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Claims circulating on social media suggest the UAE has tapped Avalanche technology to run its national digital identity system and digital vault. The reality is more nuanced, and quite a bit less definitive.
UAE Pass, the country’s flagship digital identity platform, does use blockchain technology to secure its document storage system. But no public documentation from the UAE government or Avalanche Labs explicitly confirms that Avalanche is the protocol powering it.
What UAE Pass actually is
Launched in 2018, UAE Pass is the product of a collaboration between Digital Dubai, the Telecommunications and Digital Government Regulatory Authority (TDRA), and the Department of Government Enablement in Abu Dhabi. The platform now serves over 11 million registered users and connects to more than 15,000 services from upwards of 350 providers.
Among its features is a digital vault, a secure repository where citizens can store, manage, and share official documents. The vault is described as being “powered by blockchain technology” in official UAE Pass materials. That phrasing matters, because it confirms blockchain is in the stack but stops well short of naming any specific protocol.
Avalanche’s actual footprint in the UAE
On December 15, 2025, the Avalanche DLT Foundation was incorporated in the Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM). The foundation’s stated mission is to support government initiatives, enterprise partnerships, and Web3 adoption within a regulated framework.
Avalanche also partnered with Xalts, a UAE-based fintech company, in 2024 to work on real-world asset tokenization.
But operating a foundation in Abu Dhabi and tokenizing assets with a local fintech partner is not the same thing as running the blockchain layer for a national identity system used by 11 million people.
Why the gap matters
If Avalanche were genuinely running the infrastructure behind UAE Pass, it would be a landmark moment for the protocol and for Layer 1 blockchain adoption by nation-states. It would also likely be accompanied by official announcements from both the UAE government and Ava Labs. None of that has materialized publicly. The UAE Pass platform’s own descriptions reference blockchain generically. Avalanche’s official communications about its ADGM foundation focus on future potential rather than existing integrations with national identity infrastructure.
For AVAX holders and traders, the distinction is material. A confirmed integration with UAE Pass would arguably justify a significant rerating of Avalanche’s enterprise credentials. An unverified claim that gets walked back could do the opposite, eroding trust at a time when the protocol is trying to build institutional credibility in one of the world’s most active blockchain markets.
Disclosure: This article was edited by Editorial Team. For more information on how we create and review content, see our Editorial Policy.
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