Friday  2002-07-19   Web of Services

Digital ID week: XNS, Liberty and spam

This week saw two important milestones for digital identity.

First XNS. Two years after initial announcement, OneName has finally released its initial specs of XNS or Extensible Name Service. As "Digital Identity" (a blog on the subject) point out, OneName has been trying to become ICANN of digital identity in vain. How much traction will XNS enjoy?

Second Liberty Alliance ("Say No to Microsoft Passport"). It also released its 1.0 specs. As can be expected the 1.0 specs are not without problems but they have supports from many technology companies and, more importantly, many of their large corporate users.

To be blunt about it, current drive for digital identity is led by corporations wishing to herd their customers by tagging them. However digital identity can be a force for the common good: John Patrick (a former IBM executive) envisions spam free world thanks to authentication provided by digital identity.