Paul,
Sharing some thoughts on physical device vs. hosted services:
Physical device:
1. The identity provider creates real world trust by providing cards on a
physical device.
2. There is strong "two factor authentication". Something you have
(card/key) and something you know (PIN).
3. If the device is lost or stolen, the feedback is almost immediate. The
security risk can be minimized by quick notification to the IDP that issued
the managed card.
4. Devices cost more than hosted service. However, USB keys are very
common and the IDP/user can load the cards to the key he/she already own.
Hosted I-Card service:
1. Hosted I-Card service is easy to synchronize and backup.
2. Cost efficient.
3. Cards are not stored on the selector. Good for shared machines.
4. The "master" pw is a bit of concern, especially regarding to "leakage"
of managed cards stored on the hosted service. Maybe there's a hybrid
solution. A possible scenario:
- The user stores the cards (self issued and managed) on the hosted
service.
- Suppose that the user has at least one managed card (issued by the
same IDP that issued one of the cards stored on the hosted
service), stored
on his/hers personal machine or an external device.
- This card can be used to login to the I-Card hosted service. In this
case the cards are backed up and synchronized regularly, but no un/pw is
involved.
- In this scenario, usage of shared machines still demands an external
device.
Tsvika
On Fri, Jul 24, 2009 at 9:37 PM, Paul Trevithick <[email protected]>wrote:
> Tsvika,
>
> I’m trying to understand your requirements. You wrote to me privately:
>
>
> - Most of the clients in this [your] project are windows XP based, and
> the login is done via browsers using un/pw. The computers are shared
> workstations with common windows account for all the students, making
> card portability a necessary demand
> - In order to avoid the usage of un/pw for card provisioning, it seems
> that the preferred solution will be to carry the cards on a physical device
> such as usb key or smart card. For security reasons the cards should not
> stay on the selector, but vanish when the external device (usb/smartcard)
> is
> plugged out.
>
>
> For Higgins 1.1 we are working on an Adobe AIR selector that uses a hosted
> I-Card Service. No cards are stored locally, so there is nothing to delete.
> Cards are stored on the server and fed to any selector that wants/needs
> them. Could that work?
>
> Now it IS true that for this to work we require a “master”
> username/password to authenticate the user to the hosted service. Is this
> what you are trying to avoid in your second bullet above? It seems to me
> that an external device will cost more than running a hosted I-Card Service
> and some people think that the external devices themselves should be
> protected by a PIN etc. to prevent others from using them directly. And in
> this case both solutions require a password/PIN—so they are equally bad/good
> in that regard.
>
> --Paul
>
>
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