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FOREWORD - Hearing the call
The telecoms industry appears, finally, to be giving identity management the attention it deserves. Lynd Morley looks at the most recent initiative
Identity management is fast establishing itself as one of the telecoms industry’s current major buzzes, yet not so long ago, an article on the subject would have been considered distinctly left-of-field in a telecoms publication. True, groups like the Liberty Alliance, formed back in 2001 by some 30 organisations to establish open standards, guidelines and best practices for federated identity management, have been attempting to engage the industry for some time now. But while the industry could not really be accused of turning a deaf ear, it did seem to be distinctly hard of hearing.
But then, the gradual recognition that, in an information economy, trust is the necessary foundation for secure interoperability, and central to the successful realisation of what might be possible on the web, brought identity management front and centre for telecoms players.
Most recently, the ITU has announced its own Focus Group on Identity Management (IdM), noting that the use of multiple usernames and passwords represents a boon for hacking, identity theft and other forms of cybercrime, and is causing substantial financial loss amounting to billions of US dollars. The ITU initiative, according to the organisation, is poised to offer a technology- and platform-independent solution.
The world's key players in IdM have taken the first steps towards a globally harmonised approach to IdM, says the ITU. Developers, software vendors, standards forums, manufacturers, telcos, solutions providers and academia from around the world have come together in the Focus Group to share their knowledge and co-ordinate their IdM efforts. The aim is to bring interoperability among solutions, by providing an open mechanism that will allow different IdM solutions to communicate even as each one continues to evolve.
Such a "trust-metric" system has not existed until now. Experts concur that interoperability between existing IdM solutions will provide significant benefits, including increased trust by users of on-line services, improved cybersecurity, and reduction of SPAM and seamless "nomadic" roaming between services worldwide.
Abbie Barbir, chairman of the ITU Focus Group, and Nortel standards adviser, explains: "Our main focus is on how to achieve the common goals of the telecommunication and IdM communities. Nobody can go it alone in this space; an IdM system must have global acceptance. There is now a common understanding that we can achieve this goal."
IdM promises to reduce the need for multiple user names and passwords for each service used, while maintaining privacy of personal information. A global IdM solution should also help diminish identity theft and fraud. Further, the ITU stresses, IdM is one of the key enablers for a simplified and secure interaction between customers and services such as e-commerce.
From now to July, the Focus Group will conduct an analysis of what IdM is used for, as well as analyse the gap between existing IdM frameworks now being developed by industry forums and consortiums. These gaps will need to be addressed before interworking and interoperability between the various solutions can be achieved. A framework based on this work is expected to be conveyed to relevant standards bodies including ITU standards-setting groups. The document will include details on the requirements for the additional functionality needed within next-generation networks (NGN).
Identity management, it seems, is at last finding its place in centre field.
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