Identity Federations: Here and Now David L. Wasley Thomas Lenggenhager Peter Alterman John Krienke
David L. Wasley2 Agenda Brief Federation overview Higher Ed & Research federations in Europe US Federal eAuthentication federation InCommon: the US Higher Ed federation Inter-federation Q&A
David L. Wasley3 Federations Otherwise independent entities that give up a certain degree of autonomy in order to achieve a common set of goals. Working together requires Common way to express meaning Agreed upon ways to convey information Acceptable governance and trust models
David L. Wasley4 Identity Federations Authenticate locally Campus or other Identity Service Provider IdP provides trustworthy needed identity information to Resource Providers Part of access management decision Trust established through Federation Operator by means of standards, rules, and participation agreements
David L. Wasley5 Federations and Trust Requires common IdP and RP practices Federation governance roles include Establishing the rules Overseeing adherence Degrees of trust may be inherent/useful Allows flexibility in IdP and RP services What happens when trust is violated? Liability and indemnification
David L. Wasley6 Not all Federations are the same... Identity federations may have different rules or constraints on identity release For example in Europe... Some may choose to offer on-line services as well, or hold contracts for resources on behalf of members Some are for specific business purposes or industries, etc.
David L. Wasley7 And now for some examples...
David L. Wasley8 Linking Federations How can federations interoperate? Information models must be compatible Conversion may be difficult Communication protocols Gateways are hard and may break trust models Governance and trust models Must be equivalent at some level
David L. Wasley9 Governance & Linking Federations Governance sets community standards May need to enhance or redefine somewhat Must uphold inter-federation agreement Responsible for trust between federations May require stronger role within federation May affect existing participation agreements May incur new liabilities, etc. Federation services might not interoperate
David L. Wasley10 Linking InCommon and eAuthentication Higher Ed is an important community for Federal many agency applications Both have federations in place Have been working together for ~ a year Compatible technology Similar identity attributes InCommon has richer set InCommon includes privacy protections
David L. Wasley11 Linking InCommon and eAuthentication... Trust issues eAuth defines 4 levels of identity assurance InCommon allows ‘best effort’ will need to define at least one compatible LOA Privacy... Operational issues Will need to include LOA in identity assertions Will need to tag metadata, etc...
David L. Wasley12 Linking InCommon and eAuthentication... Where we are now Draft Memorandum of Agreement Draft “InCommon Bronze” requirements Based on eAuth Level 1 Three campuses already known to qualify Working on inter-federation assessment Goal Interoperability by Fall of this year
David L. Wasley13 Q & A ?