Re: [pki-tc-chair] Widespread adoption of PKI

[Steve Hanna <Steve.Hanna@Sun.COM>]

Mark,

I will pass on your email to the PKI Technical
Committee and see what comments they may have.

My personal opinion is that Federated Identity
standards are useful and complementary to PKI.
FI can use PKI to authenticate users (or not).
FI typically uses PKI to secure communications
between trust authorities (but not always).
FI can reduce the need for large PKIs by allowing
organizations to recognize each others' credentials
(although many of the same hard issues arise, like
defining levels of trust and liability).

So I don't see FI as a panacea or a replacement
for PKI. Rather, I see them as complementary.

Thanks,

Steve

Mark Kershaw wrote:
> 
> Dear sir/madam,
> 
> I have had a brief look through your action plan and was surprised that
> there was no mention of adoption of Federated Identity standards as a way
> forward for the widespread adoption of PKI.
> 
> Admitedly at the moment these FI standards (Liberty Alliance, Saml,
> WS-Federation) do not cater for services like digital signatures but I'm
> sure this will come in time.
> 
> As a technical architect I know the cost of integrating a PKI solution into
> a product. Federated Identity if it becomes mainstream will solve most of
> these problems. From a solution providers perspective you should literally
> beable to drop any Identity Providers solution into your offering.
> 
> Any comments?
> 
> Regards
> 
> Mark
> 
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