Obama Administration Devloping Internet ID Program
The Obama administration is planning to place authority for developing an Internet ID for Americans in the Commerce Department.
The news came at an event at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, where U.S. Commerce Secretary Gary Locke spoke.
Details on the plans are essentially nonexistent, but Locke and others said a lot about what the IDs would not be: "We are not talking about a national ID card," Locke said. It also won't be government controlled. The goal is "...enhancing online security and privacy and reducing and perhaps even eliminating the need to memorize a dozen passwords, through creation and use of more trusted digital identities."
White House Cybersecurity Coordinator Howard Schmidt, who also spoke at the event, said that the ID, which they refer to as "trusted identities," would not become mandatory. Anonymity and pseudonymity will remain possible on the Internet. There will be no central database and private industry will take the lead in implementation.
A vague outline for the program was released in June entitled the National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace (NSTIC). That document was as vague as this week's event; trusted identities will do good things and avoid doing bad things.
It's not surprising that details are scarce. Designing an identity that is robust, affordable, secure, easy to use, and all the other things you'd want it to be, is not easy. In fact, many of the design goals operate at cross purposes with the others. Don't be surprised if this program takes a long time to come to a deliverable, or if the deliverable is irrelevant by the time it's here.
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