The Seven Laws of Identity

pHatidic writes "Something strange is a brewin' at Microsoft these days. Check out this video interview with Kim Cameron, Microsoft's Architect of Identity, about Kim's Laws of Identity." From the post: "We have undertaken a project to develop a formal understanding of the dynamics causing digital identity systems to succeed or fail in various contexts, expressed as the Laws of Identity. Taken together, these laws define a unifying identity metasystem that can offer the Internet the identity layer it so obviously requires. They also provide a way for people new to the identity discussion to understand its central issues. This lets them actively join in, rather than everyone having to restart the whole discussion from scratch."

Comments

Anonymity

[mosel-saar-ruwer]

As a card-carrying member of the tinfoil hat brigade, I prefer anonimity

Here are the seven principles, in abbreviated form [if anyone could make voodoo dolls of the creators of the PDF format, and stick pins in their - ah - whatevers, I'd be most grateful]:

1) User Control and Consent
Technical identity systems must only reveal information identifying a user with the user's consent.

2) Minimal Disclosure for a Constrained Use
The solution which discloses the least amount of identifying information and best limits its use is the most stable long term solution.

3) Justifiable Parties
Digital identity systems must be designed so the disclosure of identifying information is limited to parties having a necessary and justifiable place in a given identity relationship.

4) Directed Identity
A universal identity system must support both "omni-directional" identifiers for use by public entities and "unidirectional" identifiers for use by private entities, thus facilitating discovery while preventing unnecessary release of correlation handles.

5) Pluralism of Operators and Technologies
A universal identity system must channel and enable the inter-working of multiple identity technologies run by multiple identity providers.

6) Human Integration
The universal identity metasystem must define the human user to be a component of the distributed system integrated through unambiguous human-machine communication mechanisms offering protection against identity attacks.

7) Consistent Experience Across Contexts
The unifying identity metasystem must guarantee its users a simple, consistent experience while enabling separation of contexts through multiple operators and technologies.

I'm with you: Any WWW/Internet-ish global identity management system is gonna need a principle zero:

0) Anonymity.
All users are free to opt to retain their anonymity.

With the understanding that the subsequent rules 1-7 apply only to those users who chose to forgo their principle zero rights.