Mobile SDK overview
What the Trust Platform mobile SDK does and how it fits into your integration
The Trust Platform SDK runs a verification flow inside your own mobile app. Your backend creates a session through the Trust Platform API and hands the session token to the app. The SDK then guides the user through every step of that flow, such as document capture, biometrics and NFC chip reading, and returns control to your app when the flow ends.
It is the mobile counterpart of the web Player: the same flows and the same backend, with a native experience on the device.
The SDK does not decide the outcome. A completed event (.completed on iOS, TrustPlatformEvent.Completed on Android) means the user finished the flow, not that they passed. Your backend reads the business decision (accepted or rejected) from the Trust Platform API. See Interpret session results.
How the SDK fits into your integration
- Your backend creates a session and returns the session token to the app.
- The app starts the SDK with that token.
- The user completes the flow in the app, and the SDK reports how it ended.
- Your backend fetches the session result and acts on the decision.
The SDK handles the user's journey in the app. The API handles everything around it, so you need a Trust Platform integration that can create sessions and read results before you start. See the Quickstart guide.
Two ways to use the SDK
| Flow in the SDK | Flow in the SDK with native document verification | |
|---|---|---|
| What you add to your app | The Trust Platform SDK | The Trust Platform SDK and its DocIDV module, which brings in IDnow's DocIDV SDK |
| What the user experiences | The whole flow runs in the app. Document steps run in a webview. | The same flow. Document capture, and NFC chip reading where the flow uses it, run as native screens. |
| What your backend receives | The same session, outcome and data blocks | The same session, outcome and data blocks |
The native option changes how the document step looks and feels on the device. It does not change what your integration receives. If you don't add the DocIDV module, the same step runs in the webview instead, with no code change on your side.
The DocIDV module and the DocIDV SDK
Document verification (reading and authenticating identity documents) is delivered by IDnow's DocIDV engine. The Trust Platform SDK's optional DocIDV module runs that engine natively inside your app. It depends on the DocIDV SDK, which is also available for direct integration and is documented separately.
You only set up the DocIDV SDK as a dependency of the Trust Platform SDK, like any other dependency. Sessions, flows and results stay with the Trust Platform. The platform pages (iOS, Android) list the setup steps and link to the standalone DocIDV SDK documentation where you need more detail.
Follow progress from your app
While the SDK is on screen, it can tell your app what the current step is waiting for, for example that a document is in manual review. The SDK reports progress, not steps: your app decides what to do about it. Closing the SDK is your app's choice: a progress value never closes it by itself.
A common use is a step that can take a while. Your app closes the SDK when the progress shows a manual review and shows its own waiting screen. Your backend follows the session through step events, and tells the app when to open the SDK again. Opening it again starts a new run, so don't run two SDK instances for the same session at the same time. The second one is treated as a takeover from another device.
The progress values, and which steps report them, are described once in Track step progress. The code is on the iOS and Android pages.