Hello everyone
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As I type this on September 2nd - Labor Day in the US and Canada - I definitely sense the pace of activity picking up, not just in our digital identity and personal data industry, but across the spectrum of the public and private sectors, to say nothing of politics! What an interesting next few months this will be 
.'m starting this month's Director's Corner from Mountain View California, on the eve of VRM/Me2B day as the prelude to Internet Identity Workshop (IIW) this week. It's tropical compared to the 3 feet of snow up in the US north and mid-west, tho' the Bay area is providing a bell-weather for the approaching fall. I'm pleased I brought a jumper for the evenings 
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The exciting news that I was portending in last month's blog has been delayed by a few weeks. Rest assured that it is coming, so please watch out for it on the website and on social media during this month.As we gather our strength for the re-start of the conference circuit through until the end of the year, I hope that you have had a break over the northern hemisphere summer, got some skiing done in the south, and are poised for what is about to descend upon us. Take a look at the sheer spread of events at which Kantara is speaking on our Events page. While on the subject of events, Kantara has been offered complimentary passes to give to five lucky members for recent months was emailed to Kantara members and then released into the public domain. It is nothing short of fantastic news (here's the announcement again if you haven't seen it) that FDX is collaborating with Kantara on the Consent Receipt to deliver an industry game-changer for Financial Services. The agreement resonated well with Twittersphere and LinkedIn too, because it pairs Kantara’s Consent Receipt specification with FDX’s open banking use cases and API standards to support enhanced financial data traceability along a similar path that delivered the Financial API (FAPI) for authentication.
It was a massive week all up, with many Kantara members and non member participants gathering in Helsinki to speak at and participate in the MyData2019 conference - @digime @Meeco_me @Datafund @OpenConsent @IDIMAndrew @Dativa4Data Janlindq @Iainh1 @PrivacyCDN and @ruthpuente Staff supporting Kantara on and off the podium. In the US, there were two other conferences last week. Consumer Identity World in Seattle saw both Kantara President @GuruAllan @ForgeRock and @Airsideout member Peter Davis include Consent Receipt and UMA in their presentations while in Tampa at FedID, I presented Trust Marks and Ratings, and helped out @IdemiaGroup on a panel talking about identity programs and their requisite standards in jurisdictions globally supported the whole week by @jharkema82, Kantara Educational Foundation Board Director Angela Rey with Staff Chris Healy. Kantara participated in a further meeting further developing the work on mDL co-ordinated by STA's Tom Lockwood where it was great to catch up with Kantara member Exponent. Exponent is in the final phase of its KIPI R&D project facilitated by Kantara and where the technical guidance and test plan for mDL was created. Also at the show was @IDme which displayed the 'proud member of Kantara' table plaque on its booth! Thank you all for supporting our mission, ethics, ethos and values.
Moving onto later this week towards the end of IIW we gather in San Francisco for Kantara's North American member's plenary on Thursday morning followed by the Board's F2F meeting setting out the plans for the coming year with new and exciting developments at Board level pending.
The following week it's IDENTITY WEEK ASIA, October 8-9th 2019 at Suntec Convention Centre, Singapore . These passes are valued at $1000 so, even if you are not yet a member, and reside nearby or are visiting during that period, join now and save! The mention of member-only benefits reminds me to note that the slate of draft standards and associated documents has arrived into the Kantara Board sub committee group from ISOwhere I have a huge few days as the conference organisers have made the very most of my offer to help out/fill gaps. .
The week after LC Chair Andrew Hughes and I are in Paris for the ISO /IEC JTC 1/SC 27/ Working Group 5 (Identity Management & Privacy) for comment and review in advance of the next round of meetings in Paris next month. Given the difficulty many folks face in engaging with national body mirror groups, Kantara offers its members a rare opportunity to preview and contribute to this work through its Category C Liaison. If this is of interest, please contact Staff.
As reported last last month, Kantara staff have updated the the website and wiki over the summer. I hope that you can see the subtle changes! These updates have taken place while they have been fielding increased expressions of interest for the assurance program.
With that in mind, we have restarted our monthly Member Spotlight series. It features members that are highly invested in Kantara and is designed to give a sense of how their association with you has been of mutual benefit. It's a pleasure to see ID.me leading us off. This, and Member Spotlights from years gone by, can be found in the Membership drop-down menu of the website.
It's not only Staff that have been working hard. The Work Groups have been very busy over the summer:
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To give you a sense of the depth and breadth of IAWG's contributions in particular, the next 'Keeping up with Kantarians' email newsletter coming out mid-month in September will highlight this Group's selfless efforts 'to lift all boats' in helping other government and industry consortium efforts. This type of support effort is the essence of Kantara's mission and the ethics and ethos it steadfastly holds.
There is member news too from the KIPI R&D program. Steve Wilson's Lockstep Technologies has completed its Mobile Device Attribute Verification (MDAV) project. It is now commercially launched as VALIDIDY - a highly innovative reprise of certificate based attribute exchange via smartphone. It has a range of great use cases from First Responder to visiting in-home Healthcare workers. Be sure to check the VALIDIDY website out and speak to Steve or Les. The other Applied R&D project by Exponent Inc, is nearing completion of its NFC and BLE protocol based MOB4PACS project in effect turning the smartphone into a PIV card with fantastic high security and law enforcement potential. Breaking News: Exponent's final phase of work has been adjusted to support the release of the mDL standard ISO 18013-5 from the ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 17/WG 10 working group. Given the mass of activity surrounding mDL, your organization may well be interested in understanding Exponent's efforts in advance of the market. If so (and if you are a Kantara member in good standing) please get in touch so I can make introductions that might prove to be very beneficial.
A brief update also from the two other Kantara branded entities:
- The Board of the Educational Foundation is meeting regularly, currently comprising the founders ISOC and ForgeRock, joined by Sal D'Agostino representing the FIRE WG arising out of the transition of IDESG's assets to Kantara last year, and 2 independent Directors but nonetheless very familiar with the raison d'etre of the Foundation, Kay Chopard Cohen and Angela Rey. The Foundation's Mission is being fine-tuned along with other policy development, while all the time looking for grant funding to provide education and guidance into various projects.
- Kantara Europe continues to be tightly focused on the H2020 NGI_Trust project's 2nd Call for Proposals which opens October 1st, the NGI_Trust consortium being the primary source of its existing funding.
This month we welcome back Individual Contributor member Ross Foard. Great to have you back with us in your individual capacity Ross...
Summer's nearly over. Let's get cracking!meetings where we present results of the Study Periods for Consent Receipts and Records as well as Identity Proofing and Verification that we are leading through Kantara's Category C Liaison.
We are then into the latter half of October and it's another Kantara member-fest with @ForgeRock's @GuruAllan, @NixuTigerTeam 's @MartinSandren, @OnethingLess's @JamesAschberger, @Meeco_Me's @katrynadow @iglazer and myself will be presenting at Consumer Identity World in Amsterdam. Use the code CIW19Kantara and get 25% off the ticket price.
Two weeks later it's the first week of November and EEMA's legendary ISSE conference in Brussels, @Ubisecure 's @osantolalla will demo the Consent Receipt and Ruth Puente who will present the 2nd call for NGI_Trust grant funding. If you haven't attended before, you won't get a better chance than this; From Sept 30th Kantara members enter code MEFSE for 35% off full ticket price €400 (nett €250 + VAT).
And that's not all. There is the emerging premier government focussed identity conference coming up in December but I will leave those till next month to treat you with.
But in doing so, it takes us full circle, as discussion around the latest twists and turns of the UK government's digital identity 'reset' where the Identity Assurance working group's industry contributions highlighted in September's 'Keeping up with Kantarians' email newsletter include the Department for Culture Media and Sport (DCMS)'s Call for Evidence., garnered significant industry comment as did my own personal opinion piece. Both are expected to be referenced in discussion at Think Digital Identity For Government in December.
This month we welcome back several Corporate and Individual Contributor members; KnowNow Information Ltd the consent management platform from the UK, Kuma.pro the US based trust framework program assessor, Telus the highly regarded telco from Canada, Uninett the Norwegian National Research & Education Network, and esteemed individual contributor Ian Glazer.
We need you all! Please volunteer to review and comment on other industry initiatives, further develop our own specifications and programs and blog on your favourite Kantara topic.
Kind Regards,
Colin
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