Introducing Credentio: Open Source C++ Library for C2PA Content Credentials from Google

Google has released Credentio, an open-source C++ library for validating C2PA Content Credentials, supporting specification versions 2.2 and 2.4, and already powering nearly 40 conformant Google products that generate tens of billions of assets. The library runs locally to avoid cloud transmission and uses significantly less memory than other solutions, making it suitable for resource-constrained applications. Credentio is available at mediaprovenance.googlesource.com, and Google plans to expand it to generate and embed credentials in the future.

As AI transparency regulations and media provenance standards come into effect around the globe, determining content provenance has become a crucial requirement for modern media applications. To support developers in building high-performance provenance tools, today we are introducing Credentio , an open-source C++ library designed for working with Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity https://c2pa.org/ C2PA Content Credentials, starting with specification versions 2.2 and 2.4. This is the same code that has powered nearly 40 different conformant https://spec.c2pa.org/conformance-explorer/ C2PA-enabled Google products to scale to tens of billions of generated assets, including images, videos, audio files, and documents across many file formats https://mediaprovenance.googlesource.com/credentio/ supported-media-formats . Credentio provides an API designed to run completely locally within developer applications. This removes the need to send media files to cloud servers for validation, which incurs privacy, latency, bandwidth, and file size limitations. With Credentio, media files never need to be transmitted back to Google or external validation endpoints while offering : Validating provenance records in large digital assets—such as multi-gigabyte video files or high-resolution imagery—presents computational and resource challenges for traditional libraries. Credentio was engineered specifically to solve these performance bottlenecks. Credentio uses significantly less memory than other solutions when validating large files. Whether validating small images or video files reaching multiple gigabytes in size, Credentio maintains a small memory footprint. This makes it ideal for integrating into resource-constrained client applications, server pipelines, or high-performance edge software. Currently, Credentio focuses on validating Content Credentials with precision. Developers can pass custom or the official C2PA trust lists directly through the API to evaluate credential authenticity against known authorities. Credentio’s key validation capabilities include: Credentio is tailored specifically for developers seeking to build performant, enterprise-grade C2PA validator products. Whether you are building desktop apps, mobile software, or backend media processing services, Credentio simplifies C2PA compliance without compromising speed or control. As the C2PA specification continues to evolve, so will Credentio. We look forward to advancing the library alongside community needs and we plan to expand Credentio beyond validation—introducing full capabilities to generate Content Credentials and seamlessly embed them directly into media files. Credentio is now available as an open-source project. You can access the repository today at mediaprovenance.googlesource.com https://mediaprovenance.googlesource.com/ . We welcome contributions from the developer community Whether you are interested in submitting bug fixes, adding new features, or optimizing performance, we invite developers, security researchers, and media ecosystem partners to collaborate with us and help shape the future of local C2PA validation.