equitas

Equitas is a food SNAP benefits wallet built around one core constraint: benefits should only go to real, unique humans who qualify, without forcing them to expose raw income data everywhere. We use World ID 4.0 as a real eligibility gate, not just a login button. A user must pass World ID verification before continuing, and proof validation happens in the backend. Then the user uploads a paystub, which is processed into a privacy-preserving eligibility result instead of becoming a plain-text financial record.

Once eligibility is confirmed, Equitas mints a Hedera HTS NFT on Hedera Testnet that acts as a portable on-chain credential for food SNAP eligibility. That NFT is then used to unlock programmable USDC on ARC, where funds can only be used under policy controls instead of being released as unrestricted cash. The result is a wallet that feels like a debit card, but is powered by verifiable identity, tokenized eligibility, and smart-contract-enforced spending logic. We think this is a strong model for modern public-benefit infrastructure: private for the user, legible on-chain, and programmable for agencies and merchants.

Equitas is built as a native SwiftUI iOS app backed by a Node/Express service, with Hedera and ARC handling different parts of the lifecycle. On the frontend, the app manages the verification and wallet experience: World ID flow, paystub upload, eligibility state, balance display, approved merchants, and on-chain activity. On the backend, we verify World ID in the web backend, process the uploaded paystub into a proof-backed eligibility result, mint a Hedera Token Service NFT on Hedera Testnet, and then use that attestation to trigger programmable USDC funding on ARC.

Hedera is the tokenization and compliance layer. We create and manage an HTS NFT collection, mint eligibility NFTs, associate recipient accounts, grant KYC, and transfer the NFT as a real lifecycle-controlled asset. ARC is the programmable money layer. We deploy smart contracts that manage approved users, approved food merchants, benefit allowances, and merchant payments using USDC-like stablecoin logic on Chiado. We also wired the app to show real public testnet transaction links so funding and purchases can be inspected on-chain. One hackathon shortcut is that parts of the proof and account-linking flow are simplified for demo speed, but the end-to-end architecture is real and demonstrates how World ID, Hedera HTS, and programmable stablecoins can work together in a practical public-benefits product.