Direct vs Intermediary mode
In Direct mode your organization is the party that talks to the wallet, under its own access certificate. In Intermediary mode LutraID talks to the wallet on your behalf, under its own access certificate, and forwards each result to your system without keeping it. Self-hosted installations always run Direct; the hosted service runs Intermediary.
The mode is set for the whole installation, not per verifier. It concerns verification; which certificates issuing needs is covered in Production setup.
Side by side
| Direct | Intermediary | |
|---|---|---|
| Where it runs | Self-hosted | Hosted service |
| Who talks to the wallet | Your organization | LutraID, on your behalf |
| Access certificate | Each verifier requests its own, on its Registration tab | LutraID's, associated with your organization and service |
| Where shared values go | Kept by LutraID for a limited time; you read them over the API | Sent to your result endpoint, then discarded |
| What you set up for results | Nothing extra | A result endpoint per verifier |
| Your registration | Your organization and its services | Your organization and its services, linked to LutraID as intermediary |
Which one applies to you
The regulatory role follows who interacts with the wallet and on whose behalf, not who pays or where the software runs. When you self-host LutraID and run the checks yourself, you are a relying party acting directly. When you use the hosted service, LutraID connects to wallets and requests information for you, so it is your intermediary and you are an intermediated relying party.
Choose self-hosting if the information people share must stay in your own infrastructure, or if you need your own access certificates. Choose the hosted service if you would rather not run the software or hold wallet data at all.
In the regulation and the ARF
- Article 5b of Regulation (EU) No 910/2014, as amended by Regulation (EU) 2024/1183: registration of relying parties and intermediaries
- ARF 3.11 Relying Parties, services, instances and intermediaries
Last updated: 26 October 2026.