On 20-Jan-06, at 11:18 AM, Leslie Daigle wrote:

It is clearer, but I think the charter still needs to be
clearer about what is meant by "digital identity".  Is
the purpose to be able to access *any* stored data about
a person, or *specific* stored data?

'any'... but the relying party has to know the name of
the thing it's asking for.

In many regards, saying "any" is easier; sort out the format
for expressing attribute/values, and you're done.

Yes, that's been the plan so far. Other's can provide the
names of the attributes and the syntax and semantics of
the values. That could be done in the IETF, or in another
standards body, or by industry consortia, or just be a
free for all folksonomy kind of thing

However,
then there are issues of interoperability (is there a minimum
set of identity data that is mandatory to provide?).

Mmm, I'd say 'no', but Scott might say 'yes'. I'm reluctant
to end up down the schema rathole arguing over things
like mobilephone versus cellphone... for example.

And, if it is "any", then how is this not a directory service
with additional labelling (addresses/names/identifiers) on top?

I think that the DIX and LDAP information models will
turn out to be very similar indeed. But I don't think that's
what distinguishes user's agent from a directory service.

In the directory centric model the user informs the
relying party of their DS and the RP does a search
against the DS for the user's attributes, perhaps
using some credentials provided by the user, or
with some credentials provided to the RP by the
DS beforehand.

In the user centric model the RP requests some
data from the user who forwards the request to
their agent, selecting the data items, providing
consent for their release and then forwards them
to the RP.

Same parties, different protocol flow... with greater
user privacy. Kim Cameron's 'Seven Identity Laws',
make it pretty clear why the directory centric model
doesn't work for digital identity, and explains why
Microsoft Passport was not widely adopted outside
of the MSN universe.

John
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