgian company idlegcy NV decided to create the world’s first web platform, which enables people to manage their digital data saved in the vast expanse of the internet or by private and public organisations centrally, from one location.

Our goal in the first stage was to complete MVP in a very short time (2 weeks), to give it over for the use of other companies of the customer (Commanity, DIA Technologies, Forte etc.). Despite a very tight schedule, we managed to achieve the goal and the initial feedback was very good.

As a result of fluent cooperation, the web app idlegcy was created, enabling persons to contact each data collector through one point-of-entry instead of making several contacts. As the project progressed, we saw the need for two distinct environments to accommodate the different needs of the individual and the organisation role.

"I.CNTRL is an app that helps a person to manage their identity. Information and data kept on you in different systems and by different organisations define how you are perceived digitally. Your identity is the total sum of these perceptions. Administration of your data and limiting their misuse is becoming increasingly important in ensuring the protection of your digital identity. This is also why we have created an app, which enables everyone to manage and check the use of their data and digital identity in a fast and convenient way from one place."

— Jan Lagast, managing partner of idlegcy

I.CNTRL.ME is a platform for individuals to manage all of their digital data from one convenient location. Via the platform, they can communicate with known organisations that handle their personal data, inquiring an overview of the data they possess, making changes to it or asking for its removal.

I.CNTRL.IT is the counterparty of .ME, a platform for organisations to handle the communication with the individuals whose data they possess. The combination of these two applications provides a convenient, central place of efficient communication. This, in turn, saves resources which would alternatively be required for manual work.

We chose the Event Sourcing pattern as the technical solution for the project as it ensures that the entire communication between an organisation and an individual is efficiently preserved. .NET Core, Vue.js, PostgreSQL and Marten were the fundamental technologies used in developing the system.

idlegcy has been a bold customer with an innovative idea and agile approach. Our cooperation was smooth from the very start and we could feel the similarity of approach: input at the agreed time, frequent communication, demos; fast and effective method without sacrificing quality for speed.

It may be said that good people from both sides got together – the strongest developers and designers from our side, and a very good product and project manager from the customer’s side. Only then is it possible to achieve the desired result in 2 weeks.

This is also a perfect example of the irrelevance of distance in software development. If the team is good the distance is never an obstacle in achieving the best results. Online project management environments, Skype and continuous access to the work results through web environments remove any physical barriers.