Identity Management
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Identity Management A White Paper by: Skip Slone & The Open Group Identity Management Work Area A Joint Work Area of the Directory Interoperability Forum, Messaging Forum, Mobile Management Forum, and Security Forum March, 2004 Copyright © 2004 The Open Group All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners. The materials contained in Appendix B of this document is: Copyright © 2003 Securities Industry Middleware Council, Inc. (SIMC). All rights reserved. The Open Group has been granted permission to reproduce the materials in accordance with the publishing guidelines set out by SIMC. The materials have previously been published on the SIMC web site (www.simc-inc.org). Boundaryless Information Flow is a trademark and UNIX and The Open Group are registered trademarks of The Open Group in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Identity Management Document No.: W041 Published by The Open Group, March, 2004 Any comments relating to the material contained in this document may be submitted to: The Open Group 44 Montgomery St. #960 San Francisco, CA 94104 or by Electronic Mail to: [email protected] www.opengroup.org A White Paper Published by The Open Group 2 Contents Executive Summary 4 Introduction 5 Key Concepts 6 Business Value of Identity Management 17 Identity Management as a Business Control – The Security Perspective 23 Key Actors and their Roles 32 Identity Management – The Personal Perspective 36 Identity Management – The Technical Perspective 39 Identity Management – The Legal Perspective 58 Possible Next Steps 59 Appendix A: Example Risk Assessment Methodology 66 Appendix B: Additional Business Scenarios for Identity & Access Management 69 Appendix C: Example of a Trust Model 96 About the Authors 103 About The Open Group 104 List of Tables 105 List of Figures 105 Index 106 www.opengroup.org A White Paper Published by The Open Group 3 Boundaryless Information Flow™ achieved through global interoperability in a secure, reliable, and timely manner Executive Summary This White Paper explores key concepts of identity management, places these concepts within their business, personal, and technical perspectives, and proposes a set of steps to be taken by The Open Group to serve as a change agent promoting the resolution of industry-wide impediments to interoperable identity management solutions. The key concepts explored are trust, authentication, provisioning, authorization, and directories. The issue of trust is explored in terms of its intuitive and historical perspectives, along with the relationship between trust and risk. These concepts are then placed within an information technology (IT) perspective with discussions of IT trust services, delegation of authority, and informed consent. The issue of authentication is explored in terms of identity, relationships, affiliations, profiles, and roles, and is discussed in the context of assuring both verification and timely revocation. Provisioning is the stage at which trust gets translated into the notion of authority, and is explored in terms of a logical lifecycle progression in a business environment. The concept of authorization is explored from the perspectives of managing the permissions associated with IT resources and appropriately integrating this function with identity management. Finally, directories are examined in terms of their roles as data repositories, publication vehicles, and decision points. Following the discussion of key concepts, this paper examines identity management from various perspectives, including business, security, personal, and technical. The business value of identity management is discussed, both in terms of measuring the investment in identity management and of assessing the risks of either implementing an identity management system or choosing not to do so. In terms of security, identity management is presented as a potential business control that can be implemented to protect business assets. To present the personal perspective, this paper explores various aspects of individual concern, including the role of people individually and as participants in larger social contexts. Finally, technical issues are explored. These issues include the notion of core identity, a framework for identity management, and various issues related to hardware, software, and standardization activities. The paper concludes by setting forth an action plan by which The Open Group can serve as a change agent for the industry. Proposed actions include the publication of an architecture guide, development of certification programs, and focused coordination with governmental agencies and international standards bodies. www.opengroup.org A White Paper Published by The Open Group 4 Introduction “The human experience of IDENTITY has two elements: a sense of belonging and a sense of being separate.” Salvador Minuchin, 1974 Identity is defined as the quality or condition of being the same; absolute or essential sameness; oneness. Identity is what makes something or someone the same today as it, she, or he was yesterday. Importantly, identity can refer to a thing (e.g., a computer) as well as a person. Things and people can have different identities when working with different systems, or can have more than one identity when working with a single system, perhaps when working in different roles. A typical large enterprise is operated by people who join as staff (permanent or temporary), contractors, and business partners. These people are assigned roles and act in them. These roles are always “temporary” in the sense that they have no fixed duration. Eventually people either change roles or leave, creating a need for identity information to be actively managed and maintained throughout its lifecycle, frequently across multiple systems. Globalization of businesses and the increasing integration of information technologies are compounded to make diversity of identity management an obstacle to the continuing development of the enterprise’s objectives. To address this, there is a requirement for an integrated approach to identity management to automate, accelerate, and simplify identity creation and maintenance. Identity Management (IdM) is a convergence of technologies and business processes. There is no single approach to identity management because the strategy must reflect specific requirements within the business and technology context of each organization. This convergence has drivers from both the business and technology perspective to: • Enable a higher level of e-business by accelerating movement to a consistent set of identity management standards • Reduce the complexity of integrating business applications • Manage the flow of users entering, using, and leaving the organization • Support global approaches/schemas for certain categories of operational tasks • Respond to the pressure from the growing numbers of Web-based business applications that need more integration for activities such as single sign-on. Identity management security is an integral part of many organizations’ business strategies. The integration of directory and identity management is critical to linking individuals and to fulfill diverse and changing functions and roles. Typically, an individual is identified in a directory. A typical directory today contains user credentials and, in some instances, application permissions. Many directories function as the “guard” and policy enforcement point in the enterprise. It is also the starting-point for most single sign-on environments. www.opengroup.org A White Paper Published by The Open Group 5 Key Concepts Trust Trust is something we understand at a human level, but not necessarily when it comes to business-to-business relationships or to the technical systems needed to support business relationships. In this section, we discuss a concept of what trust is in a business and technical context, how trust gets translated into the notion of authority, where authority originates, and how it gets delegated. We also explore the relationship between trust and liability, since liability is a business concept that can be objectively measured, and since it is often used in making business decisions. Having established the relationship between trust and liability, we explore contractual aspects of trust and liability, since contracts form the basis of virtually all business-to-business interaction. What is Trust? The dictionary definition of trust is as follows: Trust: firm belief in reliability, honesty, veracity, justice, good faith, in the intent of another party to conduct a deal, transaction, pledge, contract, etc. in accordance with agreed principles, rules, laws, expectations, undertakings, etc. What Trust is Not It is useful to remember some things that trust is not. Trust is: • Not transitive (cannot be passed from person to person) • Not distributive (cannot be shared) • Not associative (cannot be linked to another trust or added together) • Not symmetric (I trust you does not equal you trust me) • Not self-declared (trust me – why?) Quotations “It is good to trust, but better not to.” “Trust, but verify.” “caveat empto – let the buyer beware.” Trust and Identity Before we talk about managing and using identity in computer systems, we should consider what identity is, and how