Hello everyone
This is the running update from the Executive Director. Have questions or comments? Suggest some added information or edits? Contact ED Colin at kantarainitiative dot org.
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I'm typing this the day after the October time slew period has ended - the two week period where Europe's clocks go back one week before North America's. The chairs of Kantara's work groups will be happy to see the back of it because inevitably we lose valuable meeting time. It seemed that we managed pretty well this Fall, with only very minor upset. Well done the Leadership Council (and the WG Chairs that comprise it) for good management .
October was a hugely busy month of travel for me personally as your Exec Director with more to come in November, tho' not quite so intense as October.
October continued the good news that September and October delivered Kantara. It's more the norm in recent months. Is it that our 10th anniversary awareness galvanized longstanding intent into definitive action? Maybe. Is it that the OMB's M-19-17 circular to US federal agencies in which conformance to NIST 800-63-3 is reinforced? Quite possibly. It's well known in federal circles that self attestation is not given much credence, and Kantara being well known as the only 3rd party assessor and approver of a transparent community developed 63-3 scheme and class of approval. Whatever it is, it is seeing Kantara staff very very busy with prospective member enquiries and proposals and requests for Kantara engagement from industry - both federal and state in the public sector along with private sector too. I do hope it won't be too long before we can share those with you.
The month began with IIW 29 in Mountain View with great demos on EduGAIN, Gluu Gateway and Transmute ID with Kantara UMA and Kantara Consent Receipt from members GEANT, Gluu and Transmute Industries respectively. There great presentations from Kantara work group participants @gffletch with his legendary UMA 101 class (so gratifying to see a full room of interested folks not seen before) and and @justin_richer on OAuth xyz that takes the profiling work done to create OpenID Connect and Kantara UMA together with other learnings, to work towards an OAuth 3.0. Fincity's Erik Lamb and I attempted to a 'Consent Receipt for Financial Services' session that suffered from projector challenges. Nonetheless all IIW materials - Kantara related and others are here.
I had to cut short my attendance at IIW 29 for the Board's F2F meeting in ForgeRock's offices in downtown San Francisco with a near full attendance in person and remote. It was an intense but fulfilling meeting as key decisions were taken on Kantara's 2020 strategic direction that were primed for the event. You'll see some structural changes coming in the form of all-member ballots that will pave the way for this next exciting phase of Kantara's development as it reinforces its mantra 'nurture, develop, operate' in its open and inclusive community participation format. Thank you all for supporting our mission, ethics, ethos and values.
After a long flight via Taipei, I arrived in Singapore for the IDENTITY WEEK ASIA conference on October 8-9th 2019. As I mentioned last month the conference organisers have made the very most of my offer to help out/fill gaps. It was very valuable with several follow ups from AsiaPac organizations interested in Kantara, one in particular looking at membership level+ engagement.
The week after LC Chair Andrew Hughes and I were in Paris representing Kantara and its Category C liaison to ISO /IEC JTC 1/SC 27/ Working Group 5 (Identity Management & Privacy) meetings. We presented results of the Study Periods for Consent Receipts and Records as well as Identity Proofing and Verification. If you haven't yet seen the breaking news on that, it is that a New Work Item - Consent records - information structure - was proposed for national body ballot. The accompanying 'working draft 0' comprises the section headings from Kantara's Consent Receipt and contributions from Kantara's original participants together with those from around the world signals 'the end of the beginning' as Andrew aptly put it. and seeing them taken up by a treaty organization like ISO sees the achievement of Kantara's core ambitions with its open specifications.
Kantara members and supporters @iWelcomeCompany 's @EstherHoeksema @ForgeRock's @GuruAllan, @NixuTigerTeam 's @MartinSandren, @Meeco_Me's @katrynadow, @iglazer and @LubnaDajani were all presenting at Consumer Identity World in Amsterdam. What a blast! A special big shout-out to @iWelcomeCompany for your invitation to a nighttime canal trip and lovely meal afterwards. Thank you!
Thankfully, my 5 week travel burst ended there and the last week of October was spent at my UK home catching up on sleep, work and 'life' in equal measure .
It won't last long however as my bag is already part-packed for Whitehall Media's IDM conference in London this coming Wednesday where I am speaking on the controversial topic of government IDM programmes. Kantara generally and myself personally have been exposed to a considerable range of them and we are constantly asked to 'contrast and compare' them as we see them from our global independent viewpoint. I suspect there will be no shortage of controversy this time either... Not that I will be around long enough to hear it because a few hours after speaking I am on Eurostar to Brussels to speak at EEMA's legendary ISSE conference in Brussels. @Ubisecure 's @osantolalla has prepared a new video of the Consent Receipt in operation with Consentua's hypothetical 'paper cup shop' demo that I will show in my introductory orientation slides, and we are delighted to welcome @NixuTigerTeam 's @MartinSandren to share the podium together with @KantarNews staff Ruth Puente presenting the 2nd call for NGI_Trust grant funding. The following week sees me in Blackpool
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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