Ethos credibility scores are an objective way to determine someone's credibility. This calculation will continuously change as the definition of "credibility" changes, too.

To start, the only information we have about a user is their

These two data points represent the "foundation" for a credibility score. New Twitter accounts and fresh Ethereum wallets will result in 0 credibility score earned, likely putting an account in the "Questionable" category, under 1200 ethos score.
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Older accounts from Twitter or Ethereum wallets with age help bring a user to "credibly neutral" at 1200 or more. This helps us create some barrier of entry to be credibly neutral, although still very spoofable.

Beyond the account history, a user's initial credibility score is set by who invites them. Invitations from credible people will life a new user's score up, while invitations from low credibility score have the chance to drag a new user's score down.

Inviting a user creates a bond between the inviter and invitee, tying their scores together for a specific amount of time (still TBD). This means that if a credible person invites someone, and the invitee's score goes down from their initial score, the credible person's score will also go down in some relation to the amount of the invitee.

This bond is used to discourage people from inviting non-credible Ethos users, sybils, or other potential bad actors.

Beyond simple account history and who invited you, an Ethos score is almost entirely driven by how other people review, vouch and slash them.

Positive reviews and vouches will increase credibility score, while negative reviews and slashes will remove from a user's credibility score.

All peer-to-peer mechanisms are weighted with the actor's credibility score; a user who lacks credibility will have a diminished affect when leaving reviews compared to someone who has significant credibility.

(To be implemented) Individual activities like reviews can also be magnified by community consensus. If a user leaves a review that was heavily downvoted, it will count less towards the subject's credibility score. Similarly, reviews that have significant upvoting will count as a bonus for the subject's credibility score.

This weighting helps us maintain a safe and trusted environment

Currently all credibility scores are calculated and stored offchain, with the intent of eventually moving these algorithms onchain.

When viewing a user's profile, you can click the "What does this mean?" link to take you to the credibility score definition page.

Here you will see the full algorithmic calculation of exactly how that score was determined.

Credibility scores and the definition of what credibility means are expected to change over time. Today we only pull in a few bits of information from the rest of the web, and we intend to pull in more comprehensive information about users in the near future.

What do you want to see calculated in your credibility score? What would you change about it?

Drop your recommendations at feedback.ethos.network