Abstract
The establishment of identity is a major issue for State and Federal governments today particularly in the wake of Sept. 11, 2001. Since 2000, Iowa has been developing ways to improve its identity related processes. Iowa has started an initiative to address the "gateway" to identity -- authentication. This goal is to provide a module for securing online transactions with State entities, allowing a single set of "enterprise" credentials to represent a user across all systems. By providing authentication as a shared service, end users (employees, businesses and citizens) will be have more faith in the integrity of the State's records as they continue to build greater online relationships with the State. This project does not tackle single-sign-on but, rather, seeks to establish a re-usable programming model and data to facilitate a single-credential-set so that users can manage one username and password for all State systems. Also addressed is user authorization, the application of privileges within each system. The goal in this area is to create a common taxonomy, repository, and service for applications to implement authorization. By using a common repository, applications will be able to leverage permissions data across the enterprise when the end-state "single sign-on" goal is achieved. |
