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Universal Manifest

Smart Home Device Management

This page describes an integration pattern for carrying smart home device identity, household privacy policies, and automation rules across IoT ecosystems using Universal Manifest.

Boundary: normative vs non-normative

Section titled “Boundary: normative vs non-normative”
  • Normative contract: Specification and Conformance
  • Non-normative guidance: this page

All smart home-specific claims, pointer names, and consent keys on this page are explicitly non-normative.

What you implement

Section titled “What you implement”

Inputs

Section titled “Inputs”
  • A valid Universal Manifest (um:Manifest) with a household or device subject identifier
  • Network-local resolver or discovery mechanism to fetch the home manifest
  • Device capable of reading and applying household policies

Outputs

Section titled “Outputs”
  • Policy-compliant device behavior (telemetry, remote access, location sharing)
  • Deterministic handling for expired or unavailable home manifests
  • Device registration acknowledgment to the home automation platform

Minimum behaviors

Section titled “Minimum behaviors”
  • Enforce TTL and re-fetch the home manifest periodically
  • Check consent keys before any outbound data transmission (default deny)
  • Ignore unknown fields safely
  • Apply household policies consistently across device types

Use cases

Section titled “Use cases”
  • Device onboarding: A new smart thermostat joins the home Wi-Fi. It discovers and reads the home manifest, applies the “no telemetry” policy, and registers itself — all without manual setup.
  • Privacy enforcement: The home manifest says home.shareUsageData: denied. Every device on the network suppresses outbound usage telemetry to manufacturers.
  • Energy management: An energy provider reads the home manifest (with consent) to enroll the household in a demand-response program, adjusting thermostat schedules during peak hours.

Suggested shards

Section titled “Suggested shards”
Shard NamePurposeKey Entity Fields
deviceIdentityDevice registration and capability infodeviceName, manufacturer, model, firmwareVersion, capabilities
homePolicyHousehold-wide privacy and behavior rulespolicyName, dataRetention, telemetryPolicy, guestAccessPolicy
automationRulesAutomation scenes and trigger configurationsruleName, trigger, action, schedule, enabled

Suggested pointer names

Section titled “Suggested pointer names”
  • home.manufacturer.firmware — manufacturer’s firmware update endpoint
  • home.assistant.config — home automation platform configuration (e.g., Home Assistant API)
  • home.energyProvider — energy provider’s demand-response or usage API
Section titled “Suggested consent keys”
  • home.shareUsageData — gates sharing of device usage data with manufacturers or third parties
  • home.allowRemoteAccess — gates remote management connections from outside the home network
  • home.shareLocation — gates sharing of household geographic location

Consumers should default to deny for any household data use not explicitly consented to.

Suggested claim keys

Section titled “Suggested claim keys”
  • home.deviceOwnership — owner, guest, or managed
  • home.networkRole — hub, endpoint, bridge, or sensor

Example fixture (excerpt)

Section titled “Example fixture (excerpt)”
{
  "@context": "https://universalmanifest.net/ns/universal-manifest/v0.1/schema.jsonld",
  "@id": "urn:uuid:1a2b3c4d-5e6f-7890-abcd-ef1234567890",
  "@type": "um:Manifest",
  "manifestVersion": "0.1",
  "subject": "did:key:z6MkpSmartHomeNetworkExampleDid",
  "issuedAt": "2026-02-26T12:00:00Z",
  "expiresAt": "2026-03-05T12:00:00Z",
  "shards": [
    {
      "@type": "um:Shard",
      "name": "homePolicy",
      "entity": {
        "@id": "urn:uuid:2b3c4d5e-6f78-9012-bcde-f12345678901",
        "@type": ["um:Entity"],
        "name": "Rivera Household Privacy Policy",
        "policyName": "default-private",
        "dataRetention": "local-only",
        "telemetryPolicy": "none",
        "guestAccessPolicy": "restricted"
      }
    },
    {
      "@type": "um:Shard",
      "name": "deviceIdentity",
      "entity": {
        "@id": "urn:uuid:3c4d5e6f-7890-1234-cdef-234567890abc",
        "@type": ["um:Entity"],
        "name": "Living Room Thermostat",
        "deviceName": "Ecobee SmartThermostat Premium",
        "manufacturer": "Ecobee",
        "model": "EB-STR-02",
        "firmwareVersion": "4.8.2.107",
        "capabilities": ["temperature-control", "occupancy-sensing", "voice-assistant"]
      }
    }
  ],
  "consents": [
    { "@type": "um:Consent", "name": "home.shareUsageData", "value": "denied" },
    { "@type": "um:Consent", "name": "home.allowRemoteAccess", "value": "denied" },
    { "@type": "um:Consent", "name": "home.shareLocation", "value": "denied" }
  ],
  "pointers": [
    { "name": "home.manufacturer.firmware", "url": "https://firmware.ecobee.com/devices/EB-STR-02/updates" },
    { "name": "home.assistant.config", "url": "http://homeassistant.local:8123/api/config" }
  ]
}

See the full fixture and implementation details in the integration source.

Next

Section titled “Next”