Identity-based cryptography is a type of public-key cryptography in which the public key of a user is some unique information about the identity of the user (e.g. a user's email address). This can use the text-value of the name or ___domain name as a key or the physical IP address it translates to.
The first implementation of an email-address based PKI was developed by Adi Shamir in 1984[1], which allowed users to verify digital signatures using only public information such as the user's identifier.
- ^ Adi Shamir, Identity-Based Cryptosystems and Signature Schemes. Advances in Cryptology: Proceedings of CRYPTO 84, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 7:47--53, 1984